Once the dust had settled and Spain had strode off with their second World Cup trophy back in July, a lot of fans and pundits began putting the tournament behind them and looking ahead to the domestic seasons.
So too did betting companies, like Norsk Tipping, and sportstech firms like Sportradar.
But for these companies another task inevitably presented itself – taking a look at the huge amount of data and fan engagement insights a tournament like the World Cup provides.
In the second part of SBC News’ World Cup overview, Norsk Tipping’s Hans Erland Ringsvold and Sporradar’s Jens Nielsen, we take a look at player behaviour during this year’s tournament, and to what extent it has changed…
How has Norsk Tipping’s understanding of player engagement and sports bettor behaviour changed as a result of this World Cup, if it all?
Hans Erland Ringsvold: Given our strict responsibility regime, we have no desire to use the championships as a platform to make our customers more interested in rapid live sports markets. Our ambition is to be present so that our customers can place a bet on the matches they want, in the way that they want.
We had over half a million Norwegians place one or more bets on the match against England. These are numbers we would hardly have thought possible. For those unaware of the adult population in Norway, more than 500,000 customers is the equivalent of one in eight Norwegians above 18 years old placing a bet on that match alone!
Have there been any particularly noticeable changes in betting behaviour compared to other big international tournaments, such as more bets on individual players as opposed to teams?
Hans Erland Ringsvold: With one of the world’s biggest superstars on our team, it’s perhaps no surprise that betting on Erling Haaland was very popular. Luckily for us, he never scored a hat-trick, although he came very close on a couple of occasions in the group stage. But with a brace in three games, it became expensive for us.
But yes, we see that the proportion of bettors on match winners is decreasing with each championship, with customers gravitating towards pre-canned bet builders, totals, both teams to score, correct score and not least player props. The increased focus on players and not only teams, both national and league, is a trend I guess any bookmaker sees.
Jens Nielsen: As expected, we saw more player-centric betting globally and player props became an important point of differentiation for Sportradar. There was strong interest in narratives built around players to score, and to make assists and passes.
It helped that so many of football’s biggest stars performed so well at the tournament. The attention on profiles like Haaland, Mbappé, Messi and Kane certainly increased the focus on player-related markets.
What were Norwegians’ expectations ahead of the matches against Brazil and England? Were there any particular markets that got a lot of interest?
Hans Erland Ringsvold: After the victory against Ivory Coast, the World Cup was already a success, and the Norwegian people were incredibly optimistic ahead of the match against Brazil. Remember that Norway has never lost to Brazil in World Cup history, and the famous match in 1998 was, until this championship, the most talked about match in the country’s history. It ended 2-1, so many believed that this would happen again.
Brazil was defeated and the optimism ahead of the match against England did not decrease much. As previously mentioned, our customers went completely crazy and ran to the app to place a bet on Norway.
In both matches, it was mostly variants with Norwegian success that were bet on, where Erling Haaland would score was the most popular, in addition to Norway advancing.
The Norsk Tipping sportsbook growth compared to the previous World Cup 2022 and the Euro 2024 highlights the impressive scale of engagement. Using the 2022 World Cup as a baseline (index 100), the 2026 tournament demonstrated an extraordinary lift across all core metrics:
Lasty, Jens, what would you say the main lessons are for the next tournament? Are there any key takeaways from World Cup 2026 around bet processing and data leveraging for the 2030 tournament?
Jens Nielsen: We believe there is still plenty of room for innovation in sports betting, especially for the products and the user experiences to become more customized and more personalised.
We will keep innovating our sportsbook services and features along these lines in the coming years and expect the sportsbook experience of 2030 to greatly reflect this.