Across the Leagues Betting Advice - Email Archive Content

World Cup, Day 1: Qatar v Ecuador - and a 159/1 acca...

Sunday 20th November 2022

In Across the Leagues – World Cup 2022 today:

  • Dual Forecast – 159/1 acca…
  • Qatar v Ecuador – preview & picks…
  • Budweiser Player of the Match alert…

World Cup, Day 1:

Qatar v Ecuador – and a 159/1 acca…

Welcome to Day 1 of your exclusive Across the Leagues World Cup 2022 service. I’ll be in your inbox on every matchday. Covering all 64 games over the next four weeks…

Ready for action…

  • The tournament kicks-off this afternoon with the hosts Qatar taking on Ecuador at 4pm, UK time. I’ve got a stats selection for you in the preview below

I’m ready for action. World Cups only come along once every four years. I woke up before my alarm clock this morning, after spending much of Saturday evening hunting out betting markets and prices online. See below for my latest findings.

You have my word…

I’m not going to promise to make you a millionaire by Christmas. But what I can guarantee you is this: I’ll be working hard every single day to provide you with a useful, unique, informative betting service for Qatar 2022 – and as many winning bets at value prices as I can find…   

Covering the entire tournament with stats-based bets, big-odds selections, in-depth analysis, and little-known angles.

All with the goal, of course, of helping you make money from the biggest sporting event on the planet. As well as enhancing your enjoyment of the competition…

Big prices in the book…

One certified route to excitement & entertainment is to see a massive-odds bet selection give us a good run for our money. Read on for one such pick today. And we’ve already got a couple in the book…

Here are the links to the research & prep I’ve sent out over the past week, all available on the Email Archive on the Across the Leagues website (under the Pick & Analysis tab on the top menu):

15th Nov:
Group Winners – is it really this easy?
Why I’m NOT backing all eight odds-on favourites to win their Groups

16th Nov:
The magic number – and a 50/1 shot…
World Cup Top Scorer stats - and our first bet of the tournament

18th Nov:
The Golden touch at 18/1 and 80/1…
My pick for the Golden Ball award – and an outside chance for Top Scorer

19th Nov:
I’ve made my predictions…
Tournament ‘wallchart’ predictions – with 19/1 and 33/1 picks…

19th Nov (2):
Update – De Bruyne at 125/1 and 80/1…
An update on the Top Scorer prices and Each Way terms…

  • Another price update for you: tournament Outright Winner picks Belgium are now available at a best-price 20/1 Each Way with BetVictor, Betfred, and  Unibet (Each Way terms: 1/2 odds 1-2 places)

Dual Forecast acca at 159/1…

On to today’s advice now…

In yesterday’s predictions article I shared with you my tournament ‘wallchart’ selections, attempting to map out the entire World Cup from the group stage through to the knockouts and the final. Read more here.

Working from that batch of selections, one big-odds approach I like the look of for a speculative play is for an acca in the Group Dual Forecast markets…

The Dual Forecast asks you to select the two teams to qualify from any given Group. Unlike the Straight Forecast market, which asks for an exact order of 1st & 2nd place. The Dual Forecast pays out if you pick the two teams that qualify from their respective group, in any order, 1st or 2nd place.

Here are my selections – with the eight-fold rolling up to a very exciting price for the full house:

Group A – Netherlands & Ecuador

Group B – England & USA

Group C – Argentina & Poland

Group D – France & Denmark

Group E – Spain & Germany

Group F – Belgium & Croatia

Group G – Brazil & Serbia

Group H – Portugal & Uruguay

Not all bookmakers allow you to combine these in a multiple. For example, SpreadEx and Sporting Index Fixed Odds have the best prices overall, but only accept singles in this market.

I’ve listed below the best odds for the acca at bookies whose online bet-slips accept multiples for Dual Forecast bets. With a top-price 159/1 for the eight-fold acca at Paddy Power & Betfair Sportsbook.

Group Dual Forecast acca – Paddy Power online bet-slip:

Budweiser Player of the Match alert…

At the last World Cup and at Euro 2020, we had some great success targeting the markets for the Official Man of the Match award…

For Qatar 2022, the official FIFA award is called Budweiser Player of the Match.

The key thing to note about this is that the award is voted for by the public, in-play, via the official website and app. In the past, this has overwhelmingly led to the ‘obvious’ star player/ winning goal-scorer getting the prize…

For example, if Ecuador beat Qatar today, and their all-time leading scorer Enner Valencia gets the winning goal – then I’d say he’s going to be a very good shout to get the most votes. You can only bet pre-match, unfortunately – otherwise this really would be a goldmine…

Here’s the Player of the Match page on the FIFA World Cup site. You can vote once per match.

And here’s some more info from the FIFA site. Voting takes place ‘between the 60th and 88th minute’ (and re-opens in Extra Time during the knockout stage).

The next thing you need to know is where you can place these bets. I’ve been shopping around, and so far we have three mainstream bookmakers to shoot at for this market…

‘Man of the Match’ – Bet365, VBet, William Hill (settled by official FIFA announcement)

‘Official FIFA Man of the Match’ – Skybet

At Euro 2020, the likes of Paddy Power & Betfair Sportsbook and Ladbrokes & Coral also got in on this market. I’d expect one or two more bookies to join the party in the days to come.

Qatar v Ecuador

4pm, BBC One

Match odds: Qatar 27/10 (3.7), Draw 21/10 (3.1), Ecuador 5/4 (2.25)

Now for a look at the opening game…

The hosts have won four Friendlies in a row in the build-up to their first ever World Cup match. But formbook stats are hard to come by for Qatar, and it’s all been a bit secretive, with games played behind closed doors – and talk of penalties being freely dished out (it’s 12/5 with William Hill and Betfred for a penalty in the match today, and 2/1 in general).

I’m more inclined to put weight behind Ecuador’s stats here. If their recent form-line continues, then we’ll be looking at a low-scoring game this afternoon. I’ve gone for Ecuador 1-0 on the official FIFA predictor game. That option is a 5/1 favourite in the Correct Score betting, and 11/2 (6.5) at best with Bet365. Chris Sutton at the BBC has also gone for Ecuador 1-0.

  • Ecuador have kept 6 clean sheets in a row – with 4 x 0-0 draws, and 2 x 1-0 wins
  • Under 2.5 Goals bets have paid out in 9 of Ecuador’s last 10 games

Under 2.5 Goals is the favourite in the Under/ Over Total Goals market, at 1/2 (1.5) and 4/9 (1.44).

I want to tread a little carefully on the opening day or two, and get a feel for the tournament. One stat I’m keen to follow today though is Ecuador for the most corners:

  • Ecuador have won the Most Corners in 9 of their last 11 games 

That includes ‘Corners Match Bet’ payouts against the likes of Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico. With Ecuador covering -1 and -2 Corner Handicap bets with room to spare in eight of those nine games.

Ecuador are odds-on to win the Most Corners (also called the Corners Match Bet), with Paddy Power & Betfair Sportsbook a best price of 4/6 (1.67), and 1/2 (1.5) elsewhere. For more like Even Money (2.0), I like Ecuador -1 Corner Handicap, which pays out if they win 2+ corners more than Qatar.

TODAY’S PICKS

World Cup 2022

Groups – Dual Forecast:

Qatar v Ecuador

Corner Handicap markets also available with Bet365, BetVictor, Betway, Unibet, Boylesports.

I’ll see you tomorrow, with three games on the Monday schedule. Including England v Iran, and USA v Wales.

P.S
Want to get in touch? You can email me direct at:

oliver@acrosstheleagues.co.uk

Enjoy the football…

Best wishes,

Oliver Upstone

Oliver Upstone

Across the Leagues