UEFA Champions League Preview: Favorite Futures Bets
With Matchday 1 just a week away, the best club competition in soccer returns, and we have multiple bets to kick things off in our UEFA Champions League preview.
Manchester City enters the tournament as the betting favorite after lifting the cup last season. The Cityzens are followed by European giants Bayern Munich and Real Madrid at most sportsbooks.
Meanwhile, City striker Erling Haaland has the lowest odds to be the top goalscorer in the competition. It has been profitable to back Haaland after he’s won the Golden Boot in two of the last three seasons. Bayern’s summer signing Harry Kane is next in the odds, and he is joined by Kylian Mbappe to round out the players with less than +1000 odds.
We will be back next week to preview the opening round of matches, but we start with our favorite future bets for the UCL below.
UEFA Champions League Preview: Favorite Futures Bets
Future 1 – Group A Winner – Bayern Munich (-160) FanDuel
If I’m being honest, I don’t usually like to lay a price like this for a futures bet. However, I don’t believe the odds genuinely reflect how much better this Bayern side is than the rest of the group.
Yes, Manchester United is also in Group A, but the German giants are -170 in the opening match against the Red Devils next week. There is a good chance they will also be favorites for the return leg at Old Trafford.
The next two sides in the group are Galatasaray and FC Copenhagen. Last season, the Danish club only scored one goal in six UCL group stage matches to finish fourth in Group G with a -6.4 xGDiff, according to Football Reference.
Meanwhile, the Turkish champions return to the Champions League for the first time since the 2019-20 campaign. The last time they advanced to the Round of 16 in the competition was back in 2012.
Future 2 – Top Goalscorer – Harry Kane (+450) FanDuel
One of the reasons I love this Bayern side is the addition of star striker Harry Kane from Tottenham Hotspur. He will lead the line as one of the best goalscorers in the world.
Kane has also already hit the ground running for his new club with three goals in the Bundesliga. He also took the only penalty kick for Bayern, which is very important for a futures bet.
There are two key components that the previous winners of this bet have all had. Your team needs to have a deep run or win the tournament, and you need to be the penalty taker.
With Bayern’s easy group and attacking style, I really like the price of Kane to win the Golden Boot of this prestigious competition. This is also a great alternative if you don’t want to lay the heavy price above for Bayern to win Group A.
Futures Parlay – Bayern Munich and Arsenal to Win Their Groups (+153) FanDuel
Behind the German side, I believe Arsenal was the next team that received a fortunate draw. This makes the English club a great parlay piece to close out our Champions League preview.
For starters, the Gunners were drawn into Group B, which started with Sevilla from Pot 1. This is the same team that is at the bottom of the La Liga table with no points through three games.
Mikel Arteta’s side will also play Lens and PSV Eindhoven. These clubs have a combined total squad market value of 391.38 euros, according to Transfermarkt. This is well short of Arsenal’s 1.09 billion evaluation, which just shows the gap in quality.
Over the summer, the Gunners did a great job of adding to their squad depth with the additions of Declan Rice, Kai Havertz, and David Raya. This should allow Arteta to rotate more in games.
I really like the chances of Arsenal having a great return to the UCL.
