Find the best World Cup betting odds

So how will this affect your betting? Well, firstly the huge spike in interest and potential to lure in new customers will mean betting sites will flood the market with all kinds of promotions and offers. Some of these will offer great value odds in exchange for signing up to them and others might offer nation specific boosted odds. Ladbrokes are a good example of the latter (we can predict a host of England promotions alongside Chris Kamara’s face this summer).

The sheer quantity of promotions might come across as a little overwhelming but we really recommend you take some time to research which betting sites are offering the best welcome promotions. Once the tournament begins the promotions will shift to existing customer offers, so it will be important what site, or sites, you’ll have signed up to.

The new customer offers will begin a week or so before the tournament. There will be all types, and we suggest you check out our promotions page as well as do your own research. Generally, the best welcome promotions will be a World Cup specific offer as well as their usual permanent welcome offer.

So, in the build up to the world cup and during the tournament itself you will have a huge selection of bets to choose from. The type of bet you chose will most likely correlate to your knowledge level as a sports fan and your skill level as a bettor.

The winner of the tournament is the most common type of bet for the casual bettor or sports fan. It’s the most long-term bet you can place and if you’re not betting on the tournament’s favourite you’ll usually find pretty good odds.

In the build up to the world cup and during the tournament itself you will have a huge selection of bets to choose from.

Moving on from this bet you’ll find standard usual short term bets, on match winners, over/under goals and for the real betting aficionados, betting on corners.

There is one other tournament favourite, and that’s the tournament’s Golden Boot which we discuss in more detail below.

Odds change. At the time of writing this article we are three months out and Brazil and Germany are neck and neck as the bookies favourites. Yet, only a couple of weeks ago, before a round of internationals, Germany were the clear favourites. Keep a track of the team you have an interest in, any injury to a key player could see a shift in odds before the tournament.

So, how do the teams rank according to the bookies?

Well, Brazil and Germany are both the clear favourites. You can currently find the same odds for both. Unibet and 888Sport are offering the best odds at 19/4.

Brazil only play two friendlies before the tournament against Croatia and Austria in early June. We don’t expect these will alter the odds too much and be aware with games so close to the tournament their performances won’t necessarily reflect their form once the World Cup begins. Neymar’s fitness will have a significant effect on his country’s ambitions; he looks to be returning from injury much sooner than expected and should be fully fit for the World Cup.

Germany will play Austria and Saudi Arabia in early June. Barring a major upset we don’t see these results affecting their odds that drastically. Unlike Brazi,l Germany does not have one star player, so their odds should not be affected by one player’s fitness.

After the two favourites you can find France at 13/2 with Bet365, BetStars and Betway. France’s odds changed dramatically after the last set of fixtures where they lost 2-3 to Colombia at home, before beating Russia 3-1 away. They will face Ireland on the 28th of May, Italy on the 1st of July and USA on the 9th of June.

Spain are fourth favourites to win at 7/1 with Unibet and 888Sports. Argentina are fifth at 10/1 with Betway. Argentina had been neck and neck with Spain until the two met in March at the Wanda Metropolitano in a 6-1 win to Spain.

The Red Devils, many people’s dark horse, are sixth favourites at 12/1 with Ladbrokes and 188Sport. Considering the wealth of talent they have at their disposal it’s time they performed at a major tournament.

Then come good old England. After qualifying top of the group and some encouraging performances in friendlies you might expect expectations to be high. But this is England and after tournament after tournament of mercilessly extinguishing any expectations they come in as seventh favourite. Aristotle once said ‘one cannot hope unless there is a chance that one’s hope will not be realized’ - how his words still ring true for the Three Lions.

Quick quiz: can you name the top-scorer from the World Cup in 2014,2010, 2006, 2002 and 1998? Answers below*

What is interesting about the Golden Boot is that the bookies favourites never really win it. This tournament’s favourites Messi, Neymar and Cristiano Ronaldo were last World Cup favourites as well - yet only Neymar made it into the top three with 4 goals, earning him the not-so-coveted bronze boot.

This is how they rank, with the latest odds in brackets:

Now, with the Golden Boot a little bit of research and patience can go a long way.

First, look at the player’s goalscoring record and how they are used by their coach. Then, you should look at their group games. Here you have a helping hand in deciding who is most likely to pick up goals. It is in the group stages that most of the big teams (with the best strikers) will pick up goals against the weaker sides. For example, Kane or Lukaku against Panama. Last tournament’s top scorer picked up half of his total goals (3 out of 6) in the group stages.

The best odds you can currently find on England to win the World Cup are 18/1.

The bookies are more optimistic on England reaching the Quarter-final with Betfred offering 4/5 on them reaching the second knockout round.

You can find odds of 7/1 for England to reach the final.

Harry Kane is probably England’s brightest hope and he is currently fifth favourite for the tournament’s top goalscorer. The best odds you can find are 17/1 with Unibet and 888Sport.

As we mentioned earlier, if you are betting with your heart and want to back England then we can recommend a bookie like Ladbrokes which offers a lot of nation-specific promotions.

So, who do we predict will win the World Cup? We think it will be Brazil or Spain. We did think it would be France but after the recent round of internationals we grew less convinced. Spain have disappointed at the last two tournaments but they are looking utterly revitalized and their 6-1 drumming of Argentina was something to behold. They also drew with Germany 1-1 in a game of football were both teams displayed an incredibly high standard of football.

Germany then lost 1-0 to Brazil, a Brazil without Neymar, a brazil that stormed through qualification only losing once in 18 matches. Brazil have showed that even without Neymar they have world class players in Thiago Silva, Marcelo and Coutinho. During qualification their manager, Tite, showed that he is willing to rotate the team using 4-3-3, 4-1-4-1 and 4-4-2 and you can only do that when you have quality in all positions.

Correct answers - Quiz

*most recent first - James Rodríguez, Thomas Müller, Miroslav Klose, Ronaldo, Davor Šuker.