World Cup 2024 Schedule

The FIFA World Cup is one of the most anticipated events on the sporting schedule and football fans around the world are already counting down the days until this year’s tournament gets underway on November 20th.

If you’re planning on placing a bet on this year’s tournament, then you’ll want to know when each match is taking place. Our schedule will make sure that you don’t miss kick-off in any of the crucial games and enable you to place your bets in plenty of time!

Now that the World Cup schedule has been confirmed, it’s time to start thinking about your tournament bets. Whether you’re an ante-post punters and prefer to have placed all of your bets before the first ball is kicked, or whether you enjoy wagering once the tournament has got underway, there are hundreds of different markets available on this iconic sporting event.

Most popular markets

Outright Winner

Although many punters enjoy placing an ante-post bet several months in advance, it is far easier to wager on the outright winner market now that the group stage draw has been completed. With the schedule allowing punters to map out each team’s potential route to the latter stages of the event,

The outright market is the popular way of wagering on any major sporting tournament and is priced up by all online bookmakers. It’s never easy picking the winner of this tournament, however, it can usually be narrowed to just a handful of teams and despite England regularly being priced up as one of the favourites, they haven’t been successful since 1966!

Most online betting sites will offer each-way odds on this market, so if your chosen team reaches the final but falls at the final hurdle, you will still be paid out at ½ the odds.

Top Goalscorer

Who will take home the Golden Boot? That’s a question that is often asked at the beginning of this tournament. If you’ve followed the majority of the competitors throughout the course of the domestic campaign, then you’ll usually have a pretty good idea of who is in form, however, the 2022 World Cup is being played in the middle of the campaign for many of these players and a different approach may be required when conducting your research.

Nevertheless, this remains one of the most popular markets and now that the group stage schedule has been confirmed, it’s much easier to pick a player who could potentially fill their boots against one of the tournament minnows.

To Reach the Final

This is a market that isn’t necessarily priced up by all online bookmakers and odds on this market tend to become available once the group stage draw has been made.

In order to receive a payout, your chosen side simply needs to reach the showpiece event. If that’s the case, you can sit back and enjoy the spectacle without worrying about the outcome!

Group Winner

Although it is perfectly reasonable to have a single bet on the Group Winner market, these markets tend to be extremely popular with accumulator fans. With a number of sections to choose from, selecting the winner of each group is a great way to keep across all of the action during the first few weeks. It also gives you an excuse to watch every single game!

Although many of the groups tend to be fairly straightforward, there are always one or two competitive sections. These undoubtedly help to increase the odds, although they can be tricky to predict. At the 2022 World Cup, Group E which features both Germany and Spain is likely to be the trickiest section to predict.

Stage of Elimination

Predicting a team to crash and burn is far from ideal, however, when it comes to betting, there is very little room for sentiment.

This is an excellent market for savvy punters who have found a team that is likely to underperform at the tournament. If there is a side who are priced up prominently, and you don’t rate them, then backing them to be eliminated in the group stage or the round of 16 could be an excellent way of obtaining some value.

First Time Winner

One of the other outright markets is First Time Winner. This tournament is often dominated by the usual protagonists with Brazil, Germany and France having all been victorious In the last couple of decades. However, Croatia and the Netherlands have come close to lifting the Jules Rimet Trophy fairly recently, and there’s always a chance that there will be a new name on the list of World Cup winners in 2022.

The 2022 Qatar World Cup gets underway on November 20th and concludes on December 18th.

Football fans will be delighted to hear that during the group stage, there will be four matches per day.

Unlike previous tournaments, each group will play each of their group stage matches on the same day with the final set of games kicking off at the same time. The group stage concludes on December 2nd.

There will be very little time to recuperate at this year’s tournament with the first set of knock-out matches getting underway the following day (December 3rd).

The quarter-finals will take place on December 9th and 10th with the two semi-final games scheduled for December 13th and 14th.

The third-placed playoff game will take place in Al Rayyan on December 17th, 24 hours ahead of the 2022 World Cup final which will be played in Lusail on December 18th

You can use the World Cup schedule to your advantage when placing your bets on this year’s tournament.

Unlike previous tournaments, there isn’t much travelling involved, so calculating distances and working out each team’s travel plans is largely irrelevant this time around. However, the 2022 World Cup is shorter than previous instalments of this competition so working out how each team will keep their players fresh across the four weeks will be important.

A quick glance at the World Cup schedule should tell you which teams may already book their place in the knock-out round of the competition ahead of the third group game. For example, in Group F, both Belgium and Croatia will face Canada and Morocco in their opening two matches, before taking on one another in the third and final group game. Both teams will fancy their chances of having secured qualification by this stage and may opt to rotate heavily for this fixture. That is likely to help shape potential bets on this game.

It is also possible to pick out sides who will be playing the majority of their group games and one or two of their knock-out matches at the same venue. Although this may only offer a small advantage, it does enable players to become more accustomed and acclimatised to their surroundings.

If you’re betting on the outright market or attempting to work out which sides will reach the final four, then using the World Cup Qatar 2022 Betting schedule to map out a team’s potential path can be incredibly helpful when it comes to wagering on this tournament.
For example, it may be possible to work out who your chosen team is likely to face in the round of 16

However, the biggest benefit of using the World Cup betting schedule is the chance to work out which teams will have the shortest/longest periods between matches. For example, at the semi-final stage, Team A will have played three matches in ten days whereas Team B will have played the same number of games within a period of eight days. This may result in many punters backing Team A, as theoretically, they should feel more rested and energized.

The World Cup traditionally takes place during the summer months and as a result, it rarely impacts the domestic schedule. However, in 2022, the tournament is being held in November/December and will have a detrimental effect on several top-flight divisions.

Premier League

The Premier League gets underway a week earlier than previous campaigns (August 6th) and it will take a mid-season break on November 13th which should give players enough time to travel to Qatar and prepare for the group stage of the tournament.

The EPL gets back underway on December 26th. There will be additional midweek fixtures to compensate for the significant gap in the World Cup schedule.

Championship

England’s second-tier also begins a week earlier (July 30th) and it will take a break during the group stage of the tournament. However, unlike the Premier League, the EFL Championship will return once the knock-out games get underway at the beginning of December.

Serie A

Although they did not qualify for the World Cup, Italian clubs will still be affected by the tournament and their top-flight will take a break from November 13th onwards.

Serie A will return in January 2023.

La Liga

La Liga will get underway at the beginning of August and will continue until November 13th. The division is expected to return on December 29th and the season will conclude later than usual on June 1st.

Bundesliga

The Bundesliga contains fewer sides and therefore, they are unlikely to suffer from fixture congestion. The season will take a break on November 13th before resuming in mid-January.

Ligue 1

Similar to La Liga, the French top flight will break on November 13th and resume on December 28th.

UEFA Champions League

The group stages of the Champions League will conclude at the beginning of November. Each of the six match-days will be crammed into a much shorter period, similar to the 2022 season.

• This is the first time that the World Cup has been held in an Arab country and just the second time in Asia – Qatar has a desert climate, and despite this tournament being played in December, it is still likely to be warm and that could have an effect on some teams/players. As a result, low-scoring games during the group stage may be commonplace, as players acclimatise to their new surroundings. Backing under 2.5 goals or first half draw may be the best way to approach some of these matches.
• The 2022 World Cup will be held across just eight stadiums. This is the lowest number of venues at a World Cup since 1978 – this is likely to result in some teams acclimatising to their surroundings as they are likely to have multiple matches at the same venues. With a record number of fans set to attend coupled with the ability to commute between the various stadiums, there should be a raucous atmosphere at the majority of these matches.
• The 2022 World Cup will be the shortest since 1978. The tournament will take place across just 29 days and that is likely to have an effect on the players. With temperatures in the 70s and 80s as well as some teams being asked to play three matches within the space of eight days, managers are likely to heavily rotate and once again, expect low-scoring and disjointed matches, particularly during the group stage. Although this may not be the ideal scenario for spectators, it does open the possibility for punters to find value in backing low-scoring markets.

Although the majority of online betting sites will offer odds on this iconic sporting event, there are a number of bookmakers who go above and beyond when it comes to providing the ultimate betting experience on the 2022 World Cup.

Our recommended sites have multiple World Cup 2022 markets as well as additional features and generous bonuses which are ideal for international football punters.