Bet365. Coral. Ladbrokes. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, these are the established names in the bookmaking industry that people know and, consequently, trust. I believe that all industries, regardless of the service that they offer, are made better by competition. That’s why I’ve been so delighted to witness the explosion of online betting companies in recent years, meaning that the bookies that have been around for years are having to up their game in order to stay ahead of the pack.
ComeOn is just such an example of a company that has thrived since the betting industry went digital. From seemingly out of nowhere they have been able to compete with the big boys, bringing excellent coverage and exciting offers straight to their customers. That’s particularly useful for the likes of you and I because they know they need to offer something extra in order to firstly attract and then maintain our business. Here I’ll tell you all about what they’ve done to impress me and why I believe you should have an account with them.
Key Features
I’ll start my review by looking at what they have in the way of features. After all, they can have the best odds in the world but if you’re the sort of person that likes to bet in-play and they don’t have a live betting feature then it’s entirely pointless. With that in mind, what better place to start?
Live Betting
What I like about ComeOn’s approach to their live betting portal is that they don’t shove it down your throat. What I mean by that is that it is very much a real thing and is an important part of their overall betting coverage, but don’t feel the need to have it dominate every aspect of their site. Some competitors put live betting front and centre of their main homepage, with links to live events included pretty much everywhere you look. ComeOn go for a somewhat more subtle approach, locating halfway down the homepage and offering occasional links elsewhere.
A look at the main sportsbook homepage will present you firstly with a list of the most popular bets, something that I’m a big fan of. I often log onto my betting accounts in order to place a specific bet, so it’s handy to see what everyone else is betting on in case I’ve somehow missed something big. Anyway, you scroll down past the popular bets and that’s where you’ll find the list of in-play bets available. They’re tabbed into different sports, so you’ll get football, then horse racing, then tennis and so on. These tend to be organised depending on the popularity of the sport, so if there’s a big basketball competition going on, for example, then you’ll see some bets for that available.
The breakdown of what you can bet on is nice and clear here, too. As well as the stage the event is at (so something like 2nd half: 48:23), you’ll also be told what the score is, what the odds are for one team or player to win, what they are for a draw, what the odds are on the other player and how many more bets you’ll be able to look through if you click on the event itself. Right now I can see that Istiklol Fergana are playing football against FK Yangiver and that there are another 40 bets I could take other than just on the outcome of the match. There are an additional 69 bets in the friendly between Podbrezova and Liptovsky Mikulas, though that’s only six minutes into the game.
When it comes to the sort of things you can bet on, you’re looking at the likes of next team to score, which team will win the first-half, total goals, goals per team and so on. The different types of bet you can place will obviously differ depending on the sport you’re looking at, so tennis will have things such as who will win the next game or the next set, what score a player will win a game by and the exact game score within an individual set. I like ComeOn’s approach to live betting very much, not only because they don’t try to force it on you but also because there are plenty of options and they’re drawn up very clearly.
Live Streaming
At the time of writing, ComeOn don’t offer live streaming of any sort. That’s disappointing, to be honest, and one of the few things that lets them down as an online bookmaker. If I’m being truthful then I’d have to say I haven’t found it to be a total deal breaker. As I’ve said before, I always recommend that you have a good number of betting accounts in order to take advantage of the various offers that are out there. That also allows you to place your bets with one bookmaker and live stream events with another. If ComeOn’s odds are the best you can find or there’s an offer that you simply have to take advantage of then that’s a way around their lack of live streaming.
It’s worth noting that ComeOn are hoping to bring in live streaming as a feature in the future. When I asked someone on the live chat they couldn’t give me a specific date or even a ball park amount of time, but given that most of their online competitors already offer it and they’re therefore likely losing some business because of it, I’d be surprised if it wasn’t sooner rather than later. I mention this so that if you go and have a look on their site and there’s a live streaming option you don’t come back and complain!
Cash Out
They may not have live streaming, but ComeOn are otherwise pretty much bang up-to-date with the various offers that make online bookmakers such an attractive option for bettors. That includes the ability to Cash Out your bet, meaning that you can either limit your losses or else claim some winnings before the tide of fortune turns. The option is available on most single and multiple bets, though not on ones placed with free bet tokens. You’ll also find that you can’t Cash Out system bets, Asian handicap bets and tricast or forecast bets. It’s pretty easy to figure out how to Cash Out a bet you’ve placed. You simply need to head to your betting slip and you should see the option to do it on any eligible bets within there.
If your withdrawal request is successful then you’ll get the money immediately, but as is often the case with Cash Outs there’s no guarantee that it will be. Sudden movements in the market can mean that your request won’t go through and it’s always worth remembering that ‘live betting’ is rarely actually live. For that reason it’s not unheard of for the bookmakers to have information available to them that you don’t have but might become clear as events transpire. Say a goal is given in a football match, as an example, but in real time it’s disputed and the referee spends a couple of minutes consulting his assistants etc. In that instance you may get a refusal on any Cash Out request that you make.
Football
Bookmakers know that the football market is one of the biggest in the world. For that reason they want to attract the football betting crowd and most companies therefore work hard to ensure that they handle it in the best way possible. Naturally, ComeOn are no exception to that rule.
Coverage
If you were paying attention when I wrote about the in-play betting options earlier then you’ll no doubt have noticed that I mentioned matches between Istiklol Fergana and FK Yangiver as well as Podbrezova and Liptovsky Mikulas. Had you accused me of making the names of those teams up then I think you’d have had a good argument, as even now I can’t be sure they’re real. Now just because it sounds like a bookie has made up the names of football teams that doesn’t necessarily mean that their coverage is as good as it can be. Yet in this instance I think it’s a very good reflection of just how deep ComeOn’s coverage runs.
If you head to the list of sports on the lefthand side of their homepage and click on ‘Football’ then you aren’t immediately transferred to a new page. Instead you have to first select the country that you want to see the football coverage of and there’s a list of 37 different options. As if that wasn’t enough, one of the options is for ‘Europe’ and includes the likes of the Champions League and European Championships, whilst another is for ‘International’ football and that features events such as the Confederations Cup and World Cup. Even within the individual countries you’re presented with leagues to chose from. Denmark, for example, brings up the First Division, the Denmark Cup and the Superligaen.
Now on the one hand this need to delve into the specifics of each country’s leagues and the various events therein does make the whole experience somewhat fiddly. Yet on the other hand it demonstrates a depth of coverage that is hard to match even by some of ComeOn’s best known rivals. Away from the individual leagues – and it’s worth a mention that they offer odds on the Premier League, Championship, Leagues One and Two and the National League as far as England is concerned – you can also find odds on events based around football in general. What I mean by that is that you can place a bet on the next manager of a particular club, say, or on transfers if the window is open.
Odds
As they’re a relatively new bookmaker when compared to some of their competitors, I often find that ComeOn’s football odds are some of the best out there. That isn’t always the case, but more often than not I’ve found them to be decidedly competitive and even better than rivals on a good number of occasions. Put it this way, if I’m looking to put a big bet on on a football match then they’re one of the first bookies I check. They’re definitely worth having on your list, in my opinion.
Horse Racing
Football remains the biggest sport when it comes to the number of people that watch it, but horse racing will always be a firm favourite of those that enjoy a flutter with the bookies. That’s why ComeOn’s coverage of the Sport of Kings is up there with the best of them.
Coverage
Click on the ‘Horse Racing’ tab in the list of sports on the lefthand side of the site and you’ll find that ComeOn’s coverage is split into two distinct sections. Do you want to bet on UK and Irish racing or international races? If you’re limiting yourself to the UK and Ireland then you’ll find all big courses covered as well as most of the smaller ones. Right now, for example, I could have a bet on racing at Newton Abbot, Brighton, Beverley, Ballinrobe and Leicester. Tomorrow the likes of Worcester, Bath and Carlisle come into play, too. If you’re a fan of ante-post betting then you’ll be pleased to know that you can place money on the likes of the Grand National and Cheltenham Festival well before time.
When it comes to international betting then you’ll be looking at horses racing in events at Longchamp, Melbourne and Del Mar in California. You can also place ante-post bets on the likes of the Melbourne Cup, the Prix de lArc de Triomphe and The Everest in Australia. I’m not going to say that their coverage is flawless and there’s no doubt that the lack of live streaming of horse racing will disappoint a number of people, but I do think that it’s very good and worth checking out if you’re a horse racing fan who isn’t desperate to watch each and every race live.
Odds
Much like with their odds on football games, ComeOn’s horse racing odds are often very competitive. For example, I’m looking at the odds for the 4.45pm race in Brighton this afternoon and ComeOn are offering 5/1 for a horse that William Hill have on at 9/2. In the 5pm race at Beverley William Hill are offering me 5/2 on a horse that ComeOn have at 11/4. Most of the other horses are the same with both bookies, but those slight advantages on a couple of horses give you an indication of how you can increase your winnings slightly by going with the bookmaker that isn’t quite as well known.
Other Sports
I wouldn’t go so far as to say that ComeOn’s coverage of other sports is comprehensive, but it’s at least as impressive as most of the big boys and actually offers far more than some of the other new kids on the block. Sports you can bet on include:
- Trotting
- Motor Racing
- Handball
- Gaelic Football
- Chess
- Ice Hockey
As I say, not exactly all-encompassing but if you’re the sort of person that isn’t satisfied with being able to bet on trotting, handball and chess then I’m not sure what to say. If you’re a huge fan of betting on less mainstream sports then I’d be quick to recommend that you open several accounts with numerous different bookies, mainly because none of them tend to cover every single sport you can think of.
About ComeOn
ComeOn is owned and operated by the parent company Co-Gaming Limited. They launched in 2010 but got their UK Gambling Commission licence in 2015, so they’re a relative baby when you put them up against the industry’s behemoths like Paddy Power or Coral. They are based in Malta for tax purposes and have aimed themselves squarely at the British betting market right from the word go. One of the ways they did that was by sponsoring Accrington Stanley not long after ‘the club that wouldn’t die’ returned to the Football League, ensuring that they got their name out there to the football loving community.
There isn’t a whole heap more to tell you about them, to be honest. What I like about them as a bookmaker is also, perhaps somewhat unsurprisingly, what they’re most proud of. They promise to make things as easy as possible for their customers by ensuring there’s ‘no Shakespeare’ in the language they use and ‘no Einstein’ in the offers they have. The site is nice and clean, with everything easy to understand when it comes to their betting. They’ve also adopted a ‘single wallet’ approach, meaning that you don’t need to transfer funds about the place if you want to have a bet in their online casino straight after having a flutter on the horses. That sort of simplicity appeals to me, meaning that I’m quick to use them even if they don’t have the same name recognition as some bigger bookmaking brands out there.
