Indian Football Betting: Exploring Emerging Leagues And Market Trends

• October 14,2024
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• Bruce Williams

Indian Football Betting: Exploring Emerging Leagues And Market Trends

Football, known as soccer in some spheres, is easily the most popular sport in the world in terms of audiences. This naturally means that football is also the sport that attracts the most betting action. The situation is considerably different in India, though. Football is far from being the most followed sport there. Horse racing and cricket - especially cricket - receive far greater attention and coverage, given that they are both steeped in Indian culture. While most other forms of sports betting, including football, are outlawed, horse racing betting has always been legal in the country.

Football In India

We have already established that football is underdeveloped in India, unlike staple sports like cricket and horse racing. Nonetheless, football is still well-loved in the country and has been catching up to other sports in recent years. Factors that are fuelling football fanaticism in India include grassroots growth, improved media coverage, better infrastructure, foreign influence, and, not least, online sports betting. An interesting aspect of football in India is the uncanny connection to Spanish football. By the end of 2020, the top flight of Indian football - the Indian Super League - had seven Spanish coaches: Sergio Lobera, Antonio López, Carles Cuadrat, Juan Ferrando, Kibu Vicuña, Gerard Nus, and Manolo Márquez. Add this to the fact that over 20 Spanish players - Aitor Monroy, Aridane Santana, and more - were playing in the ISL. As per a 2022 survey, the Spanish Primera Division (top flight of Spanish football, also known as La Liga) receives the highest football betting volume of any soccer league in the country, competing admirably among a clutch of cricket competitions in the top 10 of sports leagues most betted on. So, in many ways, Spanish football provides the benchmark that Indian football wishes to emulate in the next few years.

Betting On Football In India

2023 is a wonderful year for sports punters in India, with the government finally seeing the light and looking into how sports betting can be regulated and managed instead of outlawed. Several states - Sikkim, Nagaland, and Meghalaya, to name a few - have already created licensing bodies for online casinos and sportsbooks. This, as expected, has seen a spate of local sportsbooks cropping up in the country, almost all of which are, of course, able to offer football betting to the citizenry. The rest of the country is served by offshore betting sites, with most international providers freely admitting sign-ups from India. Bet365, 1xBet, Betway, 22Bet, and Parimatch are top destinations for Indian sports punters.

Indian Football Betting Leagues & Trends

• The Indian Super League (ISL) - continues to see ample betting action annually, which is to be expected given that it is the country’s top flight. Local and offshore sportsbooks offer various options for ISL football punters. As per statistics from Betstudy, Over/Under 2.5 Goals and 1X2 are two types of wagers popularly made in the ISL.

• However, ISL betting action does not compare to internationally renowned leagues from other countries where football is highly developed. Chief among those leagues is La Liga, which receives a whopping 6% of all sports tournaments betting volume in India. The English Premier League (EPL) and European competitions like the Champions League and Europa League are also popular.