Venue: Cape Town, South Africa
Portugal have their “easy” group match in the “Group of Death” Group G on the 21st of June when they take on North Korea in Cape Town. The fixture kicks off at 13:30 South African time.
Portugal are, understandably, at very short odds to win this game. The best price you can currently get on a straight Portugal win is 1/5, with Betfred or BetUS. Some bookies are offering as little as 1/6. Most are offering 5/1 on the draw, including Bet365 and 888sport.
A North Korea win is looking unlikely with odds as long as 20/1.
Portugal will be looking to take as much as they can away from this game, as will their group mates Brazil and the Ivory Coast when they meet with North Korea. In a tough group like this where goal difference could matter, they will be looking to score on the North Koreans as many times as possible, rather than just take away the three points.
Looking at the correct score market, the favourite is 2-0 to Portugal, which will get you 5/1. 1-0 and 3-0 are both at 6/1. 4-0 is an interesting bet – Portugal can easily achieve this, and in a game where they will be looking for a high margin win the 10/1 odds could be worth a look, as could 20/1 on 5-0.
The favourite for first goal scoere is one Cristiano Ronaldo. For him to score first you are looking at around 13/5. Liedson is at 14/5, Almeida 16/5, and then it goes out to 5/1 for Nani.
Prediction
I can definitely see Portugal taking away a good few goals from this fixture. North Korea will be the team all the others in the group will be looking to rack up goals against, as they are just not capable of offering up much competition to teams of the caliber of Portugal, Brazil and the Ivory Coast. For this reason the prediction is a 4-0 win to Portugal – odds on this are 10/1.
