Campeones, Campeones, Ole Ole Ole! Spain are World Cup Champions!

At last Spain became World Champions. And they truly deserve it, cause they were the best team in past 2 years with all the rest just trying to match them. The same as Barcelona on the club level. Spain have on of the most talented squad of all time in football history, with such great players as Xavi and Iniesta. I have some comments about this match, just as I saw it.

Spain – Netherlands 1:0 (AET)

The tension was so great that it was felt even a 1000 km in front of the TV. Although I didn’t expect any other scenario of the game.  The tactics of Oranje became clear from the first minute – play tight, crush technically Spain players catch Spaniards on the counterattacks. Dutch played really roughly, on the verge of red card, if status wasn’t not final, then we would have seen the red card in the first half  (De Jong karate strike in the chest of Alonso). The second half was held in the same nervous struggle, but there was plenty of opportunities to score goals, but both teams lacked finishing touch. In extra time began sparkly, but then I think both teams frightened themselves by their own attacks, the game had already been in the state of who will score first goal, will be a winner. On controversial points in extra time – there was penalty on Xavi, despite the fact that this extra time of the Final of the World Cup, second yellow card for Heitinga was right decision, Robben should have been shown a second yellow also, for a goal after the whistle blown, but … all disputes and controversy was forgotten after “illusionist” Iniesta, a specialist in holywood ending goals  in extra time (just remember his goal in the return match with Chelsea on 92nd minute). Overall, the match was pure joy to watch, as it was a clash of 2 equally strong teams, who both deserved to be there and to win it. In the end, Spain was more lucky one and they managed to score a crucial goal just before penalty shoot-out. By the way, penalty shoot-out was the only thing I wished not to happen in the Final and thanks God we’ve had a winner that was determined by great football move… Bravo Espana!  I’ll miss big football festival greatly!

Video highlights (will be update through the week):

Raw Video: Spain Cheers WC Win CORRECTS

Video Highlights of the match (FIFA.com)

Spain erupts in nationwide fiesta as ‘dream comes true’

Celebrations in pictures:

World Cup 2010: Paul The Octopus and the unlucky punter

Interesting article about Paul the Octopus and some crazy fan who placed 500,000 bet on Germany to progress to the Final. Quoted from www.goal.com website.

“Spain’s defeat of Germany was a resounding victory for La Furia Roja and soothsayer Paul the Octopus, who maintained his 100% winning record. However, the punter who staked €500,000 on a German win is unlikely to be joyous today after losing the largest World Cup bet in history.” Read full article here >>>

One of the highlights of this article is odds on which this fan placed a bet, 1,91. Whereas before the match Germany were slight underdogs and at normal bookie he would have got even surely. He would have lost nonetheless, but still. By the way the name of this heavy PR’ed bookie is William Hill.

“Goal.com’s official betting partner Titan Bet have installed Spain as favourites to win their first World Cup on Sunday. Vincent del Bosque’s side are priced at 1.53 with the Netherlands valued at 2.35.”

Without any comments compare it to Pinnacle’s 1.595 on Spain and 2.580 on Netherlands! Betfair has also it priced much higher – with Spain 1.60 and Netherlands 2.62. Do you see the difference?

Free Bet on World Cup winner. Vamos la Furia Roja, Vamos Espana!!!

8 teams left and it is time to make a selection of the winner of 2010 World Cup. 5 teams has realistic chances of taking World Cup title. Favorites are still the same, it’s Brazil. But I will be picking Spain for the title with a nice odds 3.830 @ Pinnacle.

Brazil……….3.370
Spain………3.830
Argentina….5.800
Germany…..8.100
Holland…….9.250
Uruguay…..19.000
Ghana……..48.000
Paraguay….61.000

Betfair trading: 2 successful results from yesterday

2 matches and both of them appeared to be successful in terms of trading @ Betfair. Both of them had similar patterns in the beginning, but completely different after the 1st goal was scored. Netherlands was a lucky overs result with 3rd goal scored with final touch. Brazil game made 2 quick goals, proving that one of my new rules appears to be the right one.

Basic rules for my yesterday’s trades were as follows. Pre-match bet – LAY of over2,5 goals. 15-20 min BACK of over2,5 goals. Then if the goal is scored in 1st half, then wait for 10 minutes and then LAY the bet. The reason for implementing such rule is simple – odds don’t rise that fast in first 10 minutes, especially when it is an early goal like in Netherlands game. But at the same time your trading can be destroyed by a 2 back-2-back goals, like in Brazil’s match case. I will develop this rules with time, but for the time of being it worked.

Here are the my moves in the Brazil – Chile match.

World Cup. Day 18. Brazil and Netherlands hot favorites to progress

Sorry for keeping quite for a weekend, had a football tournament to play, so I didn’t have a time to post my thoughts. Unfortunately whenever you don’t post your thoughts, all the picks come through. Uruguay win in regular time, Ghana (0) in regular time, Germany (0) in regular time + to progress and finally Argentina (-1) – almost all of those bets came through, only Ghana was pushed result as it finished 1:1 in regular time.

Today we have both Brazil and Netherlands as hot favorites in their pairs and both of them should come through into quarterfinals. Their opponents are both with some problems. Chile will have to deal without 3 first choice players (Gary Medel, nicknamed “Pitbull”, Waldo Ponce and Marco Estrada) who are suspended and Slovakia spend a lot of emotions in their final game against Italy. Both of the favorites had little trouble coming out of the group and last games played relaxed, saving some energy for the 1/8 finals. Dutch team has another massive boost in the face of Roben, who will be starting the game. While Brazil welcomes back Kaka, who comes after suspension. All the facts lead us to taking both team wins for a multiple or 2 single bets on asian handicap (-1).

World Cup. Day 14. When we will see real Dutch team?

Despite 2 wins out of 2, I can’t quite say that Holland have shown even 50% of their capabilities. They have great potential and I think that today we have a chance to see them in real action. I would tip Holland to go deep in the tournament, but they have 1 potential problem, in the quarterfinals they will most probably face Brazil team and that’s always a hard match for them. Italy will try to make sure they qualify, most probably from 2nd place. Paraguay will make sure today they will finish in 1st place, to book a meeting with Denmark or Japan in 1/8 final. Denmark – Japan always a risky match, there is so much at stake there.

I will post today only my picks for todays matches, those I’ve picked @ blogabet also.  Won’t have any time to make odd comparison, but believe me, I still can say that one of bookmakers will have them the best of all. Don’t even have to name it!

Cameroon – Holland

Pick:  Over 2.5
Stake:  8/10   Odds:  2.09
Bookmaker:  Pinnacle

World Cup. Day 13. Will England meet France in the airport?

Crucial day today for 2 pre-tournament favorites, Germany and England. Both are in the must win situation and both will play group leaders. I am not worrying about Germany, cause they played nicely in both of the matches, despite 2nd match loss to Serbia. But England showed absolutely nothing here in South Africa and if Slovenia will be able to build up on the performance against USA, then England can pack their bags and meet France in the airport on the way back to London. I doubt that this will happen and England will squeeze through, but still that was unthinkable situation before the World Cup began. 2 more interesting games, USA – Algeria and Serbia – Australia, with all the teams withing a chance to qualify.

Moreover I will offer a free bet on the 3 matches, including today’s Germany and England wins. 10 Euro Free bet @ Pinnacle for a Germany, England and Spain wins in their last games in the group.

Germany, England and Spain to win their last matches

It was long time I was planning to do that and here we come. I offer a Free bet on last round double bet that looks a dead certain one. 3 teams that are considered as favorites of the group pre-tournament, but facing a must-win situation right now. That’s of course Germany, England and Spain! Odds for the triple bet is 3.057.

Terms of Free bet:

1. Register account @ Pinnacle, clicking here
2. Make a minimum deposit (20 euro)
3. Place a bet on Germany, England and Spain triple (up to 10 euro); Odds 3.057
4. If the bet is lost, I will refund it on 30th of June through either PayPal or Pinnacle refund

It’s as easy as 1-2-3! I am 99% sure that this multiple will come through, but Free bet offer is a kind of insurance in case if Ghana will put a massive fight or England will play the same as against Algeria, or Chile will put big resistance against Spain (they surely can, as Chile is considered as good quality side, they were 2nd best in South America qualifiers behind Brazil) . Everything can happen in football.

I will mention that this offer is free of any rollover conditions, so if you wish, you can cash-out immediately after this 2 matches results. It depends on you, its only yours decision.

Betting on Sports must be fun!

World Cup. Day 11. Will Spain answer their critics in match against Honduras?

This was one of the most shocking World Cups as far as I can remember. Low scoring matches, most of the teams don’t intend to attack, playing it safe, therefore shocking results, with England and Italy playing draw with some minor teams. European Champions Spain faced other problem in first game against Switzerland, they played nicely, but simply couldn’t break 10 men defense. In fact I think that 7 Suisse players didn’t cross the midfield in that match, sitting back in defense. I understand, that if they would go out and play open football, then they would get similar result like South Korea got from Argentina. But still, I like when both team are wishing to play football, not when one team only creates and the other only destroys. That day destroyers proved to be  stronger then creators. Today I doubt that this will repeat.

So today I have chosen many options from which to chose on whom to bet. I will return to my analysis with Best Value bets (BVB), Most risky bet, Most safe bet and I will add Poor value bet. Here are all bets I have chosen from today’s 3 games.

World Cup. Day 10. Brazil to face challenge from Ivory Coast

Taking vacation during World Cup is a must do thing. Unfortunately I couldn’t do that so I missed all the matches yesterday, including entertaining late night game Cameroon – Denmark. It proved to be an attacking affair between this 2 teams, something what we miss so much at this World Cup.  Today we will have a big match between 2 great teams. Brazil are always joy to watch, while we can say the same about Ivory Coast team. This should also be an entertaining match, cause Brazil isn’t pragmatic team and refuse to believe that they will play the way Netherlands played in 1st half. Ivory Coast is also capable of showing good attacking football. Even if this match will finish 0:0, I guess it won’t be boring. The 0:0 draw against Portugal wasn’t anything but boring. In other fixtures Paraguay will try to build on the performance they showed against reigning World Champion.