The Women’s Euros get underway in Netherlands on 16th July 2017 and they run until the 6th August. With four groups of four teams, including the hosts along with such big guns as Germany, Italy, France and England, it promises to be a fine spectacle. Here we will take a look at the current Women’s European Championships and give our betting tips and predictions for the outright winner market.
The 2017 tournament is the ninth UEFA-sanctioned Women’s Europeans Championships, and – alarmingly for the other teams – Germany have won all but one of those, including the last six! It is certainly no surprise then to see Germany Women as the favourites for glory in Holland this time around, priced at best betting odds of 2/1 with Bet365. The Germans won all eight of their qualification games, and they didn’t even concede a single goal! In short, they are going to be a tough side to overcome.
If there is one side who could challenge the German hegemony then it is France. They too had a 100% record in qualifying, and they also won all eight games without conceding. Olivier Echouafni’s women can be backed at 7/2 with BetVictor to win the tournament, but really this isn’t a big enough price to tempt us.
England are next in the betting at 10/1 with Betfair, and though they drew one of their qualifying games (against Belgium) and – shock, horror! – conceded a single goal, they do offer some value. Mark Sampson has moulded the England side into a highly effective unit who really battle for one another. They almost went all the way at the last World Cup, and though they had to settle for third place in the end, they earned some valuable experience.
England also have a winnable group (which also contains Scotland, Portugal and Spain) and if they win their group they should get an easy quarter final match against Iceland… although the men’s side had something similar not all that long ago and that didn’t exactly go to plan!
Looking for an outsider at longer odds, there are a couple that look like they could offer some decent betting value, for an each way bet (paying 1/3 of the odds for making the final). Though not nearly as effective as their male counterparts, Spain Women have some very talented players and they are a match for most teams on their day. They came through a relatively tough qualifying group unscathed, beating near neighbours Portugal twice in the process.
The big hurdle for Spain could well come in the quarter final if – as predicted by many – they face France, who are well fancied to go all the way. As such the big match for the Spanish will come against England in Group D. Victory there and Spain – rather than England – could have the easy passage to the semis, and then anything can happen!