Euro 2024 Golden Boot Betting Tips
- Romelu Lukaku (each-way)
- Dominik Szoboszlai (each-way)
Now, every punter will have their own approach, but my two main criteria for looking for a Golden Boot winner are: A) a player who scores a high percentage of his team’s goals and takes penalties, and B) a player whose team is in a really weak group and should rack up plenty of goals. So, without further ado…
Romelu Lukaku
Belgium’s Romelu Lukaku fits both these criteria nicely having racked up an incredible 14 goals in eight qualifying matches and possesses a sensational international record of 85 goals in 115 matches.
Lukaku has had a polarising club career which has oscillated between excellence (Everton and Inter Milan), relative mediocrity (Man Utd) and outright disaster (his second spell at Chelsea). Belgium’s early exit at World Cup 2022 fits the latter category with Lukaku missing four chances at a combined 1.7 expected goals in a must-win game over Croatia in the last round of group matches which finished 0-0.
Given his age, 31, and Belgium’s superb production line of talent which includes Leipzig’s Lois Openda, this may be Lukaku’s last major tournament as a core player for the Red Devils and he will surely be desperate to make a big impression to help erase those painful memories of two years ago.
His cause is certainly aided by his country playing in the weakest group in the tournament, facing off against Ukraine, Romania and Slovakia. All of these sides are 125/1 or higher in the Outright Market and Belgium’s potent forward line should have far too much for this level of opposition.
Manager Domenico Tedesco has an arsenal of attacking talent that is the envy of most managers at the tournament including established Premier League talent like Kevin De Bruyne, Leandro Trossard and Jeremu Doku, as well as emerging stars like Charles De Ketelaere and Johan Bakayoko.
Scoring chances are guaranteed for Big Rom in this lineup against the small-fry opponents that Group E provides. And as we saw four years ago, Cristiano Ronaldo won the Golden Boot with all five of his goals coming in the group stages. Don’t be surprised if history repeats itself in this tournament.
Dominik Szoboszlai (each-way)
My second selection is of the more speculative variety and readers may be wondering how a player who scored just three Premier League goals in 2023/24 could even be considered for a bet like this. Well, before you click that little X on this tab, there are many reasons to believe that we will see a completely different player to the one that had an up-and-down first season at Anfield.
Firstly, Dominik Szoboszlai is the attacking hub of Hungary and plays a similar role for the Magyars as Gareth Bale played so successfully for Wales. He will take every set piece and averaged a whopping 3.5 shots per game in 2023 which for context, are the kind of shot numbers Mo Salah racks up for their club, Liverpool.
Szoboszlai has scored six goals in his last 12 matches at international level at the heart of a surprisingly high-scoring Hungary side. They averaged 2.0 goals scored per game in topping their qualification group and have the ability to be one of the tournament’s surprise teams. Added to that, their group opposition in Scotland, Switzerland and Germany have defensive frailties to varying degrees.
If you’re trying to rack your brain to imagine a player like Szoboszlai winning Golden Boot at an international tournament, think back to World Cup 2014 where James Rodriguez won the award with Colombia. Like James, Szoboszlai will be raining in shots from distance and we just need to get a bit of luck with hopefully a couple of them finding the net.
Euro 2024 Betting Tips
- Romelu Lukaku (each-way)
- Dominik Szoboszlai (each-way)
All prices are bang up to date with our snazzy widgets, while odds in copy are accurate at time of publishing but subject to change.
Read These Next on Euro 2024
- Score your latest football betting tips at Paddy Power News
- When does Euro 2024 start? Date and kick-off time for first game in Germany
- Euro 2024 Golden Boot odds: Who is the favourite to be the top scorer?
- Euro 2024 fixtures, groups and schedule for this summer’s big tournament
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