European Volleyball Champions League Betting Guide

The leagues comprises the top 20 teams in Europe including 18 teams who are given automatic berths, and a further 2 who won the qualification rounds. The teams are seeded into five groups of four, where they each play a double robin round, resulting in six games each. After the group phase is finished, the five group winners proceed to the knockout playoffs. The three best ranked runners up will also join the group winners to make eight quarter finalists. The tournament proceeds through the semi-finals to the finals, where the winner becomes the CEV Champions League winner.

The games are played with the standard rules, as adopted by the NCAA. The teams play in sets that go up to 25 points, with a 2 point margin. If a team reaches 25 points while the opponent has 24, the game will keep going until one team has achieved a 2 point advantage, although this is rare in volleyball. There are 5 sets in each game, and the first team to win three sets wins the game. If the game is tied after four sets, it goes to the fifth and final set, which is played to 15 points. The NCAA volleyball rules are the standard rules that have been used in major international competitions from 2008.

How to Bet on the Champions League CEV

Each year volleyball fans follow their favourite teams in the prestigious competition between the best of the best in Europe. To add to the excitement, there is a huge range of volleyball betting options that give fans the chance to make every game even more gripping.

Outrights

Betting can start before the competition begins. With outrights, fans will be able to place bets on their favourite teams in advance. Odds will be given for each team to win the competition outright. The outright bets are usually more favourable before the competition starts and clear favourites to win start emerging. Any team competing in the qualifying rounds can be bet on, meaning even the biggest longshot can be bet on with extremely long odds.

Match Winner

Once the competition begins, each game will have a large number of bet the most simple of which is the match winner, where a bet can be placed on either team to win the match.

Set Winner

Matches can be divided into individual sets. In games that use the best of five sets format, the first two sets can be the decisive sets that determine the match winner. Bets can be placed on which team will win the first or the second set. These bets are difficult to predict but pay out earlier than the match winner bets and they can offer generous odds.

Handicap Bets

Punters who want to change the odds to make bets more profitable or to make risky bets more appealing, can take advantage of the handicap bets. Handicaps can be made on sets in a game, or points in an individual set.

Handicaps on sets are slightly more rigid, as they will need the team to win the match with a specific number of sets. A handicap of -1.5 will mean that the team needs to win the match by either 3-0 or 3-1. A handicap of -2.5 will mean the team has to win the game in straight sets, or 3-0.

Handicaps on points in a set offer a little more flexibility, as each set goes up to 25 points, meaning teams can win sets with huge margins. This allows fans to place bets with handicaps as high as -10.5, -11.5 and so on.

While the examples shown used negative handicaps, positive handicaps can also be applied on sets or points in a set. These help make betting on the underdog a more attractive prospect.

Over/Under Bets

There are many bets available in the over/under market, these bets are usually not directly affected by which team wins the match. They instead focus on certain in-game statistics, such as how many points will be scored in a set, how many points will be scored in the whole match, how many sets will be played and more.

The bet presents a value, this can be for the number of points scored by a team, such as 90.5, and there will be a bet for the team to score over 90.5 points and a bet for the team to score under 90.5 points in the game. These are always two way bets, and often there will be a number of different options available. For points scored by a team for example, the over/under bets may range from lower values such as 87.5 and go up to 98.5.

Many More Markets

Volleyball betting has plenty of special bets that can come with very long odds. There are some highly specific bets such as a team to win in straight sets, will a team lose the first two sets and then win the match, the correct score of the first set, amongst many more. There are also a number of parlay bets that can offer huge odds, these include bets such as a team to win the first set and win the match, a team to win the match with over 92.5 overall points and more.