The English Premier League attracts a global audience of millions. It is the most watched competition on the planet and, consequently, the most popular when it comes to gambling, with billions of dollars staked on it every year. Here are some tips to bear in mind if you want to bet on this league.

First decide if you want to bet short-term on an individual match basis, or prefer to adopt a longer-term approach, and place a bet on the finishing position of a team, or teams, at the end of the season.

The most obvious bet of all is who will be Champions at the end of the season. It is important to realise that, in football, like many facets of life, money talks. The teams with the biggest budgets can afford the best players so, although there are 20 teams theoretically that could win the League each season, in truth only a small handful have a realistic chance of success.

In fact, only 6 teams have ever won the Premier League and two of them, Blackburn Rovers and Leicester City, can be considered exceptional cases and unlikely to repeat the feat any time soon. Of the other four – Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City, and Manchester United – City are the reigning champions and have, arguably the best manager and squad, as well as the wealthiest backers, while Chelsea may push them close. Arsenal and United are currently in transition, whilst the other two members of the so-called “Big Six” Liverpool and Tottenham, can also be considered contenders, although recent history is against them. Liverpool last were champions in 1990, whilst you have to go back 57 years until Spurs finished in top spot.

Given that only one team can be crowned Champions, a popular alternative is to bet on who will finish in the top four – the Champions League places – and in what order. It is likely to be one of the six but you could get good odds on one of the “best of the rest””, like Everton or Wolves, sneaking in there at the end of the season.

Another common bet is to decide which teams will be relegated at the end of the season. Again, those with the smallest budgets are vulnerable, whilst teams that have been promoted from the Championship the season before are likely to struggle. The step up to the Premier League can be a big one, and newly promoted teams can find it tough to survive when they get there.

Betting on the Premier League winner, the top four, or the relegation candidates can either be done before the season starts or when it is already underway, although, obviously, the later in the season, the narrower the odds become as outcomes start to become crystallised.

A further popular bet is which player will win the Golden Boot for the top goal scorer in the League. This will nearly always come from one of the top teams, so check the odds on Harry Kane, Mo Salah, or Sergio Aguero.

Then there is short-term betting, which, at its simplest form, concentrates on the outcome of a single match – win, lose, or draw, home win or away victory. As with any sport, take the time to do a little research first. Understand the teams, their positions in the table, the starting eleven, and the strength of their bench, as well as their current form. Are the winning matches regularly, or are they in the middle of a rut, with confidence drained? Don’t forget to check if a team’s line-up for a match is affected by injuries and suspensions.

Another important fact to consider is how the teams in question perform at home and away. There are some sides that will always play well in front of their home fans, but are terrible on the road, whilst others find the burden of pressure of paying at home too great, and prefer to play away.

Apart from the straight bet on the outcome of one match, there are a number of other betting options available. One such bet is an accumulator where you are betting on the result of a number of matches at the same time. This may offer attractive odds, but remember you need to predict all the results accurately for the bet to succeed.

Again, do your homework and do not overload your bet – your accumulator should contain no more than three or four matches maximum.

If you are interested in longer odds, then a popular market is predicting the correct score – here you are betting not only on the overall outcome, but the number of goals each team will score. This option is available for both the half-time and the full-time score as well.

A variant on this is half-time and full-time; here you are betting on which team will be leading at half-time, and who will win the match eventually. Obviously you will get better odds and a higher pay-out if you bet on one side to trail at half-time, and then to turn the game around in the second-half and eventually win.

For those who prefer to bet on individual players, then there is the option to wager on which player will score first in a match. Look at the two line-ups and see if there is an obvious goal scorer in either side. This in an unpredictable bet which can be lost in the first minute when somebody else finds the net, or won in injury time when your man finds a glorious winner!

Finally there are the more exotic bets like Overs and Unders, and Handicap Bets.

Over and Unders means placing a bet than there will be more or less than a specified benchmark of goals in one match, with the most popular reference point being 2.5 goals. Handicap betting, by contrast, sees one team given a goal or half-goal start beforehand to even up the odds. The stronger team has to overcome the handicap before a bet on them succeeds.

There are many ways to bet on the Premier League but invest the time first to know the teams and the players before laying your first wager.