Betting and the World Cup: tips from an expert

For decades, the FIFA World Cup final tournament has been the number one event in sports betting in terms of volume. At the level of individual matches, only the Super Bowl goes ahead of the soccer World Cup final in turnovers.

Even at the turn of the millennium, legend said that several bookmakers would always stay afloat for the next four years with the proceeds of the previous World Cup soccer matches. Although the world has changed and especially international betting has become hugely professional with the arrival of large betting syndicates, there is still room for the more “traditional” World Cup betting.

– The World Cup quite a lot inspires new or otherwise non-betting people to invest a little in their favorite team, says the betting product group manager Miikka Nurmi From Veikkaus.

According to Nurmi, it is more difficult to predict the change of game at the World Championships this time due to the special nature of the tournament.

– A lot depends on how interesting the competitions are. There has also been a certain amount of boycott sentiment. The fact that the matches are shown on television and come at a good viewing time also has a surprisingly large effect.

Even in betting, Finland has been regarded as a hockey country. Nurme has to throw quite a bomb on this, because the soccer World Cup final tournament collects twice as many substitutions compared to the ice hockey World Cup.

– It’s about the fact that the teams in the World Hockey Championships have such big differences in level that almost all the matches are not that interesting from a sporting point of view. There are no “pointless” matches in the World Cup.

Level differences narrowed?

While the bookmaker collects money from the World Cup tournament with a large volume, the bettor should basically take the opposite strategy and prefer precise strikes. The essential thing here is to see as many matches as possible and react bravely to what you see.

The nature of this tournament is in many ways completely different from all the previous ones. Even the timing of the tournament puts both teams and players in a difficult situation. The tournament, which is played in the middle of the club team season, has not given the national teams time to camp and get their game or even their collective spirit in shape.

This will probably be seen, at least for some teams, as a drop in level compared to what they are used to. At the player level, the most significant factor is fatigue.

Some of the star players may already be exhausted at the beginning of the games. The best way to see this is by watching matches. It is difficult to imagine that a team that plays poorly at the beginning will have time to improve its level by practicing a lot in the conditions of Qatar.

In general, the level differences between the national teams have narrowed a lot in recent years, and the mood of the moment and how the game works plays an even bigger role in the power relations and success of the teams than before. In turn, the material advantage is balanced by the fact that the star players of the games have probably had to grind considerably more this fall than players from smaller countries.

Can Brazil withstand the pressure?

The biggest favorites to win the games come from familiar addresses. Brazil and Argentina stand out quite clearly from their European challengers, at least in the bet market.

Of the two, I personally consider Argentina to be the more interesting case in terms of betting, despite the fact that Brazil has an unbeaten streak of less than 15 matches.

The top favorites always have the most pressure, and I’m not quite sure if they can Neymar, Richarlison and partners to carry them to the end. It is also worth noting that in the last summer’s Copa America, Argentina beat Brazil in the final (1–0).

The most interesting of the challenger countries is united Spain. Germany is not what it used to be, England is overrated and France is in perpetual danger of internal turmoil.

This time, the two most potential surprises of the tournament come from the same starting group, while both Serbia (championship coefficient 80) and Switzerland (80) have the opportunity to go far, due to their material, when they advance from the group. However, it is unlikely that both of them will qualify at the same time, because Brazil will also play with them in Group D.

Uruguay can also be a possible surprise (odds 42).

You look at the cards and the cards

In addition to normal match-specific bets, this time you should pay attention to a few special bets. In addition to the exceptional timing and the fatigue of the players, there are many other factors that make these games special.

The inconsistency of the host country certainly creates more stress for the players than usual. Although the stadiums are cooled during the matches, the hot air is also an additional stress factor for sure. Players are people too, so the general world situation cannot fail to affect at least some individuals among several hundred athletes.

All these factors together increase the probability of undesirable events (yellow cards, red cards, penalties) in these games in my opinion. When you add to this the effect of using VAR (video assistant referee) for example increasing penalty kicks, my main idea in these games is to play “overs” in almost all bets involving cards or penalty kicks.

VAR was introduced at the World Cup for the first time at the Russian Games in 2018. A total of 29 penalty kicks were awarded in that tournament, while 13, 15 and 17 were whistled in the previous three games.