Whilst the rugby betting markets certainly don’t live up to that of football, tennis or NFL, they are on the up and have seen a decent amount of growth in recent years. Just taking the Rugby World Cup for example has seen an increase of over $100 million to be traded compared to the same tournament just eight years ago.
There’s no doubt that the pinnacle of the sport comes in the form of the World Cup. Similarly to football, it’s run every four years with the hosts being chosen by a ballot from a panel of top rugby executives. The betting markets for the World Cup are run like very few other sports. As there is no real prize money for the eventual winners, the ‘powers that be’ for each country are allowed to place wagers on their team with respected bookmakers. Obviously players and non playing staff members are strictly prohibited from betting on any of the matches, even if not involved, but the governing bodies see the opportunities as an insurance policy and reward for their teams success.
Whilst things like advertising and TV exposure will massively increase for the winning country and the majority of players alike, each rugby board often offer up a bonus incentive for their nation if they win. For example, England’s bonus pool is a reported $4.4 million which will be distributed between players and staff members. To cover these costs they place the wagers on their team winning the overall tournament to compensate due to the lack of prize money.
Rivalling that of the World Cup is that of the Tri Nations and the Six Nations which are tournaments that host northern and southern hemisphere teams respectively. The Six nations compromises of England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Italy and France and is the highlight of the northern hemisphere international scene. The Tri Nations include Australia, South Africa and New Zealand and will compromise of three of the strongest playing test nations in the world.
Domestically the Heineken Cup is one of the largest tournaments for teams around Europe. The standard is often high as the teams battle it out over a gruelling group stage schedule before playing down to the winner who will lift the prestigious award. Betting is usually rife with this competition as the margins between all the teams are often slim. It’s highly likely the majority of domestic rugby betting will come from the Heineken Cup.
Whilst in any form of betting there’s no such thing as a ‘sure thing’, but we take pride in our bets and have come up with a series of tips that you can apply to make your rugby betting experience a whole lot more profitable.
Check line ups – International games take up a big chunk of the domestic season with many teams being massively depleted as a result. The ‘bigger’ teams may have several players away meaning they are far from full strength compared to a ‘lesser’ team who may have few or none away, levelling the playing field up.
Take advantage of live betting – Rugby is a perfect sport to take advantage of live betting. The pace of the game makes it a good target to gain which team has the upper hand in the match and if the game is starting to swing at all. The live betting platforms are really growing on the rugby betting scene so you will even get competition for odds.
Use betting offers – As with any sport, it’s important to take advantage of as much free money as possible when betting. There are so many bookmakers with generous betting offers that betting without a bonus of some sort is burning money.
