One of our punters could have cared less about Saturday’s last World Cup quarter-final between Russia and Croatia heading to extra-time because he was already laughing all the way to the bank.
After placing his £20 four-fold early on Friday morning, our Surrey-based winner (who is in his 60s) must have been popping some corks when the whistle blew in Sochi to confirm the game had finished 1-1 in normal time, landing him a whopping £99,840 return.
Showing far greater foresight than Theresa May to net his prize, our crafty customer stunningly predicted the four correct scores of all the World Cup quarter-finals.
The action kicked-off on Friday afternoon as he started his punt by picking the 7/1 shot of France to topple Uruguay 2-0. There was nothing Luis Suarez and Co could do to prevent his call becoming a reality, as goals from Raphael Varane and a horror show from Uruguay goalkeeper Fernando Muslera helped bring home leg one.
His most impressive shout came by backing Belgium’s 1-2 upset of Brazil at 11/1. A Fernandinho own goal and a super strike from Kevin De Bruyne gave Roberto Martinez’s men the lead and our punter will have been grateful for a Renato Augusto’s consolation strike with 14 minutes to go – even if he had a few nervy moments towards the end of the game as Belgium clung on to win.
Next on his hitlist was England’s routine 2-0 victory over Sweden on Saturday, which came in at odds of 7/1. He had Harry Maguire’s massive forehead and Dele Alli to thank for that one!
Finally, he needed Russia and Croatia to play out a 1-1 draw at 11/2 in normal time to score his massive windfall. A belter from Russia’s Denis Cheryshev was quickly answered by Croatia’s Andrej Kramarić in the first half to leave our victor chewing his nails for 51 minutes of match time.
Amazingly, everything fell his way and he now has nearly £100,000 to look forward to England’s World Cup semi-final with Croatia with.
That’s one hell of a bar-tab to play with!
Enjoy the winnings!
Find the latest world cup betting over at paddypower.com