Euro 2024 Free Bets & Offers

What Are The Main Offer Types?

Normally there are two main offer types put forward when the Euros are about to kick off: free bets and bonuses. Free bets will see you given a set amount of money as a free bet token when you make a deposit into your account and place your first wager with a bookmaker, whilst bonuses usually see you receive bonus money when you’ve met certain criteria and that bonus money then needs to be ‘rolled over’ before it will begin to count as cash.

If you’ve ever paid even a passing interest to adverts from betting companies then you’ll no doubt have seen adverts saying things like ‘Bet £5 On The Euros & Get A £10 Bonus’. The idea is that new customers will sign up to a betting company and deposit money into their account, betting £5 of that money on a European Championship match. By doing so, as long as the bet was placed on an event with odds of, say, 1/2 or greater, you’ll be given £10 in bonus money.

The trick from a bookmaker’s point of view when it comes to such bonus money is in the small print. Normally this will tell you that the bets that you place with your bonus money must also be on events with odds of 1/2 or greater and that you’ll need to rollover your bonus money a certain number of times before you can use it as real cash. If you have to roll it over five times, for argument’s sake, that means it will need to have been bet and settled five times and then you can withdraw it.

The difference between that and a free bet is that the free bet offer will usually have language such as ‘Bet £5 On The Euros & Get A £10 Free Bet’. Once again you’ll need to deposit money into your account and then bet £5 on an event with odds in excess of a certain amount. Once you’ve done that your account will be credited with your £10 free bet. The free bet will also have all sorts of small print, such as needing to place it one lump sum rather than splitting it and also having to hit certain odds criteria.

Sometimes the wording will say something along the lines of ‘Get £10 Money Back On The Euros’. This doesn’t mean that £10 will be refunded to you as cash if you place a £10 bet on a European Championship match and it’s a loser. Instead, if your £10 bet is a winner then you’ll get to keep your winnings and if it’s a loser then you’ll be given a £10 free bet token to use on a different match. The risk of simply losing your £10 is mitigated by the fact that you’ll get a £10 free bet token, which is better than nothing at all, but still need to be wagered to convert it into cash.

Special Offers

Big events like the Euros attract plenty of event specials, which are basically different ways of giving you free bets and bonuses, but they sound better.  They are often more restricted, to a select match or individual bet, but can also often be higher value than the usual welcome deal if you plan to bet on that market anyway.

Some of the main types are:

What To Look Out For In The Small Print

All offers made during the European Championship will have small print attached to them, so it’s worth thinking about what you need to bear in mind if you’re hoping to take advantage of a bookmaker’s offer.

Here’s a quick look at the sort of things to look out for:

• Are You Eligible?: The offers on the site are designed for UK users over the age of 18 who are residents.  This doesn’t mean you can claim similar deals if outside the UK, just that you should check if you are eligible.
• Qualifying Bet: You generally need to place a qualifying bet over minimum odds to activate a promotion.  This may be open to all sports or could be restricted to a certain sport, market or even bet.
• Minimum Odds: Most bets and free bets or bonus money have to be made on events with a minimum odds figure. Sometimes this will be something like ‘1/2 or greater’, but the small print will tell you for sure.
• Maximum Payout: A lot of the time a bookmaker will tell you that they’ll only payout a certain amount of money on winning free bets. This means that there’ll be no point using your £10 free bet on something with odds of 30/1 if they’re only going to pay out a maximum of £200, for example.
• Rollover Requirements: This is particularly relevant when it comes to bonus money. Oftentimes bookies will say that you need to bet and settle your bonus money a given number of times before it becomes ‘real’ cash money. Keep an eye on the number of rollovers needed and the odds on the bets you can place.
• Is There A Time Limit?: Qualifying for an offer and then when you get them the free bet tokens will both often have time limits attached, saying that you need to use them within 7 or thirty dates, for example.
• Do You Need To Enter A Code?: It’s not uncommon for a bookmaker to tell you that you need to enter a code such as FREEEUROBET10 in order to get your bonus money. Keep an eye out for this if it’s the case.

Obviously this list is far from exhaustive, but hopefully it gives you an idea of the sort of thing that you need to keep a lookout for when you’re trying to take advantage of the free bet offers that are thrown around by bookies in the build-up to the Euros kicking off.

UEFA European Nations Cup

When Delaunay died in 1955 his son Pierre took over as the head of the organisation that would become known as UEFA, picking up the mantel on the desire to create a competitive tournament for European teams. In 1958 the UEFA European Nations Cup was created, with the notion being that the four best teams on the continent would go up against each other in a tournament in France. 17 teams applied to take part, with 8 eventually doing so.

Romania, Portugal, France, the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Austria and Spain were the teams involved in the forerunner of the European Championship. In the end the Soviet Union beat Czechoslovakia 3-0 in one final and France lost 5-4 to Yugoslavia, leading to a final between the Soviet and the Yugoslavs. The former won 2-1 after extra-time to become the first nation to win a pan-European competition.

The Tournament Begins To Be Popular

Spain were chosen as the hosts for the second iteration of the competition, with the hope being that by choosing such a well-known footballing nation it would encourage the likes of England and West Germany to take part after the refusal to do so the first time around. 29 nations entered teams at the qualification stage, proving that it was indeed a popular idea with football loving countries throughout Europe. West Germany wasn’t one of them, though, and England didn’t really take it seriously.

There was a need to get the number of teams that originally applied down, so there was a knockout competition played that eventually left just four teams to move forward to the competition proper. Spain, Denmark, Hungary and the Soviet Union were the ones that made it, with the hosts eventually defeating the holders 2-1 in the final. It was successful enough to mean that the tournament began to gain a certain level of prestige, even if political troubles in Europe at the time marred certain moments just as it had done four years earlier.

A Group Stage Is Introduced

Italy played hosts for the 1968 iteration of the competition, but things were complicated in terms of the structure as 31 teams wanted to take part in it. As a result it was decided that a group stage would be used initially and the winners of the groups would progress to a quarter final stage. West Germany finally entered but disappointed, failing to get out of their group. The hosts nation won again, this time thanks to Italy’s 2-0 win over Yugoslavia in the final.

The group stage was seen as something of a success for the process of whittling down the number of teams that wanted to enter the tournament, so it was used again when Belgium was the host nation in 1972. The competition had really begun to hit its stride and be taken seriously by this point, which was confirmed when West Germany defeated the Soviet Union in the final to be declared the champions of Europe. The would go on to win the World Cup two years later to prove their dominance.

Big Changes Come In

Having been growing in popularity year-on-year, a decision was taken to make big changes to the competition in 1980 when the tournament proper saw 8 teams take part rather than 4. It was also the first year that involved the host nation qualifying for the final stage automatically. This lasted until 1996 when England was the host nation and the tournament was expanded to welcome 16 teams to the final stage.

Four years later and another first came into effect for the Euros, when the Netherlands and Belgium shared hosting duties. It was the tournament in 2004 that was seen as being representative of the true nature of the European Championship when Greece won it at odds of 150/1. This caused the football associations of countries like Scotland and Ireland to want to be a part of it, so they proposed that it should be expanded to welcome 24 teams. That came to pass for the 2016 competition.

Delayed Pan-European Tournament A Success

The decision to host Euro 2020 across the European continent in 12 different countries was already an ambitious thing to do but the fact the tournament was delayed by a year and then played against the backdrop of a global pandemic made it even more of an unknown.

By the time the tournament rolled around eventually in 2021 the number of countries was reduced to 11 as Dublin could not host due to local restrictions in the country.  Most games were played in front of half-filled stadiums with fans finding extreme difficulty traveling around.

Despite the odds being stacked against Euro 2020 (which kept the name 2020 simply because UEFA and sponsors already spent a load on branding) it turned out to be a resounding success.  The quality was high with 142 goals scored in the 52 games, 36 more than in France 2016, and referring was far better with 2.9 yellow cards per game compared with just over 4 per game in 2016.  That is despite VAR, which for once largely stayed out of proceedings taking a light touch role, that was appreciated by fans.