If you’re still unsure of who and what to back at Euro 2012, don’t panic, as we have it covered for you with our free Euro 2012 Tips Guide. Download your copy here now.
In it we have grilled 7 of the best football tipsters around to help dig out some rock solid betting advice for Euro 2012 from proven experts. Outright winner, group stages, dark-horses and most over-rated teams are all explored in-depth.
You can get the full set of advice in our Free Euro 2012 Tips Guide but to give you a taster, we have an overview of what each expert is backing in some of the most popular betting markets.
Euro 2012 Outright winner
We start off with the most popular market – outright winner, where we have reigning European and World champions Spain heading the betting as best-priced 3/1 favourites to retain their crown.
To get a sense of where the value likes for the outright market, we asked SBC’s elite panel of professional tipsters just who they think will be lifting the cup in 2012.
Phil Brown of Betting Laying Club sees Germany as the most likely winner, a view supported by Greg Gordon of Scottish Football Bets. Greg can see a Germany triumph due to their “Great set-up and attention to detail, dynamic tactics and a winning mentality.”
A few of our experts do unsurprisingly lend their support to favourites Spain with both Goran Trpevsi of Goran Winners and Form Lab Black sweet on them. Alex Coldicot from Form Lab explaining why he sees the Spaniards being victorious again:
“They’re the best team in the world with a massive amount of experience and with Barcelona and Real Madrid failing to make the Champions League final their players should be fresh and hungry for further success.”
Matt Love of Football Elite takes a very different view to the rest of our experts with regard to the outright market. He believes the market to be wide open and when asked who he seen as the most likely winners he replied;
“Not got a clue to be honest! Could be 1 of 8 or 9 teams. If you forced me into picking 1 I’d say France at 12/1 are probably the ones I’d go for.”
Matt believes it is hard to find an edge within the tournament and has admitted it won’t be a betting opportunity for him. He explains:
“In all seriousness I think a lot of caution has to be applied. If you are betting in this event ask yourself why. Is it because you truly feel you have an edge? Or is it just because it’s a big, high profile football tournament?”
This is a completely understandable stance from Matt. After all anything can happen in such a short tournament and luck will play a massive part.
Euro 2012 Group Stage advice
If you are looking to kick off the tournament with some solid early bets then you could do a lot worse than having a punt on some of the group stage markets.
Phil Brown sees the best value bet of the tournament centring on Group B as he predicts:
“The winner to come from Group B (Holland, Denmark, Germany, Portugal) is available at 11/8, which offers excellent value.”
Matt Love also finds his best value bet in the group stage. He reckons:
“Poland to qualify from their group at 4/5 looks a decent bet to me.”.
Its a view shared by Goran Trpevski, who also fancies Poland to do very well in their group:
“The closer we get, the more I think of Poland and that’s because they really are in a poor group and not because they are so good. Greece have a poor squad, Czech Republic are nothing special and Russia is good but far from great. Piszchek (Dortmund) is one of the best right backs in the World, whilst Lewandowski comes fresh from a killer season in Dortmund and so does Kuba. With the fanatical home fans behind them, winning this group won’t be impossible and at the time of writing you can get around 4.00 (3/1) on that’s value. I also like a bet on Poland winning this group and Russia coming second at odds of around 8.00 (7/1).”
Greg Gordon has banker material on his mind as he specifies that the 4/9 offered by Victor Chandler about Italy obtaining less than 6 points in their group must be taken. He names it as his best value bet of the tournament as be believes its a tournament too soon for Cesare Prandelli’s side.
Summer of Footballs’ James supports those doubts over Italy in the group stages. James says that a “Lay of Italy to qualify from group C at 1.6s” is a very sensible one in his eyes.
Euro 2012 Dark horses
If you are wondering who is worth a punt at a decent price as a ‘Dark-Horse’ then our experts also supply the ammunition you need with plenty of agreement on where shocks may be found.
Goran Trpevski has both Poland and Croatia down as his own dark-horses:
“Croatia are one to watch if they click, although Poland as the home team with fanatical support in a poor group can surprise a few.”
Greg Gordon agrees with Poland as a likely outsider, saying;
“Poland can defy their FIFA Ranking (65) by using home advantage to qualify from a really poor group.”
Adding weight to the host’s claims is Matt Love who goes on to say:
“Poland. Why not? Home advantage, not the toughest group in the world and well organised with a core of semi-decent players. Everything is there for them to have the potential to have a bit of a run.”
And to round off the Poland love-in, Form Lab Black also agree:
“Poland. They have an easy group and have home support, plus they have three of the highly successful Borussia Dortmund team in their side and have a chance of making the semis.”
So there you have it, some pretty comprehensive dark horse support for Poland from the experts!
Euro 2012 Most overrated team
Finally, we asked our panel who they saw as the most overrated country. Exactly, which team’s price may be too short or who doesn’t have the necessary credentials to cut it at Euro 2012?
Form Lab Black were none too keen on France:
“Not overly impressive in qualifying, they were the joint lowest scorers of all the group winners with just 15 goals and won just two of their last five qualifying games. Furthermore, they’ve taken just two points from their six group games at the last two major tournaments.”
Goran Trpevski, however is looking a bit closer to home for many of us as he says:
“England have had this position in the last 30 years and it’s the same again as the bookies do a great job here fooling the general public. Most websites are in English, the EPL is the most followed league, which all combined brings a false picture or the overall quality of the English national team.
England are not bad, no one is saying this, but why every tournament are they one of the favourites? Italy also come with into the tournament with an overrated squad. We must remember though that in cup competition anything can happen. If this was a league of 38 games I can tell you that England and Italy would finish 30 points behind Spain. This, however, is a cup so it’s really up for 5-6 teams to take it and will depend on a combination of form and luck alongside one-off bits of skill and referee decisions.”
Our other experts also plumped for both Spain and Italy as two teams likely to be over-rated, with both Phil Brown and Matt Love feeling the Spanish at 11/4 offer previous little value.
Greg Gordon was far from keen on the Italians stating that they are “ A team in transition, with no pace in midfield and an unsettled line-up. Its a tournament too soon for Cesare Prandelli’s side”
Find out more in our Free Euro 2012 Tips Guide
If you want to read even more from each of these 7 tipsters, including their full rundown of best bets for the tournament then pick up our free Euro 2012 tips guide.
Keep an eye out for even more Euro 2012 tips appearing on the blog in the next few days, including the amazing Fink Tank’s best value bets for the tournament.