Infantino’s enlarged World Cup gamble pays off with punters

PARIS: The World Cup has engaged punters like never before with an 80 percent increase in betting volume compared to the 2022 edition, even taking into account the higher number of matches for a 48-team tournament, a betting expert told AFP.
Although many football fans were skeptical about the increase in the number of teams from 32 to 48, it appears punters have welcomed it.
“We’ve seen an 80 percent increase in the ticket volume,” Darren Small, senior vice president of Managed Trading Services at Sportradar, told AFP.
“So we’re seeing more bets and more active customers.
“We’ve seen record numbers and we’ve surpassed our expectations in terms of what we felt we were going to see if we compare it to 2022, which is a little difficult because it was different as it was in the winter.”
For Sunday’s final between Spain and defending champions Argentina, Small expects the company to be handling approximately 8.5 million betting tickets for their 250 bookmaking clients round the world.
Sportradar is a global sports technology company that says it creates immersive experiences for sports fans and bettors.
Small said even if the numbers have surprised the company, they anticipated an increase because of the expansion of the tournament to 104 games.
“But we also expected it just because of the industry growth and general growth,” he added.
England may have to wait another four years to try to add a second star to their 1966 triumph but they have topped the betting table.
Indeed the four semifinalists — also the top four FIFA-ranked teams — drew the most interest.
England attracted approximately 16.3 million betting tickets ahead of France (15.5m), Argentina (15m) and Spain (14.5m).
The games with the highest volume of betting