When you think about sports betting, floorball is definitely not the sports that will come to mind. This inventive game, which originates from Sweden, is essentially like floor hockey and resembles hockey in every way you can imagine.
Though it cannot compete with its icy cousin when it comes to popularity, floorball has found more and more fans over the years and nowadays, it’s possible to bet on floorball at all reputable betting sites. In fact, due to being a smaller niche, floorball might have lucrative odds that top even football.
What Exactly is Floorball?
If you enjoy ice hockey, it’s more than likely you’ll love floorball. Intended for indoors playing, floorball is played with five players and a goalkeeper, using plastic balls and sticks. Sticks are, of course, used to drive the ball to the opposite team’s goal. The game itself lasts 3×20 minutes and as in many other sports, it includes penalties, time-outs, and other such mechanics. Similarly to regular hockey, it’s possible for the game to last another ten minutes in case of a tie and penalty shootouts might also happen.
However, there’s one distinct difference in comparison to ice hockey: checking is forbidden. In fact, it can lead to a two-minute penalty. Besides checking being prohibited, it’s not allowed to lift opponents stick and a player cannot raise their stick.
Floorball is most popular in European countries like the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Norway, and Sweden. Sweden is quite easily the most influential of all the countries: it’s officially known as the inventor of the present-day floorball and one of the most important floorball leagues is also from Sweden.
Sweden’s Svenska Superligan and Finland’s Salibandyliiga are the two biggest professional floorball leagues and at the same time, these are also the two major leagues you’ll find among floorball betting options.
Are Floorball Odds Any Good?
Since floorball is such a new field, it’s understandable that even more experienced bettors might have some doubts. Thanks to the simplicity of betting options, a vast selection of competitions, professional leagues, and lucrative odds, floorball can actually be a great option, especially for those who’d like to try betting on something new.
The best betting options are often related to bigger competitions. The main competitions are Floorball’s World Championships, Canada Cup (which happens to be the biggest floorball tournament outside Europe), Czech Open, Champions Cup and EuroFloorball Cup. Beyond these, floorball is tremendously popular in Sweden, having numerous competitions throughout the whole year.
If you’re looking for great floorball odds, those are the competitions to keep an eye on.
How to Bet on Floorball
Similarly to any other sports, the first step towards successfully betting on floorball is familiarizing yourself with the rules. Even if you’re an avid ice hockey bettor, as mentioned above – floorball has many distinct differences that might change the entire course of the game, so it’s essential to learn the rules before placing your bets.
The next step is to find a reputable site that offers plenty of floorball sports betting options. Despite being a fairly new game, floorball is available on most Latvian online betting sites with an especially big selection of betting markets available for Swedish floorball events. You can compare different Latvian “totalizators” sites via this link.
Though the choice of available betting markets might not be comparable to ice hockey, if you opt for a reputable betting or casino site that has a decent amount of floorball leagues covered, you can be sure you’ll never get bored betting on floorball. This new innovative game is something to keep your eye on – and it might even become your new favorite betting choice!
