Formbook: horse racing and sports blog

Although England don’t have a good record against the Portuguese, Sporting Index have still got them as favourites to win by 0.3 to 0.5 goals on their “Supremacy” market. This is influenced by the fact that Portugal are missing both Deco and Costinha through suspension. However, Big Phil has proven to be Sven’s nemesis twice before in the big competitions. He managed to beat England with 10 men in Shizuoka in 2002 when Ronaldinho was sent off. Two years later he successfully changed formation in Lisbon after Rooney was forced off through injury. With the influential Figo available, and Ronaldo looking likely to figure, Scolari could dash English hopes for a third successive tournament.

On top of this, Scolari has never lost a World Cup match. In fact, the 11 straight victories he has enjoyed with Brazil in 2002 and now Portugal is a record. His current team has also not lost a match (competitive or friendly) since the Euro 2004 final. On the other hand, England are still unbeaten in Germany. Although Sven’s team have only scored five goals so far, Portugal have only managed six. On the back of this, and the other low-scoring matches in this round, Sporting Index predict a total of just 2.1 to 2.3 goals will be scored in 90 minutes.

So in this battle of wits between the Swedish iceman and Big Phil, formation will be key. In the Ecuador match, Carrick made more passes than any other England player, (66 in total, 57 successful). He also spent significantly longer on the ball (196.9 seconds) than anyone else - Ashley Cole is in second place with 156 seconds. However, Carrick didn’t make a single tackle (Terry topped that list, with 5). In fact, England’s three central midfielders only made one between them.

Although the boy wonder Rooney had the lowest possession of any England player at just 84.5 seconds, he looks ready to start scoring. With his Goal Minutes priced up at 14 to 17, you’d expect to see plenty of punters betting high at 17 minutes. Lampard may have missed an impressive 18 shots so far, but he’s doing something right to have had so many goes and England’s top scorer in the qualifiers has got to get lucky sooner or later; he is available at 11 to 14 minutes. Even though Pauleta has been quiet by his standards (many tipped him for the Golden Boot), his spread of 10 to 13 also looks tempting.

Bookings are likely to figure prominently in the betting as well. So far, there has been an average of 5.6 yellow cards per match across the tournament. England have been given seven cards over four matches, whereas Portugal have an impressive 18. Although this includes nine cards earned in their very negative match against Holland, a “grudge” match like this could get feisty. Sporting Index has a price of 68 to 72 points on their Bookings market (10 points for a yellow card, 25 for red). Having seen Portugal v Holland settle at 220 points (four red and 16 yellow cards), there won’t be many punters betting low on Saturday.

Total Tournament Yellow Cards

At the start of this tournament, Sporting Index predicted the total number of yellow cards shown in all 64 matches was 270 to 280. As more and more have been dished out, this price has moved up and up, currently standing at 326 to 330 (276 cards shown after 54 matches). With 10 matches to go, there’s still plenty of time to take an interest in this market.

Have you worked out who’s going to win the World Cup yet? Argentina have overtaken Brazil as favourites with Sporting Index, and pushed England in to third place. If you’re looking for a slightly different bet, check out the World Cup markets at Sporting Index. We’ve taken a look at some of their prices (see preview below) - new clients can claim a big free bet:

£200 World Cup Bet for New Clients

Open a Sporting Index account*, place five sports bets (each with the potential to win and lose £20) and claim a free £200 per goal bet on any live World Cup match.**

*Credit and suitability checks, **terms and conditions apply. See site for further details about an account with Sporting Index. Sports spread betting involves a high level of risk and you can lose more than your original stake. It is not suitable for everyone so please ensure that you understand the risks involved and only bet with money you can afford to lose. For full details of these offers, and apply for your Sporting Index account, click here

World Cup - Outright Winner

Unlike a fixed-odds Outright Winner bet, with Sporting Index you can still make money even if a team fails to progress beyond the last sixteen. At the time of writing, their prices for some of the top teams are:

Argentina   50 - 53
Brazil      47 - 50
England     38 - 41
Germany     36 - 39
Spain       34 - 37
Italy       29 - 32
Holland     28 - 31
Portugal    23 - 26
Ukraine     18 - 21
Sweden      17 - 19
France      18 - 21

Points are awarded for how far a team progresses:

Winner = 100pts, Runner-Up = 75pts, Losing Semi-Finalists = 50pts, Losing Quarter-Finalists = 25pts, Last 16 = 10pts, All Others = 0pts.

To bet on this market, you bet high or low depending on whether you think a team will do well or badly.

How it all works

For example, let’s say you want to bet on England’s chances in the World Cup. You have a choice to make:

Will England get more than 41 points (ie reach the semi-finals),

OR

Will England get less than 38 points (ie no further than the quarter-finals)

Let’s assume you think that we’ve not seen England’s full potential yet, and you want to back them to progress. In this case, you would bet high at 41 points, for a stake of eg £2 per point.

If you’re right, and England lose in the final, they would be awarded 75 points. As you bet high at 41 points, you would win (75 - 41) x £2 = 34 x £2 = £68.

Clearly, you would win even more if England earn 100 points by lifting the trophy: (100 - 41) x £2 = 59 x £2 = £118.

If England just make it to the semi-finals, then you’re still in the money as they would earn 50 points on this market. You would therefore win (50 - 41) x £2 = 9 x £2 = £18.

However, it can go the other way. Another key injury, or some bad decisions by Sven, and the team could be flying home early. If England fail to get past the quarter-finals, they would only earn 25 points. As you bet high at 41 points, you would lose (41 - 25) x £2 = 16 x £2 = £32.

Yellow Fever - how many more cards?

This tournament has seen a record number of yellow cards, as FIFA clamps down on a raft of measures. You can bet on bookings in a couple of ways with Sporting - either on a match, or the total for the whole tournament.

Match Bookings

So far, there’s been an average of approx 5.4 yellow cards per match. Interestingly, although the sample size is small, the matches involving Eastern European or African teams are averaging higher, at around 6 yellow cards per game.

Sporting Index award 10 points for a yellow card, and 25 points for a red card (max 35 points per player). So 5 yellow and 1 red card would be worth 75 points. This means that if there’s a match with plenty at stake and you think that both teams will really get stuck in, you would bet high on Sporting’s Bookings market.

E.g. Sporting Index quote 58 to 62 points, which is to say they think there will be 6 bookings. If you think it will be a “physical” match, then you would “bet high” at 62. Alternatively, anyone predicting a quiet day for the ref would “bet low” at 58. How much you win or lose depends on how right or wrong you are, as per the previous examples above.

So for Sunday’s match between England and Ecuador, bear in mind their form. England have picked up just 4 yellows in 3 matches, and Ecuador 6 so far. This would suggest a low number of bookings when they meet, compared to Portugal v Holland that evening. Both of these have picked up 9 cards each in their group matches, which suggests an average of 6 per match. With more at stake in the knock-out rounds, anyone betting high will hope for a repeat of the Ivory Coast v Serbia match - 7 yellows and 2 reds meant the bookings were worth 120 points!

Total Tournament Yellow Cards

At the start of this tournament, Sporting Index predicted the total number of yellow cards shown in all 64 matches was 270 to 280. As more and more have been dished out, this price has moved up and up, currently standing at 320 to 324 (205 cards shown after 40 matches). With 24 matches to go, there’s still plenty of time to take an interest in this market.

Hopefully that’s given you something to think about. For all the latest prices and to apply for your Sporting Index account, click here

Although England haven’t beaten Sweden since 1968, Sven has stated his desire to end this run as part of his legacy to the team. Sporting Index fancy his chances of doing it, with England priced up as favourites to win by 0.3 to 0.5 goals. The Total Goals spread of 2.3 to 2.5 is quite low though, probably in anticipation of a draw; all England need to top the group.

Sweden need a point to guarantee their place in the last 16, and except for Ibrahimovic (injured) they’ve got a full strength team. Four of their players are on one yellow card, including both strikers (Allback and Larsson). Elsewhere, Wilhelmsson and attacking midfielder Kim Kallstrom provide Sweden with further threats.

England will start Rooney and Owen together, with Crouch rested and Gerrard replaced by Hargreaves. This will give Lampard the freedom to do what he does best, and he’ll be worth watching as he tries to give himself a birthday present - he’s 28 on the day. Finally, ref Massimo Busacco is a well-regarded Swiss official but has already shown a red card in this tournament. He produced two yellows and a straight red against Ukraine when they were routed by Spain. He was also the ref that sent Rooney off in England’s 1-0 loss to Northern Ireland in the qualifiers. Sporting expect at least five cards, which sounds high but there have been a lot shown so far…

Hopefully that’s given you something to think about. For all the latest prices and to apply for your Sporting Index account, click here

It’s hard to see past the current holders and favourites. Despite Edmilson, Brazil have few injury queries and will be fielding the Fab Four of Ronaldinho, Adriano, Ronaldo, Kaka. They are also fielding 3 of the top 4 favourites for the Golden Boot. The word from all the bookies is that punters are piling on Brazil to win. Their “Total Tournament Team Goals” spread is the largest of any team at 10.6 to 11.4 goals. With a Group containing Australia, Croatia and Japan it’s unlikely many people will bet low at 10.6.

Having said that, Adriano has had a fairly average season at Inter. Looking more closely at the Golden Boot market, in spite of Ronaldo also having an indifferent season in Madrid (and looking a touch on the flabby side) he does play further forward than Ronaldinho. The Bucktooth Wonder was also top scorer in 2002 and in Brazil’s qualifying campaign.

With a lot of home support England are slight second favourites on Sporting’s Outright Winners market. France, Argentina and Germany are very close behind in the betting. On the goals front, England are predicted to score a total of just 8.6 to 9.2, and this looks generous compared to Argentina’s spread of 7.4 to 8. Unsurprisingly, Owen is favourite to be top England goalscorer. However, despite Crouch looking as ungainly as a Boris Johnson tackle his price has been moved up by the number of punters backing him to come good this summer.

A lot has been made of France’s ‘98 World Cup and Euro 2000 victories and then their failure at 2002 and 2004. They also had a poor qualifying campaign in a mediocre group with 5 draws in 10 games. However since Zizou, Makelele and Thuram came out of retirement they’ve looked a lot sharper. Despite an apparently “dodgy keeper” their first XI also boasts Henry, Trezeguet, Viera and Gallas.

The difference for France this time is that other than a strong Switzerland, who France drew twice with in the Qualifiers, they only face Togo and South Korea. Even if they are slow starters and have a hiccup they should get out of the group and enjoy a relatively easy draw.

Sporting’s pricing of Portugal, who have also been gifted a relatively easy Group, suggests that they fancy the Euro2004 runners-up to do well.

If you’re looking for an upset then Iran are worth keeping an eye on, as they are underrated by everyone. Ali Karimi - Asian player of the year - is a regular for Bayern Munich, and Ali Daei has notched up an impressive 107 international goals. In a group with Portugal, Mexico and Angola, they could shock everyone and snatch second place.

Sporting’s Total Tournament Yellow Cards market has a spread of 268 to 278. This spread is 20 points higher than four years ago, and 40 higher than eight years ago. It looks like all the recent FIFA announcements about stricter referees have been heeded by the punters pushing the price up. The price has also moved up on the “Dodgy Keepers” market (how many times a keeper will punch the ball), the spread has risen to 98 to 104 punches.

Hopefully that’s given you something to think about. For all the latest prices and to apply for your Sporting Index account, click here.