San Marino and Romania And today they shine in one of the strangest qualifying matches for the 2026 World Cup. Not only because the Flashes were facing one of the weakest teams in the world against an opponent who was fighting for qualification, but because the competition regulations allowed for a scenario that was as strange as it was real: La Serenissima needed to lose by a landslide to maintain a remote chance of reaching the World Cup qualifiers.
Finally, this scenario disappeared after the defeat against Bosnia and Herzegovina, which did not leave Romania any chance in the qualifiers to reach the World Cup in the traditional way, and remained with the “playoff” place that San Marino aspired to. This place is awarded to the best seed in League D of the Nations League, where the worst teams on the European continent play..
This context translates into a betting market that clearly reflects the sporting distance between the two teams and the exceptional nature of the scenario. San Marino’s win came with a payout of $100.00 at Betson (now standing at 80.00 heading into the match), one of the highest odds in the entire qualifying round and an indication of the exceptional nature of a San Marino win. On the other hand, Romania’s favoritism is expressed through a share of 1.01, while parity amounts to 26.00, an alternative that also seems unlikely.
San Marino arrived at this latest double-date mired in a scenario as improbable as it was real: they maintained the remote possibility of reaching the 2026 World Cup qualifiers. Thanks to its status as one of the group winners in the last Nations Leaguegiving you an exceptional qualification window.
For this option to remain viable, the team needed a very precise mix of results in the other groups and, in particular, for Romania to improve its goal difference to displace Bosnia and Herzegovina, thus freeing up one of the qualifying places that San Marino had been aiming to win.
This equation generated an unprecedented paradox: San Marino could only benefit from the defeat to Romania. That’s why I paid more than Al-Nasr will pay today.
How was the account? A heavy defeat would have allowed the Romanians to advance in their group and keep open the mathematical possibilities that could have favored San Marino in the final distribution of places. Given this scenario, the organizational framework has circumstantially turned this match into an exceptional situation where a negative result could preserve the last thread of hope in the World Cup.
This is reflected in the odds of a Swedish-origin betting house. Not just because they are a team that has never started as favorites in the lead-up to matches, but because defeat on this particular occasion could mean their last chance to reach the World Cup.
San Marino is the lowest team in the FIFA rankings (210th) And his performance has historically been very poor: he has barely won three matches in 219 officials.
San Marino comes into this match with a record that alone explains the extent of the surprise any positive result would entail: until September 2024, they had gone 141 matches without a win, one of the longest droughts recorded in international football. This streak was only broken on 5 September 2024, when they achieved a historic 1-0 victory over Liechtenstein in the UEFA Nations League, their first official victory and only the second in their history, also including a friendly match against Liechtenstein in 2004. In those two winless decades, the team suffered more than 135 defeats, conceded more than 560 goals and barely added a few draws, numbers that cement their reputation as the weakest team in Its history. FIFA rankings and the exceptional nature of any possibility of progressing in the World Cup rankings
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