France Clear Favourite To Win Group

Published on May 18th, 2014 3:10 pm EST
Today we are continuing with our breakdown of all of the World Cup 2014 Groups with our evaluation of Group E.

Group E contains the following four teams:

France
Switzerland
Ecuador
Honduras

Let's look at how each of the four teams qualified for the event:

France - won a UEFA playoff match against Ukraine (3-2)
Switzerland - won Group E of UEFA qualifying
Ecuador - finished fourth in CONMEBOL qualifying (top four teams automatically qualified)
Honduras - finished third in CONCACAF qualifying (top three teams automatically qualified)

Despite narrowly qualifying for the World Cup (they edged by Ukraine), France is the clear favourite to win this group. Let's take a look at the odds to win the Group:

France, 1.80
Switzerland, 3.25
Ecuador, 5.50
Honduras, 17.00

Now the odds to qualify from the group:

France, 1.20
Switzerland, 1.57
Ecuador, 1.91
Honduras, 8.00

As you can see, the only team that is really considered to be a longshot to qualify is Honduras, while the other three teams all have a better than even money chance of advancing.

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The Group E schedule looks like this:

June 15th

Switzerland vs Ecuador
France vs Honduras

June 20th

Switzerland vs France
Honduras vs Ecuador

June 25th

Honduras vs Switzerland
Ecuador vs France

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Will there be any big upsets in this group? Will France be able to make it through, or will the teams from Ecuador and Switzerland give them a hard time?

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