As for football betting, a lot of gamblers prefer to deal with traditional and the most popular European and world tournaments. For instance, they are the European Championship, the World Championship, and others. However, these are not the only betting opportunities, and it is possible to get advantages out of other competitions, with Under-21 European Championships being among them. This article is to describe what aspects you should pay attention to if you want to succeed in Under-21 football betting.

Under-21 European Championships Explained

 An Under-21 European Championship is a regular competition held every two years. In order to separate it from the major football tournaments mentioned above, this competition is organized in odd-numbered years only. With final steps lasting for about two weeks in June, Championships with their general principles resemble the major international football tournaments. Under-21 international teams are also subdivided into groups where the teams play in order to be qualified for final stages.

Nevertheless, there are still some differences. There are only three groups of four teams. To be more exact, the third group has been added recently, and only eight teams participated in the earlier series. The extended format was introduced in order to make the tournament more popular and more exciting. With its history dating back to 1978, the Under-21 European Championship has had a few winners. In short, the Netherlands, Spain, and Italy are the most frequent winners. It should be mentioned at once that this tournament is a good opportunity for young and talented players to enter the traditional football, which happens often. So, the fact that top performers often leave their Under-21 teams makes it extremely difficult to build a betting strategy on the basis of past performance.

The Question of Age in Under-21 European Championships

 According to the tournament rules, players are allowed to participate in an Under-21 European Championship if they are under 21 at the date when the tournament starts.

Paying attention to the fact that the whole tournament including qualifying and final stages lasts for about two years, it can be very often that some teams contain players who are a bit older than 21. Statistical information shows that the transitional period of this age is accompanied by a significantly increased performance of the older players in comparison with that of their teenage rivals. So, this information can be used for gambling purposes.

In order to understand whether it is reasonable to take the age of players into consideration, let us take a look at an actual example. There was a period when England was taking the youngest squad for three consecutive championships. So, the team played nine games and managed to win only one of them, while only two ended in a draw. Here, it could be supposed that there is a strong correlation between the age and performance, but a more careful analysis will show that such tendency cannot be clearly identified.

Analyzing Players’ Success

 Another aspect that can have some correlation with team’s performance is the number of caps won by a team. It should be said from the very beginning that this correlation is also weak, but you can pay attention to the number of Under-21 players who have already represented their teams at full international or club levels. The greater presence of such players can mean that this team is a bit more experienced than their opponents. From this point of view, we can notice that it is experience and better skills, not age, that are more significant for placing successful wagers on Under-21 European Championships.

Performance during the Whole Tournament

 As it has already been mentioned, the tournament lasts for about two years, which means that teams can show different performance at different Championship stages. In other words, it is not always that a team that managed to win all its games at qualifying stages will show the same successful football when finals will take place. So, it is not reasonable to place outright wagers on a team that showed the excellent performance at the qualifying stages.

Nevertheless, there is at least one exception to this rule when 2013 saw the brilliant performance of the Under-21 Spanish squad. Then, the team won all their games except for one that ended in a draw over both the qualifying and final stages. This result can be easily explained by the fact that 14 players of that team gained a rich experience by playing at full international and club levels. Also, such players as Thiago, de Gea, and Isco were in that team, which makes it clear that the squad had a significant advantage over all its rivals.

Transfer Value & Under-21 European Championships

 Since the above-mentioned factors do not prove to be helpful for the kind of betting under consideration, gamblers should find some that do. Among others, the best way is to look at the transfer value of the squad. Since these values are fixed by professional specialists according to players’ skills and previous performance, it is possible to say that this information is quite reliable. The easiest way to find these figures is to visit one of the specialized websites. So, the more expensive the players are, the better chances to win a team has.

To understand the importance of this value, let us consider the example with Spain once again. The total value of starting 11 was £130 million in 2013. It means that the median value was about £11.8 million per starting player. If we want to understand the Spain’s superiority, the second highest median during all the other Under-21 European Championships was only £4 million per player in the German squad. Finally, if we look that the median value of Italy that opposed Spain in 2013 final was only £3.4 million, we will not be surprised by the fact that Spain won the tournament.

Conclusion

 To conclude, we can say that Under-21 European Championships betting is rather difficult to earn benefits from because there are few correlations that can provide bettors with necessary assistance. Nevertheless, if you are ready to work hard, it is completely possible to succeed in this niche market.