Quick answer: about 56% of league matches in 2025/26 had at least one goal in each half, a fair price of roughly 1.78. The rate ran from 68% in the Eredivisie to 50% in the Romanian Liga I. Home teams scored in both halves in 28% of matches and away teams in 20%.
Most of what you need to price this market is the expected number of goals. We checked 7,774 matches in 24 leagues, plus five calendar-year leagues, to show how far that gets you and where team-level numbers add anything.
Data: StatPair match and half-time statistics · 24 domestic leagues, 2025/26 season (7,774 matches) · five calendar-year leagues, 2025 season (1,771 matches) · goal-count and form tests: 21,684 matches, July 2024 to 28 October 2026 · Updated: 29 October 2026
TL;DR
- Goal in both halves (GIBH): about 56.1% of matches in 24 leagues (estimate range 54.7% to 57.6%; see the method section).
- Halves: the first half had a goal in 69.6% of matches, the second half in 77.7%. The second half produced 55.5% of goals.
- By league: Eredivisie 68.2%, Bundesliga 66.8%, Scottish Premiership 64.4%. Lowest: Romanian Liga I (50.3%), Serie A and League Two (51.2%). Argentina (2025) was at 41.5%.
- Team to score in both halves: 28.2% for home teams, 20.3% for away teams. Bayern did it in 74% of their league games, Wolves in 5%.
- Total goals drive everything. Across leagues, goals per match and GIBH correlated at 0.74. In matches with exactly two goals it landed 51% of the time; with three, 76%.
- Recent GIBH form adds little. A pre-match goal expectation predicted it slightly better than both teams' GIBH record over their last 10.
How we measured it
Goal in both halves means at least one goal (by either team) in the first half and at least one in the second. Team to score in both halves means the same for one team's goals. Domestic league matches only, 90 minutes plus added time.
We used the first-half and second-half team statistics in StatPair. There is one complication: own goals aren't included in the half-by-half figures. In 1,724 of the 21,684 matches since July 2024 (8.0%), the halves add up to fewer goals than the final score.
For those matches we know the total but not which half the missing goal came in. Our main estimate assigns each missing goal to the second half with the 55.5% probability seen in the complete matches. We also show the range from the worst case (every missing goal in the half that already had one) to the best case (every missing goal in an empty half). The true figure must lie inside that range. Leagues and teams are ranked by the main estimate.
Samples: all 24 leagues with at least 150 matches in 2025/26, plus the five calendar-year leagues for 2025. Team tables need 30+ league matches (403 teams).
Goal in both halves by league (2025/26)
| League | Matches | GIBH | Goal in 1st half | Goal in 2nd half | Home team scores both halves | Away team scores both halves | Goals per match |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eredivisie | 301 | 68.2% | 79.6% | 83.9% | 39.5% | 26.4% | 3.19 |
| Bundesliga | 303 | 66.8% | 75.9% | 86.4% | 36.3% | 26.7% | 3.23 |
| Scottish Premiership | 222 | 64.4% | 75.3% | 79.3% | 33.0% | 23.6% | 2.80 |
| Croatian HNL | 176 | 61.4% | 75.3% | 75.9% | 27.6% | 24.2% | 2.66 |
| A-League Men | 160 | 60.9% | 72.7% | 80.7% | 26.0% | 27.5% | 2.85 |
| Saudi Pro League | 268 | 59.6% | 73.2% | 77.9% | 30.5% | 21.2% | 2.97 |
| Danish Superliga | 192 | 58.9% | 74.6% | 77.4% | 30.4% | 19.7% | 3.08 |
| Ekstraklasa | 302 | 56.9% | 70.8% | 75.8% | 32.1% | 21.3% | 2.74 |
| Premier League | 374 | 56.9% | 70.3% | 77.2% | 28.0% | 18.2% | 2.73 |
| La Liga | 365 | 56.4% | 69.3% | 82.0% | 26.7% | 18.7% | 2.71 |
| League One | 551 | 56.4% | 69.0% | 80.1% | 26.9% | 18.9% | 2.63 |
| Primeira Liga | 299 | 55.9% | 67.4% | 79.3% | 28.1% | 21.6% | 2.66 |
| Ligue 1 | 300 | 55.9% | 68.6% | 77.6% | 33.0% | 20.6% | 2.81 |
| Süper Lig | 298 | 55.8% | 65.6% | 78.0% | 26.2% | 21.7% | 2.65 |
| Liga MX | 264 | 55.4% | 70.6% | 76.1% | 29.8% | 21.2% | 2.96 |
| Serie B (Italy) | 388 | 54.8% | 68.1% | 76.9% | 27.9% | 18.5% | 2.55 |
| Greek Super League | 232 | 54.3% | 69.6% | 74.7% | 26.1% | 18.2% | 2.58 |
| Belgian Pro League | 300 | 54.1% | 69.8% | 75.5% | 29.4% | 18.3% | 2.68 |
| Championship | 547 | 53.4% | 69.6% | 74.8% | 23.8% | 14.9% | 2.58 |
| Israeli Ligat Ha'al | 236 | 53.3% | 64.9% | 77.0% | 26.4% | 23.1% | 2.97 |
| Segunda División | 460 | 51.8% | 67.1% | 73.7% | 25.6% | 19.8% | 2.63 |
| Serie A (Italy) | 373 | 51.2% | 64.4% | 74.9% | 23.2% | 22.0% | 2.42 |
| League Two | 555 | 51.2% | 65.4% | 77.2% | 23.3% | 18.8% | 2.57 |
| Romanian Liga I | 308 | 50.3% | 66.2% | 74.6% | 28.4% | 17.2% | 2.53 |
| All 24 leagues | 7,774 | 56.1% | 69.6% | 77.7% | 28.2% | 20.3% | 2.73 |
GIBH and the team columns use the main estimate. Goal-in-half rates use matches where the halves add up to the final score.
- It follows goals. The Eredivisie and Bundesliga, the two highest-scoring leagues, top the table, and Serie A (2.42 goals) sits near the bottom. The exceptions come from the halves: Scotland ranks third on 2.80 goals because both halves were lively, while the Israeli league (2.97 goals) ranks 20th because only 64.9% of its first halves had a goal.
- The two halves are close to independent. Multiplying the chance of a first-half goal by the chance of a second-half goal gives 54.0%, very near the 54.6% we see in complete matches. A goalless first half doesn't make a goalless second half much more likely.
- The first half is the bottleneck. 30.4% of matches were goalless at half-time, compared with 22.3% goalless after the break. If you're looking for a reason the bet loses, it is usually a quiet first half.
- The big five averaged 57.1% (1,715 matches). The 22 leagues we can compare with 2024/25 averaged 55.9% that season, almost the same.
Calendar-year leagues (2025): MLS had a 59.1% GIBH rate (437 matches), the Brasileirão Série A 52.6%, Brazil Serie B 49.2%, the J1 League 43.8% and Argentina's Liga Profesional just 41.5% (434 matches, 1.94 goals per match). In Argentina the first half had a goal in only 56.3% of matches.
Goals per match decide most of it
Here is the GIBH rate by the number of goals in the match, using complete matches from all seasons:
| Total goals | Matches | GIBH | If goals were placed at random |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 4,861 | 51.0% | 49.4% |
| 3 | 4,421 | 76.1% | 74.1% |
| 4 | 2,824 | 88.8% | 86.6% |
| 5 | 1,549 | 95.0% | 93.0% |
| 6 or more | 991 | 97.7% | - |
"At random" means each goal falls in the second half with 55.5% probability, independently of the others.
Goals spread across halves slightly more evenly than chance: in two-goal games, both arrived in the second half 30.7% of the time and both in the first 18.2%. Over 1.5 goals came in 76.0% of matches, and 73.3% of those over 1.5 matches had a goal in each half (5,349 matches). So GIBH is mostly "over 1.5, minus the games where the goals bunch together".
Using a pre-match goal expectation
For each match where both teams had played six or more league games, we built a simple expected total: the home team's goals scored and the away team's goals conceded, averaged, plus the same the other way round, all using season-to-date figures.
| Expected goals (season-to-date averages) | Matches | GIBH | Actual goals per match |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 2.2 | 2,019 | 47.1% | 2.28 |
| 2.2-2.5 | 3,789 | 51.4% | 2.48 |
| 2.5-2.8 | 5,161 | 55.7% | 2.67 |
| 2.8-3.1 | 3,406 | 60.0% | 2.89 |
| 3.1-3.4 | 1,663 | 62.0% | 3.05 |
| 3.4 or more | 803 | 65.9% | 3.29 |
That is a range of about 19 points from the quietest matchups to the most open ones. It is not xG (StatPair doesn't provide xG); it is built from goals scored and conceded.
Does recent GIBH form help?
We averaged both teams' share of GIBH matches over their last 10 league games. Matchups where that share was 70% or more produced a GIBH 61.9% of the time (1,931 matches), against a 59.7% league baseline. Matchups under 40% produced 47.7% (1,354), against 50.0%. That is about two points either way. The correlation with the outcome was 0.088 for the form figure and 0.115 for the expected goals figure. Goal expectation is the better starting point; recent GIBH streaks add little on top. For a fuller look at how halves differ, see our first half vs second half statistics guide.