Weekend Review: Bookies delight at Portugal's Euro 2016 victory

Portugal’s Euro 2016 extra-time win rounded off a bumper day of sport for the bookies yesterday, despite the success of Brits Andy Murray and Lewis Hamilton.

The goalless 90 minute affair, which saw former Swansea City striker Eder settle the game in the 109^th minute to upset hosts France, was described as the “perfect” result by Ladbrokes’ Alex Donohue.

“If we’d have been asked for our dream outcome before the game that’s what we would have scripted,” he said.

“Turnover was very high indeed and following wins for [Andy] Murray and [Lewis] Hamilton it helped tip the balance of a massive day back in our favour,” he added.

Having already refunded around ?5m in its ‘Bore Draw’ promotion, it was nervous times for bet365 due to its ‘Penalty Payback’ offer of refunding outright bets if a punters’ selected team is eliminated by penalties, and there was much relief when Eder bagged the winner.

“All in all we’ve given over ?30m back on the tournament with our Penalty Payback, Bore Draw & In-Play Offers,” said bet365’s Steve Freeth. “So we were understandably chuffed to see Eder break the deadlock late into the game and then Ronaldo-less Portugal hold on to prevent the shootout.”

Sky Bet’s Sandro Di Michele said the Portuguese victory rounded off a “great tournament” for the operator. “They [Portugal] were an excellent result for us in the outright book having started the tournament at 18/1 and were relatively unfancied all the way through the competition,” said Di Michele.

And Eder’s goal appears to have made one lucky BetVictor punter a millionaire after coming closest to correctly predicting the first goal scorer and time of the first goal in the final, as part of the firm’s ‘The Million Pound Goal’ competition.

“Early indications show that there is currently one winning Million Pound Goal ticket and independent auditors are currently verifying the result but it does look as though BetVictor, and indeed Eder, have made someone a millionaire,” said BetVictor’s Jack Milner.

And while the Euro 2016 final was a “fantastic” result for Betfred, the outcome of the men’s singles final at Wimbledon was anything but for the operator.

“It was a total disaster,” said Betfred’s Peter Spencer. “Losses on [Andy] Murray are well into six figures and certainly our worst day ever at Wimbledon.”

Punters made the most of the firm’s ‘Best of British’ offer of 6/4 for Murray to beat Milos Raonic and Lewis Hamilton to win the British grand prix for the third time on the run, while its evens offer of Murray and Serena Williams to win their respective finals also proved popular.

Unibet’s price boost of Murray to win pre-tournament – from 3/1 to 4/1 – proved costly for the firm, as the Scot won comfortably without dropping a set.

“We had a decent margin form the outright but this was wiped out from the Murray boost,” said Unibet’s William Vickery.

But the Scot’s win wasn’t the worst case scenario for everyone, as Ladbrokes testified. “The Murray win wasn’t a disaster at all as 1/4 isn’t a recreational price,” said Donohue. “3- 0 was actually fine too as we laid 3-1 and 3-2 heavily.”