Champions League Betting
The UEFA Champions League is entering its 58th season and to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the FA, Wembley Stadium has been chosen to host the 2012-13 Champions League Final on March 15th 2013.
With the the Champions League group stages fast approaching, last seasons surprise winners, Chelsea will be hoping to prove the bookies wrong and win a second successive European title.
With the play-offs narrowing the teams left in the competition, there's bound to be some great odds and betting offers to claim over the coming weeks!
Champions League Free Bets
The Champions league has 76 teams registered to take part from the 52 UEFA member nations but only the best teams make it through this tough competition.
Each country is awarded a number of places up to a maximum of four, based on the teams' performance in European competition over the last five seasons.
You'll find the most successful countries, including England and Spain, enter with four teams with most bookie offers like the SkyBet free bet better used on teams with previous success in the Champions League.
A total of 22 teams progress directly through to the group stages of the competition. Amongst those through this season are Arsenal, Chelsea, Man City and Man United while Real Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia are through for Spain with Juventus and Milan representing Italy.
A number of teams enter qualifying rounds at various points in the provisional three rounds and single play-off phase. You'll be able to get some great betting offers and free bets on most Champions League fixtures in the two-leg knockout games in the qualifying rounds.
Clubs like Motherwell and Feyenoord have already been eliminated by Greek runners-up Panathinaikos and Dynamo Kiev in the third qualifying round.
Champions League Betting
Bookies launch their free bets and Champions League betting offers once the group stages start so make sure you follow 'Free Bet Offers' on Twitter to keep on top of all the best offers.
The top two teams from each group progress to the round 16 of the 2012/13 Champions League competition, when the tournament becomes a knockout played over two legs.
As the competition progresses odds change and you'll find more free bet offers and betting offers targeting selected teams and individual player betting markets.
English champions Man City, and runners-up Man United will be hoping to better last season when they failed to progress past the group stages and there are some decent free bets available at the some of the best bookies in the business on the chances of both Manchester clubs failing to make the round of 16 two seasons in a row.
Both Barcelona and Real Madrid are the bookies favourites to win the Champions League and we'll expect to see a large amount of money bet on just these teams. As favourites, the odds may not be the best so you'll get much better value by using free bet offers on some of the less popular teams/matches in the tournament.
Despite last season's result, both Manchester clubs and big spending French club Paris Saint-Germain are also amongst the bookies favourites. Those backing Chelsea are hoping new signing Eden Hazard can inspire the holders to a second Champions League title.
When you've decided who to bet on, sign up with a bookie that offers good odds as well as Champions League free bets on the markets you wish to bet on.
Champions League Odds
As well as odds, betting offers also vary from bookie to bookie so you may wish to sign-up with more than one to take advantage of numerous free bets and betting offers as well as live in-play betting deals on this seasons Champions League.
The Champions League always throws up a few surprises as we saw in the 2011/12 season when Bayern Munich lost the final - even with home advantage.
Recovering from that loss, along with missing out on the Bundesliga title to Borussia Dortmund may make it difficult for Bayern to return to the later stages of this year's Champions League.
If you're looking for more of a long shot at the winner, make full use of bookie offers and free bets by betting on Italian champions Juventus's return to the Champions League.
The Champions League is one of the most exciting football tournaments when it comes to betting as it pitches the top teams in Europe against each other. You'll get some great online betting offers and free bets throughout the competition with bookies giving some strong odds.
This seasons Champions League is set to offer some great matches so join an online bookie, place your bets and watch the completion and excitement unfold!
