Women's World Cup: Best bets for the tight England-Spain final

It's been a long, hard journey full of early morning kickoffs, but we’ve made it to the end. The Women’s World Cup final will take place on Sunday, August 20 at 6 a.m. ET, and it will be contested by two European powerhouses: England and Spain.

World Cup finals are rarely mismatched, but this one feels especially tight. England has the edge in head-to-head competition (it’s 6-2-3) and won the most recent meeting of the two in last summer’s European Championships. England also carries the most ‘big game’ experience, having played in — and won — a major final at that same tournament.

But don’t count Spain out. It’s the top-scoring team at this tournament by far, even when the stats are adjusted to account for all the extra games Spain played to get to the final. It boasts a spine of players from Barcelona, which means it has one of international soccer’s great unsung advantages: the ability to play like a club team. And it’s led by Alexia Putellas, two-time winner of the Ballon D’Or — a stat that puts her on par with legends like Alfredo Di Stefano, Franz Beckenbauer and Ronaldo.

Both England and Spain play a possession-based game; they’ll be fighting to control the center of the park to keep the tempo at their preferred level. Both feature controversial coaches whose methods caused former star players to abandon the team altogether. And both are likely to have young, headline-grabbing phenoms on the bench who will be used as impact substitutes (keep an eye out for Lauren James and Salma Paralluelo.)

So: everything is balanced in this World Cup final. But balance doesn’t mean that bets are impossible to come by. Here’s where we think the smart wagers are hiding.

Over/Under Goals Scored

World Cup finals have a reputation for being stodgy, defensive affairs, but the stats don’t back that reputation up. The past five Women’s World Cup finals featured an average of 3.6 goals per game, with none of them featuring fewer than two goals each. In fact, you have to go all the way back to the infamous 1999 final — you know the one — to find a match that stayed scoreless all the way to penalty kicks.