Betting Picks

The month of June continues to be dominated by the greatest sporting tournament on the globe, and rightly so. World cup betting is available for all the matches, and a triad of group matches is underway Wednesday. There are other options to bet on sports, with baseball and MLB betting available daily as well. However, the quadrennial offers exciting and compelling competition among the world’s greatest clubs and athletes.  Coming up, Chile takes on Honduras, favourite Spain clashes against the Swiss, and in the most evenly matched game, South Africa plays Uruguay.

The host nation hits the pitch for the second of their three group stage games.  The opening match of the tournament saw Bafana Bafana strike first and eventually earn a draw against group favourite Mexico. Later that day, Uruguay drew France in a scoreless tie, squaring up all four teams in Group A with a point a piece.  With two games left and less than stellar performances by all teams, the group is wide open and the opportunity is there for South Africa to move on to the second stage.

To earn three points, however, they will have to defeat Uruguay in Pretoria at Loftus Versfeld Stadium. Siphiwe Tshabalala fared brilliantly in the opener, netting the first goal of the tourney and earning Man of the Match status.  He will look to lead the offense alongside Steven Pienaar, midfielder from Everton, and Katlego Mphela, a forward who nearly gave South Africa a win on Friday.  The striker broke free on the left side, beat the goalie with a quick shot, but hit the post in the waning minutes.

Several players admitted being quite nervous before the first game, and rightly so.  They were not only playing for their country, but there continent, as the match was the first World Cup final played in Africa.  As South Africa has been cheered on by the entire continent, South African fans have cheered for their neighbors.  Ghana became the first African team to win on the continent, edging Serbia 1-0. Cote D’Ivoire, and Nigeria both earned draws, while Algeria and Cameroon fell in their opening matches.  In every game, the fans were wholly behind the African clubs.

South Africa will have a huge edge due to the crowd, particularly due to the omnipresent sound of vuvuzelas, an African horn than has been cited as a distraction to some European and South American clubs. Uruguay will have to ignore the noise in order to gain an important three points in Group A.

Betting Lines: Uruguay are slight favourites playing in South Africa, as Bafana Bafana narrow the talent gap due to an increasingly powerful home field advantage. Uruguay showed little punch in the opener, as they seemed to adjust to a new setting.  They should feel a bit more comfortable in their second match, after adapting to both the altitude and the noise.  However, spurred on by what has been an inspired and passionate South African crowd, look for Bafana Bafana to strike first again, and earn another 1-1 draw against a desperate and frustrated Uruguay club.