Starcraft 2 Is The Name Of The Game This Week In eSports Betting
If you are looking for any further indication that eSports may become the biggest and fastest-growing form of competitive sports to have emerged in many a year, the news that many top colleges in America have a burgeoning eSports scene of their own may well give this belief further credence.
In an article on DorkShelf, Danny Hsieh, a student at the University of British Columbia and a member of its Counter Strike: Global Offensive (GO) team revealed just how popular the eSports industry was becoming at inter-collegiate level.
“It’s not like football or baseball or basketball. You don’t have to play against guys in your area,” explained Danny.
“You can play against people across Canada or the United States or even across the world. So yeah, I do think that schools are going to start to pick up on it as an actual collegiate sport.”
The fact that some universities in the United States, such as Robert Morris University in Illinois, are now offering students proficient in eSports scholarships based on their eSports skills, further confirms how quickly eSports are becoming the norm within the American college system.
That rapid growth is mirrored too in the world of betting, where eSports has gone from being a betting option that only one or two sites offered, to increasingly being offered by a number of betting firms and the number now carrying eSports betting seems to grow by the week.
What is certain is that this is the beginning of an industry that has almost limitless capability to allow people to participate, enjoy and entertain. With that in mind, it’s a great time to start betting on esports, so let’s take a look at what bookmakers are going to be offering odds on this week.
Starcraft 2 betting highlights
The lengthy SK Telecom Proleague is in the final stages of Round 4 of the competition before the best four teams progress into the final stage of the competition, the playoffs.
Three of the four playoff places have already been decided with the event sponsors team SK Telecom T1 currently the clear leader after three rounds. Two other teams, CJ Entus and Jin Air Green Wings, have also performed well enough in the first three rounds to secure their berth in the play offs.
That leaves the five other teams, KT Rolster, SBENU, MVP, Samsung Galaxy and Prime fighting it out for the final play off spot, although after five matches in Round 4, Prime are out of the running having yet to win a match.
However, Samsung Galaxy, SBENU and MVP are tied on a 3-2 record with just two games to go in Round 4.
The action starts this week on Monday with leaders SK Telecom T1 taking on MVP and Jin Air Green Winds facing off against KT Rolster. Then on Tuesday CJ Entus take on winless Prime, while the big play off decider pits SBENU against Samsung Galaxy in what could be the crucial game in deciding which team makes the playoffs.
If you are looking for top quality Starcraft 2 SK Telecom Proleague betting this week then we recommend you take a look at the likes of Pinnacle Sports, Ladbrokes, Bet365 esport, 10Bet and William Hill for some of the most competitive betting markets on these four big clashes.
It is a relatively quiet time of the year for League of Legends and DOTA 2 tournaments, with many of the major events having finished in both these eSports games earlier in August, however such is the growth in the popularity of eSports that some minor events may be covered by some sports betting sites over the coming weeks.
It is hard to predict exactly which minor competitions could be covered and where, so as always, it is a great idea to check sites like Pinnacle Sports, Betway, Unikrn and Paddy Power sports on a daily basis to see what new markets have been made available.
Counter Strike GO: betting preview
One place you can certainly head for a little additional betting on the hugely popular Counter Strike: GO game is Betway as on Tuesday 25th, the site will bring you betting markets on four top matches in the ESL UK league.
We’ve reached the Group Stage of the competition and it sees eight of the very best UK teams competing for a £10,000 prize. Last week saw four teams, United Estonia, FM-eSports, Choke Gaming and csgoCASINO emerge with Week One victories against CEX, Good Looking Gamers, Team Infused and Fish123 respectively.
As luck would have it, the four victors from the first week will now face off against each other with csgoCASINO first up at 19:00 on Tuesday 25th August taking on United Estonia and at 21:00, the other two winners from last week FM-eSports face off against Choke Gaming.
In between those two games, Team Infused will battle Good Looking Gamers, while at 22:00, CEX against Fish123 will round off the evening.
It is only this week that the ESL UK Premier League games will take place on Tuesday, as from next week onwards, the remaining matched will be contested on a Monday.
Top eSports betting tips
Given the volatile nature of eSports, most bookmakers that offer odds on eSports events do not tend to offer odds much in advance of a match taking place. It is generally rare for a bookmaker to offer odds on an event, especially a smaller scale event, up to 48 hours before its starts.
As such, the most important thing to remember about eSports betting is that you should check back with your chosen bookmaker regularly throughout the week to see what betting markets have been added to the list for you to bet on.
Another thing to note is that most eSports tournaments have matches scheduled for the weekend, rather than midweek, so you will tend to have a far greater choice of bets and betting markets available if you tend to bet on eSports over the weekend.
Image Stefano Tinti / Shutterstock.com