World of Wagers: Norwegian nuggets and three Saturday picks

Odds Now's resident football data expert Felix Morson-Pate returns with his latest World of Wagers column, which shines focus on football's lesser-heralded leagues.

As well as putting Norway in the spotlight this week, Felix also have three fancies from the upcoming weekend's slate.

League In Focus: Norwegian Eliteserien

With just a handful of games to go before the Norwegian season comes to a close, we find a surprise leader at the top of the table.

Viking Stavanger, chasing their first title in 34 years, sit a point above recent juggernauts Bodo/Glimt (who albeit have a game in hand and a far superior goal difference).

It would be quite the upset if Viking were to pull it off, but I’d like to look further down the table for my teams to focus on this week.

If you are looking for a side to get with in the closing weeks, then I think that Stromsgodset could find themselves a path to getting out of relegation danger. Currently sat second bottom, four points off the relegation playoff and a further point away from complete safety, they did actually recently have a run of three straight wins.

My ratings (which use market closing lines and underlying performance data as well as raw results) have them as the 12th best side in the division as things stand, not 15th. Add into the mix that most of their remaining fixtures are against lower mid-table sides with little to play for, and a touch of regression to the mean, and they could finish the season stronger than their relegation rivals.

Sandefjord meanwhile could be a side to run out of steam and are one to get against in the last few games.

Sat in fifth, but a huge 11 points off the race for European football next season and rated just 9th on my numbers, they’ve suffered a couple of rather heavy defeats of late and can seem a touch too overly reliant on main forward Stefan Ingi Sigurdarson at times.

It’s a middling final run of fixtures, but I’d be siding against them more often than not going forward

Felix's best bets for Saturday October 18th 2025

Belgrano +0.5 AH (Double Chance) vs Boca Juniors - Evs (Bet365)

On paper, this may not look too appealing given Boca’s reputation as one of the premier Argentine clubs.

However, in a league where goals really do come at a premium (it is not uncommon to see 1.75 or even 1.5 total goal lines), Belgrano are making themselves incredibly difficult to beat at the minute, with four draws and a win from their last five.

Boca themselves are a tough nut to crack, but are hardly brushing past weaker opposition either, so to get two out of three results fully on side here seems an excellent proposition.

Over 3.25 goals in Breidablik vs Vikingur Reykjavik - 7/8 (Bet365)

Surprisingly, the home side are actually odds on favourites here against a Vikingur outfit in rather excellent form of late, racking up four wins on the spin.

Diving into my ratings, I’d have this closer to a pick’em game, and as the two best sides in Iceland, we could be in for a real shoot out here.

Both sides create plenty but crucially also concede quite a few chances and goals, and so something like a 3-2 either way does not seem too far out of the question here.

BTTS in La Louviere vs Westerlo - 8/13 (Bet365)

I'm keeping it fairly simple here, based on the following:

• La Louviere are slight underdogs at home. I would have them slight favourites with that home advantage but this is still a very evenly matched contest.
  
• It’s a 2.75 goal line, and Pro League games can easily become quite open.
  
• Westerlo matches are averaging 3.8 goals per game so far this term (1.8 for, 2.0 against)
  

This bet has not landed in four of the last five Westerlo games, but based on the numbers for both sides, I think that run has to end soon and this weekend could well be the time.