Euro 2008 15 Nov

Euro 2008 qualifiers

There are only seven games to consider tonight and a few of them look absolutely unplayable, either because they are so one-sided or because it is near impossible to get accurate team news and injury reports.

Portugal are massive favourites against Kazakhstan while Ireland are also huge favourites against San Marino. In both matches you are simply betting about how far the teams will win by and unless you know that they both want to score a massive number of goals then these games are best left alone. Finland are 1 ¾ goal favourites over Armenia and that’s another game I would advise leaving alone. Finland should of course win this by a decent margin but they were held to a 0-0 draw in Armenia. That might point to a bet on the visitors but the Armenians are poor travellers – they lost 3-0 in Serbia and 2-0 in Cyprus in their last two road trips – and no bet has to be the advice.

The only game I think that looks worth a bet is to take Israel off a level handicap at home to Croatia. Israel is the most improved side in the ‘European’ section yet the bookies seem not to have picked up on this. Their domestic league has become far stronger in recent seasons and a lot of this has been achieved with home grown talent. They have not lost in their last 13 internationals and are in a good position to qualify for Euro 2008 with seven points from their first three games in Group E. Tel Aviv is a tough place for teams to come to and while Croatia beat England 2-0 in the last round of games I think that said more about England’s poor form than Croatia’s excellence. Klasnic is injured for Croatia and they have struggled against poorer sides than this, drawing in the World Cup against both Australia (2-2) and Japan (0-0). Israel look like good value to me off a level handicap and I will be having a two point bet on them at 2.24.
[Croatia won 4-3]

The other games are not exciting at all.

Friendly games

Betting on international friendlies is almost always a fast route to losing money. Most teams have little motivation to win and managers use these games to test out new formations. Bookies love these games because they are meaningless and there are usually some pretty random results. You only have to look at the England team’s results in these matches to get a good example of why they are a betting minefield – they have won just five of the last 16 international friendlies they have played.

If you have a bet remember that the home side almost always has a big advantage and also keep checking team news to see who is being rested – the big name international teams will very often not be playing their top players so as not to irritate the big name clubs who want those players to be fit and healthy for league and Champions League duties.