I’ll Take Those Odds

I am not much of a bettor, and certainly don’t condone it as a leisure-time activity, but the bookmakers usually know a thing or two about where to place the odds on a team winning. With that in mind I about fell out of my chair earlier today when I saw Italy installed at 11-1 favorites to hoist the Rimet trophy in Berlin on July 9th.

Brazil, England, Argentina and Germany, yes, Germany are currently staked to better odds. Now, let’s not forget, the ultimate aim of all this is to create more betting activity by making it enticing, but 11-1 seems like a suspiciously high number. And in case you’re still reeling over the Germany odds (9.5 - 1), apparently the ‘home field advantage’ is a little more important than we thought. At least according to the Cologne based think-tank IW Institute.