World Cup - Groups A and B

With a million World Cup guides out there, we're not going to waffle about star players, how teams have qualified or what the media rhetoric is about various things. We're going to hone straight into the bets in these pieces. That's probably why you're here afterall.

Group A

Best Bets

This is the weakest group in the tourmment and Uruguay could well be the team to capitalise with Saurez and Cavani up front and able to punish any poor defending. Even with home advantage, I just can;t see Russia getting close here, and Uruguay are a strong pick to top the group at 10/11 with William Hill.

We'll also mention a bet for the opening group game at this point, which is for a penalty to be awarded. We're under VAR remember, and while I wouldn't possibly claim that any refereeing would be suspect or influenced in Russia, it is possible that the referees will be very happy to check out any possible infringement in favour of the Russians. You wouldn't want to be the man in black who missed a genuine penalty, so any tussles would surely go to the man with the telly. As such, the 3/1 on a penalty being awarded looks pretty solid here.

Saudi Arabia are surely the worst team in the event, and it's more than possible they will finish the World Cup without a goal, but the group is weak. With 28 goals in 39 appearances, Mohammed Al-Sahlawi is their main man - on pens and free kicks. He looks overpriced at 3/1 to end up as the top Saudi scorer.

Finally, Egypt are probably being over-rated ahead of the tournament. Mo Salah is special. Of course he is. But he's also been part of the pieces that have got Egypt to just 46th in the World. They arent a great deal better than Saudi Arabia, and Russia have home advantage. With some doubts about Salah, it wouldn't be a tremendous surprise to see him struggle to repeat his Liverpool form, and that makes the 7/2 on them finishing bottom of the group decent value in our eyes.

2.2pts Uruguay to win Group A at 10/11

1pt A Penalty to be awarded in Russia v Saudi Arabia at 3/1

1pt Mohammed Al Sahlawi to be top Saudi Scorer at 3/1

1pt Egypt to finish bottom of Group A at 7/2

Group B

Not a great deal of unknowns here. Portugal and Spain will surely play out for the top spot, while Iran look woefully light on goals if qualifying is anything to go by and will probably finish bottom of the group.

The first bet that stands out is Portugal to win the group. This bet could be over after the Friday is Spain beat Portugal, but they are only marginally odds-on (10/11) to do so, and the 4/7 on them winning the group is surely too short. That gives us 5/2 on Portugal which looks very tasty in this likely two-horse race. There isn't a gulf between the sides and Portugal are less reliant on their talisman Ronaldo than previously might have been the case, with Andre Silva looking a better back-up than they have had available in years.

We also expect this to be a tight opening group game, so don't expect a goal fest. Under 2.5 Goals is 4/6 and given just how much will be riding on this game, loss aversion could be more important than trying to win it from a level start. A draw would leave both sides massively fancying their chances of progressing.

Hopefully it was pretty clear that we don't "not like" Spain's chances this World Cup, we just think over a very small number of games, Portugal can run them close. Spain are a good side though - they've proved that year in, year out, and our maths makes the 10/3 available on thm reaching the final someway longer than it should be. We'd probably be closer to 11/4, so it's a spot of tournament interest at a value price.

Back to Portugal and Iran, and we've alreayd mentioned how hard they found goals to come by in qualifying. Given Portugal are 2/5 favourites to beat them when the pair meet, you could do worse than back Portugal to win to Nil in that one - its even money with BetVictor

1pt Portugal to win the group at 5/2

1pt Spain to reach the final at 10/3

3pts Under 2.5 Goals in Spain v Portugal at 4/6

2pts Portugal to win to Nil v Iran at Evens

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