Gary Neville crowned champion in Paddy’s World Cup of Football Pundits

Was it ever in doubt?

Gary Neville Jamie Carragher

By / Football News, Premier League / 5 years ago

Here at Paddy Power lockdown has got us longing for live football, be it a not-so Super Sunday or an early evening Europa League dead rubber.

Reminiscing about the good ol’ days got us thinking about the pundits who are on hand to analyse the action – with some definitely missed more than others.

So we decided to launch Paddy Power’s World Cup of Pundits to get a definitive answer on which of the studio sidekicks sit top of the pile.

And after a day of voting, you’ve decided Gary Neville is the top dog in the analysis game.

Nev went in as favourite, and duly saw off Jamie Carragher, Roy Keane and Chris Kamara in the semi-finals to be crowned champion.

We started the day with Group A where United legend Neville, who went in as the 4/1 favourite, romped home with ease.

His main competition was expected to ex-Arsenal star and I’m a Celeb alumni Ian Wright, but in the end he was well off the Sky Sports man.

Jamie Redknapp wasn’t far behind Wrighty, with Michael Owen an unsurprising fourth in the running.

Neville’s Monday Night Football partner Carragher was priced at 5/1 to win Group B, and the ex-Liverpool star duly delivered the goods with a routine victory to book a place in the final.

He was a clear winner with Match of the Day icon Alan Hansen, present regular on the show Alan Shearer and Sky’s Super Sunday veteran Graeme Souness all well adrift.

Former Manchester United and Ireland captain Roy Keane was priced at 7/1 to win Group C, with Jermaine Jenas, Peter Crouch and Andy Gray for company.

He made light work of the opposition to join Nev and Carra in the final later in the afternoon.

In Group D, Soccer Saturday icon Chris Kamara went in well-fancied, having garnered a legion of loyal supporters after his infamous ‘I don’t know Jeff’ calamity in 2010.

Ireland’s own Eamon Dunphy was a 14/1 shot to claim the prestigious crown, with Alex Scott also in the mix along with Robbie Savage.

It was Kammy who booked a place in the final to make it an-all Sky Sports affair with just over half of the vote.

And with an hour’s voting in the final, it was Neville who came out on top with 43.3% of the vote.

His old United pal Keane chalked up 26.6% of the vote to finish second with Liverpool legend Carragher third on 15.6%.

Not far behind was Kammy who polled 14.4% of votes.

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