It’s the final round of the first match group games today and we have 2004’s surprise winners Greece and Spain one of the tournament favourites playing Sweden and Russia.   

Greece v Sweden

Greece don’t look to have any injury problems for this game and 36 year old Henrik Larsson is expected to lead the front line once again for Sweden.  The two teams have only played each other 6 times in the past and Greece are unbeaten against the Swedes in the last 5 times they played.

Euro 2008 betting tip: This could be a very defensive game, especially if Greece play their solid and organised game which they did in 2004.  I’ll go for under 2.5 goals at 1.45 odds especially based on previous games in Euro 2008. (which probably means this is overs!!!).

UPDATE:  Well Greece never really wanted to come out to play football and even at odds of 1.45 unders was worth a good bet.   Greece fans may not agree but it’s good to see football winning tonight.  Sweden looked good, one of my four tips to  win Euro 2008 ( see my pre tournament post).

Spain v Russia

Russia have some problems up front, with Pogrebnyak missing through injury and the ever present Arshavin suspended for the first 2 group games.  Spain only have a few minor injury problems.  Spain have only lost once to Russia out of the 8 times they have played each other. 

Euro 2008 betting tip: Spain are big favourites for this match at about 1.75, I’ll be going with a small bet on the draw due to the Hiddink factor at odds of 3.7.

UPDATE: Well it’s lucky I recommended a small bet on this match, the Hiddink factor just wasn’t enough for Russia to get a result and Spain ere worthy of the 4-1 scoreline.  But don’t rule out Russia from qualifying just yet, they showed some flashes of brilliance which could get them through, it’s a shame Arshavin will miss two games.

So far during the tournament in each match we’ve seen all the favourites win their matches, under 2.5 goals scored and  4 clean sheets with only one team scoring.  So what does this information tell us about the betting on Group C the ‘group of death’?  Not much!! Group C should bring us some of the best matches at Euro 2008, what the tournament has been really missing so far is a thrilling match with loads of goals, maybe the France match will bring this?

Today it’s:

Holland vs. Italy

France vs. Romania

I’ll be mainly concentrating on the France match today, I would like to see Holland win today, although I can see Italy winning this match by 1-0. 

France vs. Romania- France have quite a few injury problems, Henry looks like he is going to be missing for the Romania game along with maybe Viera and Ribery.  Ribery is the player I think France will miss the most, alot of the good plays come through him and if he doesn’t play then Romania could pick up at least a point.  The furthest the Romanians have ever got in the Euros was the quarter finals in 2000.

Euro 2008 Betting tip- France are missing alot of potential key players  and Romania having never won an opening match in the Euros.  Romania are a massive 5.5 on Betfair and 5.0 on William Hill to win this match, but I’m not sure if they have what it takes to pick up all three points.  Lets go with the draw at 3.4 currently on Betfair or lay France at 1.9 odds.

UPDATE:  Well winning bet number 4 comes in for us!! There were very few exciting moments in this game(except for the final whistle of course!!), but I’ll take a boring game and winning bet over exciting any day.  At odds of 3.4 that’s the biggest winning odds tipped so far in the tournament, lets hope there a many more of them to come.   I had a feeling for a 0-0 scoreline, if only I backed that too!!  So now we can sit back and watch a potential cracking 2nd game (or animal lovers can take their profits and watch Springwatch on BBC 2).

So day 2 of the football feast continues, on to group B today where co-hosts Austria play Croatia.  There’s no doubt that a home crowd should be a major advantage to Austria, but that theory might be toally wrong in this case after 10,000 Austrian fans petitioned for them to pull out of Euro 2008 due to embarassement!!

Austria vs. Croatia- I can’t really see past a Croatia win here, they have some great players and Austria have only won two out of the last sixteen matches. 

Free betting tip- Back the win for Croatia, great odds of 1.91 currently on Betfair and 1.83 at William Hill.

Germany vs. Poland- Although Poland have played Germany 16 times and never beaten them once, this game still looks to be a tricky one for Germany.   With Germany seen as the favourites to win their opening match and to win Euro 2008, there is alot pressure on them. 

Free betting tip- I’ll try to avoid predicting the winner in this match, the last time both teams played each other was at the World Cup 2006 and Germany won by a slim 1-0 margin.  So I’ll take a risk and back under 2.5 goals at odds of 1.96 currently on Betfair.

UPDATE- Well two out of two winning bets for day two of Euro 2008…not bad!!! Both bets pretty much went down to the wire, Croatia held on to the 1 goal lead until the end against a very impressive display by the Austrians and the Germany game delivered the under 2.5 goals which we were looking for!!  Lets hope the form continues into tomorrow, keep a lookout for  more bets on Monday.

After the long long wait, Euro 2008 finally starts on Saturday!! 

Switzerland vs. Czech Republic-  The home nation will kick off the tournament against the Czechs.  It would be easy to discount the Swiss straight away, but the Czech do have vital players in midfield missing and it’s hard to not take into account the big advantage the home fans will give the Swiss. 

Betting tip: The opening games of tournaments can always be a bit dodgy and hard to call, but I really can’t see past the Czechs.  Just to be sure, lay the Swiss in this opening game at odds of 2.98 on Betfair.

Portugal vs. Turkey- Portugal are big favourites to win this match at odds of 1.79. But Portugal have struggled in the Euro 2008 qualifying matches, not being able to beat Poland, Serbia and Finland. 

Betting tip: Turkey will be hard to beat, at odds of 5.9 I’ll be taking a risk and backing them to win the match.  Try also to back the draw at 3.6.

UPDATE- In the end it was one winner and one loser.  Switzerland gave the Czechs a few scares and made some decent chances in the match.  They were unlucky not to come away with a draw.  But 1 goal was enough to win the match and win our bet.  In the end the Portuguese class told over Turkey and our risk of backing Turkey backfired.  Although Turkey did display some good moments in the match, it just wasn’t enough to make a second winning bet for us.

Before the tournament starts, we’ll take a look out at the possible golden boot winners (that’s the player who scores the most goals in the tournament as supposed to the player who wears golden footwear).  Five seems to be the magic number for the past golden boot winners, so any player getting close to that total will no doubt be in with a shout at being the top goal scorer.  Here are a few players that you might:

Luca Toni- The Italian goal machine has been on form the past three seasons, scoring 121 goals in three season.  24 of those goals were scored this season for Bayern Munich.  In my opinion he is my favourite to win the golden boot award and he’s great value to back at odds of 16.0 on Betfair.  The only problem I can see is that Italy are in the group of death, where goals could be very scarce, so Luca Toni may never get to the magic number 5.

Cesc Fabregas- at the massive odds of 230 , there’s no doubt that you could be quids in if you sign up for your free ₤25 with Betfair and bet on Cesc (click on the banners on the left, also see the William Hill banners for a FREE ₤25 bet).  Influential for Arsenal early on in the season, I’m sure he’ll also be the same for Spain.  Spain always seem to start fast in tournaments and looking at Group D, there’s a great opportunity for goals.

Jan Koller/Milan Baros- When looking at teams who score goals then you can’t get better than the Czech Republic, who like to play football in the right way.  Baros was the surprise top goal scorer last time around.  Both of these Czech strikers are at odds of 65.0 and 110.0 to be top goalscorers, if the Czech midfield can create the opening, then the strikers could really fire the goals in.

Rudd Van Nistlerooy-  Van Nistlerooy is the player that is most likely to get the goals for Holland.  At 25.0 it seems like good value for a player who almost certainly is guaranteed goals.  He was runner up Golden Boot winner at Euro 2004 with four goals,. Again the only problem is that Holland are in the the group of death, so goals could be hard to come by.

Miroslav Klose- A player that has already scored the magic 5 goals in two World Cups, so at 11.0 he is definitely worth considering to have a bet on.  Klose  looks to be out of form at international level, but this was the same for Alan Shearer in ‘96, who went on to be the tournament’s top goalscorer.

Fernando Torres- the 24 year old is a big favourite to be the top goal scorer and after having a fantastic first season for Liverpool scoring 24 goals in the league, you can see why.  He’s at odds of 10.0 to win the golden boot on Betfair.

Christiano Ronaldo-  what a season this player is having, over 40 goals score for Manchester United.  The double winner is second favourite to be top goal scorer, but can his fine form this season continue?

Free Golden boot winner Betting tips:  It’s always hard to pick out top goalscorers, especially since there’s always a surprise player to make an impact in the tournament (just like Baros did) .  I’m tempted to go bet on Luca Toni at odds of 16.0 and Russia’s Andrei Arshavin at massive odds of 360.0.

Also keep a lookout out for Turkey’s Kazim Richards who could make a big impact at Euro 2008.