Do Football Bets Include Extra Time?

If you’re a relative newcomer to the world of sports betting, you might already have been tripped up by betting sites’ rules regarding extra time in football.

And if you’re just getting into Matched Betting, without having followed football before at all, it can be even more confusing.

In this article, we’ve broken down all you need to know about extra time in football matches - when it happens, why it happens, and what effect it can have on your football betting.

What Is Extra Time And When Does It Happen?

There are a few different ways additional time can be added to the end of a football match. All of them could be thought of as ‘extra time’ in a literal sense - extra time after the normal 90 minutes’ match time - but the term ‘extra time’ means something quite specific.

Extra time is used in the event of a draw in matches where an outright winner is essential - for example, in the knockout stages of a championship. If at the end of the normal match the teams are tied, two additional 15 minute periods of play are added on, with the hope that they will decide the outcome of the match.

What’s the difference between extra time and injury time, stoppage time or full time?

• Injury time refers to time played at the end of 90 minutes to account for any time lost during the match to injuries or other halts in play. Because it’s used to make up for halts in play during the original 90 minute timeframe of the match, it is counted as part of ‘regulation time’ (i.e. the normal span of the match), even though the clock will have run past 90 minutes.
  
  Somewhat confusingly, it doesn’t refer only to time lost due to injuries, but halts in play for any reason, including substitutions, disciplinary penalties (yellow or red cards), arguments with the referee and even lengthier goal celebrations.
  

• Stoppage time is simply another term for injury time - but arguably a less confusing one, given that the name includes all possible reasons for play to be paused, not simply injury.

• ‘Full time’ refers to the normal span of the match - so 90 minutes, plus any injury/stoppage time. It does not include extra time, or penalty shootouts.

Why Does Extra Time Happen?

In many football matches, a draw is a perfectly acceptable outcome, and a fairly common one - approximately 23% of football matches end in a draw in the English Premier League.

Source: Footy Stats

However, in the later stages of competitions, a draw cannot be the eventual outcome of a match, as only one of the two teams playing can progress to the next round. Football authorities therefore have to ensure there is a way of finding a winner.

Over the years, there has been a lot of debate and controversy surrounding the best and fairest way of determining a winner in the event of a tie, and various methods have been tested historically - including, on a couple of occasions, a coin toss.

It’s preferable, though, for the winner of a match to be determined by normal play - so having 30 minutes of extra time at the end of the match allows both teams another chance to make that happen. Only if extra time fails to determine the winner will the match progress to a penalty shootout, which can usually be relied on to decide the match.

How Does Extra Time Affect Football Bets?

As a rule, bets on football matches are settled on the basis of the result of full time, with extra time not included. This can be quite surprising for people who are relatively new to football betting, and who might have assumed that a bet would be settled according to the final outcome of the match.

However, standard football betting on the outcome of a match is in the 1 X 2 format - meaning that the possible outcomes are a win for team 1, a win for team 2, or a draw (represented by an X). In matches where extra time comes into play, a draw cannot be the eventual outcome, which would render the normal betting format unworkable for those matches.

The majority of football bets, then, will be settled on the basis of the full time result - including single bets, bet builders, and 2UP and win bets - and you can usually find confirmation of this in the terms of a bookie’s site, and in the terms of an offer, as shown below.

It does therefore make sense that a bet on a football match can be settled according to a completely different result than that which determines the final outcome of the match, even if it may initially seem unfair to the average punter. The important thing is to be aware that this is how your bet will work, to avoid any nasty surprises when the score of a match comes in, especially for matched bettors.

What Bets Will Include Extra Time?

It’s worth noting that certain types of bet do include extra time when they’re settled by the bookie. Specifically, bets that relate to a team going through to the next round of a tournament, or outright winner markets, have to include extra time, as they rely on there being an overall winner and cannot be settled on the basis of a tie.

There can also be extremely specific markets available to bet on, such as ‘Extra Time Correct Score’, which clearly have to include extra time - and, in this particular case, only include extra time (the extra time correct score market refers exclusively to goals scored during extra time). If you’re ever confused about the terms of a bet, the best thing to do is check them on the bookie’s site so you know for sure what you’re betting on.

How To Account For Extra Time When Matched Betting

If you’re just getting started with Matched Betting, and worried about making a mistake, the most important thing is simply to be aware of the terms of the bet you’re making, and to be sure that you find the correct lay market at the exchange.

Generally speaking, match odds bets will not include extra time, either on the bookie site or at the exchange. If you want to place a bet that hinges on the final outcome of the match, you’ll need to look for a market with wording along the lines of, ‘To go through to the next round’, ‘To lift the trophy’ or ‘Outright winner’ if betting on the entire championship.

During major championships, you may well encounter offers that can be affected by whether a match is decided in extra time. For example, a bookie offering a £5 free bet every time England win a match during the Euros or World Cup will very likely only be counting the full time result. So, if England score the deciding goal during extra time, you will not, annoyingly, receive a free bet (I experienced exactly this situation during the 2024 Euros myself and was indeed quite annoyed about it).

What Other Methods Can Be Used To Break A Tie?

Over the years, a number of different methods have been tested to break a tie in important matches.

For some time, replays were the standard option - but ran the risk of the result being, once again, a tie. In 1965, Liverpool and Cologne played each other in three successive matches, all of which ended in draws. The result was finally decided by a coin toss, with Liverpool coming out the victors.

Clearly, this was not the optimal way to settle a tie between two very evenly matched teams.

In the 1990s, a Golden Goal rule was introduced, to try to encourage bolder play during extra time, which was often nervy and defensive, and therefore not very entertaining to watch. Rather than the full period of extra time being played regardless, the Golden Goal rule meant that, as soon as one team scored, the match was over and the scoring team had won.

Unfortunately, the Golden Goal rule only exaggerated the problem it had tried to solve, with players becoming even more cautious and defensive. Briefly, a ‘Silver Goal’ rule was tested in 2002, where if a team were winning at the end of the first 15 minute period of extra time, they would be the winners - but ultimately it wasn’t enough to solve the problems that the Golden Goal rule created. After this failed experiment, FIFA returned to standard extra time rules.

If extra time fails to force a winner, a penalty shootout will normally be the last resort to decide the victors. Penalty shootouts are widely disliked, as they’re perceived to have too much to do with luck and to bear too little similarity to normal football - but they are at least effective when it comes to deciding a tie.

Important Games Decided By Extra Time

In the later stages of a championship, when the very best teams in the world are putting everything into the fight for a cup, it’s not surprising that matches often go to extra time.

In the 2024 Euros, having scraped through to the knockout stages somewhat unconvincingly, England were tied against Slovakia at full time in their round of 16 match - and only just, with England’s equalising goal coming 91 minutes into the game. To everyone’s relief (well, in England, anyway), England scored again just minutes into extra time, securing their place in the quarter finals.

In a tense World Cup finals in 2010 meanwhile, the Netherlands and Spain were tied at 0-0 at full time. The game became increasingly fractious, with twelve yellow cards and a sending off, but there had still been no goals after 25 minutes of extra time. However, with only four minutes to go before a dreaded penalty shootout, Spain finally scored, winning themselves both the match and the World Cup trophy.

Summary

The rules surrounding extra time in football sound confusing when you first encounter them, but they make a lot more sense when you understand the reasoning behind them.

For matched bettors - or any other bettors, for that matter - the most important thing is to be clear about whether extra time is included in a bet when you place it, to avoid any unpleasant surprises when it’s too late to change your bet.