Top Sports In Other Countries

[Prenut]

I'm asking this because I have been talking to some friends overseas (UK and Russia mainly) and they all like to bet on American sports - mainly NBA with some NFL and MLB also. This surprised me, as I guess I was a little naive and assumed it was all about soccer, rugby, tennis, etc.

So how do the American sports fit in to most wagered on sports in other countries? If you are from the UK what would you say are the five most bet on sports? What about other countries? I know we have a good mix of Aussies, Irish, and Canadians. I'm particularly interested in English speaking countries, but would love to hear from non English speaking countries as well.

As a side note are UK sports bettors immediately turned off by the term soccer? I always assumed so until I saw it on the Bet365 site.

[ramchip]

I'm asking this because I have been talking to some friends overseas (UK and Russia mainly) and they all like to bet on American sports - mainly NBA with some NFL and MLB also. This surprised me, as I guess I was a little naive and assumed it was all about soccer, rugby, tennis, etc.

So how do the American sports fit in to most wagered on sports in other countries? If you are from the UK what would you say are the five most bet on sports? What about other countries? I know we have a good mix of Aussies, Irish, and Canadians. I'm particularly interested in English speaking countries, but would love to hear from non English speaking countries as well.

As a side note are UK sports bettors immediately turned off by the term soccer? I always assumed so until I saw it on the Bet365 site.

In regards to the term soccer we don't use this in the UK. I would say in the UK the top US sport is NFL by far.

[xYassassinYx]

Yeah as Ramchip said, everyone in the U.K says football not soccer.

As for top 5 sports that are bet on, I would guess these in no particular order:

Football
Horse Racing (Maybe not a sport but still)
Rugby
Golf
Tennis

Pomp would be a good person to ask about this since he has worked for Ladbrokes I think, the above is just a guess from what people i know always bet on.

As for UK people betting on US sports, yeah i'd also say NFL.

[Strider1973]

For Germany, its first and foremost soccer.
Forget about rugby, baseball or basektball in Germany.

[pokerworx]

Big boxing matches has to be right up especially when home grown fighters are at it, my guess would be

Horse Racing
Football
Golf
Big boxing matches

after that a range of things, Darts, Snooker, F1, UFC etc.

[patmcluk]

I also have worked as a bookie and I would say in the UK it is basically;

90% Horse-racing
5% Football (Played with the foot and a ball - not your hands and an egg!)
4% Greyhound racing
1% the rest (Tennis on Wimbledon week - Golf on UK Open week, Boxing when big, etc)

There is a tiny niche of dedicated British gamblers that gamble on US Sports......

[Flushdraw]

Agree with pat on this one. If you walk into any bookies 99% of the people are watching horse racing/ greyhounds. Casual bettors like a flutter on the football at the weekend but horse racing is what the serious bettors bet on.

[Prenut]

I also have worked as a bookie and I would say in the UK it is basically;

90% Horse-racing
5% Football (Played with the foot and a ball - not your hands and an egg!)
4% Greyhound racing
1% the rest (Tennis on Wimbledon week - Golf on UK Open week, Boxing when big, etc)

There is a tiny niche of dedicated British gamblers that gamble on US Sports......

Wow, that overwhelming for horse racing huh? I'm glad I started this thread, as I always thought football was the #1 sport people bet on. I guess I couldn't have been more wrong.

[faststeady]

aussies

horses, afl (toughest game in the world thats played with an egg ), greyhounds, rugby league, harness racing

[Prop]

In Thailand by far football (the foot and ball version). Perhaps I'm just not aware of it, but here I don't ever hear about horses or other sports bets. Almost every Thai male I know bets on football though, most are broke though so its like the equivalent of $3 to $15 bets for the ones I know - I'm sure the moneys larger in other parts of the country.

Side note: Staying at a resort here once I ran into an expat from Germany who was the greatest horse race gambler who ever lived and despite just meeting me was quite persistent in begging for a stake claiming his betting partner cleaned him out. He even later knocked on my door and said "how about I give you a guaranteed winner, and you can pay me a small percent of the win".

Hong Kong - Horse racing number one by a mile, nothing else close.

Taiwan - what's starting next? These guys will bet 24/7/365 on anything and everything and they don't need to know jack about it. If there is a betting line on a 7 year olds basketball game a large number of them will be in and many for big money too.