Drake and some leading players lost big money betting on the World Cup final, which Argentina won on penalties. [Image: Shutterstock.com]
Lots of interest betting
The FIFA World Cup Final exceeded everyone’s expectations in terms of drama and excitement. Not many people would have predicted the wild ups and downs that eventually led to Argentina winning the lead against France. With Sunday’s game miraculously finishing 2-2 after regular time and 3-3 after extra time, the trophy home for the next four years had to be decided via a penalty shootout.
The big names revealed their big bets
No matter where you are in the world, the World Cup is always a huge event for bettors. Huge amounts are wagered on the games every time it spins. Some of the big names revealed their big bets in the run-up to the final and it didn’t go so well for them.
Drake’s curse continues
Superstar rapper Drake has a history of high-stakes gambling. Be it playing online roulette, betting on UFC fights, or betting on soccer matches, he loves posting screenshots of his sure bet. While he backed the right team to win the World Cup final with a share of $1 million, he bet on Argentina to win in regular time. This means that he lost a potential payout of $2.75 million and lost his $1 million bet.
Drake has a partnership with online gambling platform Stake, which is one of the unregulated casino sites that were banned from Twitch streams in October.
Some people think Drake is damned when it comes to betting, as many of his major bets in recent months have failed. That includes losing over $2 million betting on Israel Adesanya to retain the UFC title last month.
No luck for live broadcast celebrities
A number of high-profile gambling-focused players have also lost large sums of money betting on the World Cup final. xQc was confident going into the match that France would come out on top. He was saying from the very first match of the tournament that the reigning champions would retain the title. He put $500,000 on France to win the match in regular time, with an estimated payout of $1.4 million:
Trainwreck placed the same bet as xQc on Les Bleus. Rochten backed France to victory in regular time, and put $1 million on his selection. He took to Twitter after the match to congratulate Argentina on their victory, saying that it “was probably one of the best finals I’ve ever seen”.
Each of these three has a long history of gambling with large sums of money, so losing bets of this magnitude is nothing new for them. They all made a name for themselves by broadcasting gambling-related content on Twitch until the Amazon-owned platform banned streaming of unregulated online casino games in October.
