World Cup 2022 Tips: Dean Woodward gives his his best bets for the tournament
The World Cup is almost upon us and one of our best betting-minds @DeanWoodward has provided us with his best bets for the tournament in Qatar.
On the 20th November, the FIFA World Cup 2022 will take place in Qatar, filling us with twenty-nine days of tournament football. This will be the first World Cup ever to be held in the Arab World, and only the second to be hosted in Asia. Intense heat in Qatar plays a part in the timing of this World Cup with it being moved from the standard summer months, to our autumn/winter months. Thirty-two teams, eight stadiums and one trophy up for grabs, we cannot wait!
World Cup Tips
Netherlands have been placed in Group A with Senegal, Ecuador and the hosts Qatar. Netherlands have been priced at the 4/9 mark to win the group, which looks rather generous given the poor opposition.
Senegal being one of the main threats to Netherlands winning the group has been given a boost with the fact that Ballon D’Or runner up, Sadio Mane, was declared injured, although still announced in their squad for the World Cup. Without him, it will have an insane influence on their chances of qualification, which will also increase Netherlands chances of taking all three points.
If Mane isn’t fully fit, Ecuador become second favourites in this group and have performed well in qualification. They finished fourth in qualification, behind Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay, failing to beat Brazil or Argentina across the four fixtures.
This leaves Qatar as Netherlands third and final match, which should be a comfortable win against the host nation. The hosts are priced at 4/7 to finish bottom of the group and Netherlands as short as 1/3 to win the match. With Netherlands now fourteen games unbeaten, including two wins against Belgium, I fancy the Dutch to repeat their nine-point haul again like they did in Euro 2022 when grouped with Ukraine, Austria and North Macedonia
Costa Rica have been placed into arguably the hardest group of the tournament, Group E with Spain, Germany and Japan.
Costa Rica are favourites to be the lowest scoring team in the tournament and given their group we can see why. It's going to be tough to take points off any of these sides – even Japan are no pushovers.
Costa Rica aren’t by any stretch the worst side in the tournament, entering the World Cup off the back of some solid results in World Cup qualification, most notably a 2-0 win over USA. The main issue for Costa Rica is the fact two of their three games are against European powerhouses in Spain and Germany who are likely to brush aside the South American outfit in routine fashion.
This leaves a shot at glory against Japan who are priced at 4/5 to take all three points against Costa Rica, combined with Spain and Germany to take all three points, 9/4 looks very generous.
