Qualification for the summer Women’s World Cup has ended. Which selections do the bookmakers favour for the title?

Australia and New Zealand will host the ninth Women’s World Cup in July/August. Women’s football also hosts its pinnacle event once every four years, but in contrast to men’s football, the four-year cycles alternate on odd-numbered years. The championship will also feature a total of thirty-two teams for the first time in history.

It is also the first time the biggest event in the women’s football world has ever been held in the geographical area of Australia and Oceania.

Sticking with historical data for a moment, we find that the very first Women’s World Cup, held in 1991 in China, featured only twelve teams at that time.

The number of participants in the tournament has apparently changed three more times over time as women’s football has become more popular.

Eight years later, the 1999 championship in the USA featured sixteen teams, sixteen years later in Canada twenty-four teams, and another eight years later we come to the present and the aforementioned three and twenty teams.

The selections will be divided into eight groups in the classic manner, with the top two selections advancing to the knockout stage.

Regarding the bookmakers’ odds, SkyBet, for example, favours the defending champions, the USA, with odds of 4. The second place in this ranking is taken by England with odds of 4.5 and the third place is taken by Germany and Spain with odds of 8.

The other, wider favourites are the French (10), Swedes (13), Australians (15) and the Dutch (17), Brazilians (21) and Canadians (29) round out the top ten.

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