John Cena Opens As WrestleMania 41 Favourite Plus More

John Cena has opened as a betting favourite to defeat Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 41.

The BetOnline Sportsbook opened a book for the April contest which will see Cena challenge Rhodes in a quest to become a seventeen-time world champion.

As of this evening, a win for the Elimination Chamber winner will pay out at odds of -200. Those looking to back the Undisputed WWE Champion will find Cody Rhodes as +150.

On Saturday night, Cena shocked wrestling fans alike when he turned heel on Rhodes and aligned himself with The Rock.

The market is BetOnline's third offering for the event which will take place from Las Vegas' Allegiant Stadium on April 19th and 20th. 

In February, the sportsbook priced up odds for the title challenges involving the winners of the 2025 Royal Rumble matches.

Charlotte Flair is currently -150 to beat Tiffany Stratton for the WWE Women's Championship while Jey Uso is -1,000 for his meeting with World Heavyweight Champion , Gunther (+550).

The challengers had started out at -200 and -3,000 respectively. You can see how the betting has gone (so far) in the tables below.

The majority of early adjustments in the women's title match have sided with Tiffany Stratton even though she isn't the favourite.

Despite starting out at +800, Gunther has had a top price of +1,200, but his odds have reduced into +550 across the near fortnight the market has been available.

View BetOnline's WWE Markets

WWE Elimination Chamber '25 Betting Favourites

Here are the betting favourites for tonight's WWE Elimination Chamber.

• Tiffany Stratton and Trish Stratus
• Kevin Owens
• Bianca Belair to win Elimination Chamber Match (Women)
• Drew McIntyre to win Elimination Chamber Match (Men)

Usually, I would put the selections in order of strength using the markets from BetOnline. For this show, due to BetOnline taking markets off the board both last night and this evening, I have opted to go with the Sky Bet markets.

BetOnline had John Cena as its favourite, but the market saw money landing on Drew McIntyre. The women's market had Banca Belair as favourite, but had seen Alexa Bliss' price drop. 

Bliss and Cena closed as Sky Bet's second-favourites for the respective Chamber matches.

Elimination Chamber Odds Notes For Early Saturday Evening

I have revisited the BetOnline markets for tonight's WWE Elimination Chamber and there are some notes to be addressed.

The first item is regarding the men's Elimination Chamber match. As I mentioned in a post from yesterday evening, the sportsbook had taken the market off the board. It was still absent from the website this morning, when I posted the first update for the day. However, at 4:49PM, I was contacted by a reader of this blog. They told me the market had returned, but had once again been taken off the board.

As you can see, the 4:49PM GMT odds had Drew McIntyre - the person whose prices have been on the downturn since midweek - at +175, which is shorter than yesterday.

John Cena was still BetOnline's favourite. However, his price had moved up to -250 from the previous -375.

CM Punk's odds were also shorter than yesterday - he was at +200 before the market was once again closed.

The women's market has also been taken off the board. That occurred sometime in the late afternoon. I do not have the odds at the time the market was shut, but I have been told Alexa Bliss was seeing action.

A look at the British/European websites would also indicate that Bliss, who is second-favourite in those domestic sites, to be seeing interest from punters.

Bianca Belair is still favourite with the UK/European companies.

If you read this morning's post, you would have seen I entertained the idea of The Rock adding himself to the men's Elimination Chamber match and winning. If there is anybody out there who is of the same opinion, despite the evidently strong interest in a McIntyre victory and that John Cena has been favoured to win due to his seventeenth title chase storyline, then Sky Bet has an option to gamble on 'Any Other Wrestler' to win the match. As of the time of writing, it's 7/1.

An 'Any Other Wrestler' option is also included in Sky Bet's market for the women's match. It is currently 9/1.

In regards to the other bouts on the card - BetOnline is still accepting wagers on those as of the time of writing.

Kevin Owens' odds to beat Sami Zayn in the unsanctioned match have slid into -250 from this morning's -220. As a result, the bookmakers have pushed Zayn up to +170 from +155.

Tiffany Stratton and Trish Stratus are now -3,000 to get a win over Nia Jax and Candice LeRae (+900). When I last wrote about the market this morning, the favourites were priced -2,000 to their opponents' +700.

View BetOnline's WWE Markets

WWE Elimination Chamber '25 Odds For Saturday Morning

In yesterday's post, I noted that the BetOnline Sportsbook had taken its market down for the men's Elimination Chamber match. It is, as of the time of writing, still down. 

I'll get back to that market in due course. For the moment, I'll concentrate on the three other markets that are available to wager on from BetOnline and share with you the tables I've recorded price changes since each market became available last week.

Women's Tag Match

The market for the women's tag team match, which will see WWE Women's Champion - Tiffany Stratton - team up with Trish Stratus to take on Nia Jax and Candice LeRae had the heels priced at +1,200 when I received word from BetOnline about the market. By the time I visited the website, a little under an hour later, I noticed they had been snipped into +900.

The adjustment for Jax and LeRae meant the price for Stratton and Stratus move up from -5,000 to -3,000.

The following morning, I noticed the bookies had taken the favourites down into -4,000 but kept their opponents at +900. However, by the following afternoon, the team of Jax and LeRae had been cut into +700 while the other team was moved to -2,000.

When I visited the website on Thursday afternoon, I noticed Stratton and Stratus' price had dipped into -2,500 thus moving the Jax and LeRae selection out to +800. 

Jax and LeRae were moved back down into +700 overnight. The favourites have also returned to -2,000.

Unsanctioned Match

When BetOnline delivered me the prices for the unsanctioned match between Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn on Wednesday of last week, the sportsbook listed the former as a +150 underdog to Zayn's -200.

By the time I reached the markets myself, Owens' price had reduced to +110 while Zayn was up to -150. 

There was a flip in roles by the following evening as Owens became the match favourite. After slipping into -110 by the morning of February 20th, he was down into -150 and - apart from a period when Zayn price dipped on Thursday of this week, all adjustments have sided with the heel in this chapter of the Owens/Zayn rivalry.

Women's Elimination Chamber Match

Bianca Belair has been the bookmaker's favourite to win the Women's Elimination Chamber match ever since betting commenced. With that said, there have been periods were some of the other runners in the match have had their prices shortened.

Belair was announced at -140 when BetOnline emailed me at 6:48PM GMT on February 19th. However, within an hour her price, along with those for Liv Morgan and Roxanne Perez, had shortened. The favourite was moved into-150 while Morgan moved to +500 from +900 and Perez was cut from +1,000 into +900.

Alexa Bliss was next to dip. Her cut from +900 into +600 - on February 20th - coincided with Belair's price also lowering.

By the following evening, Belair's price was cut into -450 from -300. It was then moved up to -410 de to Liv Morgan's odds once again dropping. This time from +500 into +450. 

Morgan moved into +400 on Thursday of this week. That was followed by Alexa Bliss' odds sliding from +750 into +700 yesterday.

Despite those downwards moves for Morgan and Bliss, Belair has also moved in that direction this week going from -410 into -425 on Tuesday and then into -450 by Thursday afternoon.

As noted around the time of the Royal Rumble, there have been reports of WWE wanting to match Bianca Belair up with Rhea Ripley. With the winner of this match set to challenge Ripley for the Women's World Championship it gives reason as to why Belair opened as the favourite and has seen punters gamble on that result.

Men's Elimination Chamber Match

In yesterday's post, I wrote about how Drew McIntyre's selection had seen late action in the market for the men's Elimination Chamber match and that is the likely reason why BetOnline stopped accepting wagers on the contest. I shared the image of the table, but here it is again for those who might not have seen the post yet.

With John Cena chasing the 'record' world title win in what is his retirement tour - plus the reports that Cody Rhodes versus Cena could be on for WrestleMania - it was understandable to have seen Cena as the favourite to win the Chamber match as the victor claims the shot against Cody Rhodes.

Cena was -600 and, by last week, those odds had descended into -2,000 before McIntyre's slide began on Wednesday. By yesterday evening, those looking to gamble on Cena would have found him at -375: the shortest price he had been during the period this version of the market was available.

CM Punk had started out as a +400 second favourite per the email I received from BetOnline. However, by the time I first came across the market onsite, Punk's price was down to +150. With fluctuations here and there, Punk's price was last at +300 yesterday evening.

All of the other selections, apart from the figurative elephant in the room, have seen their prices increase across the days the market was available. Seth Rollins' numbers went from +900 to +5,000, Logan Paul moved from +2,500 to +6,600 while Damian Priest closed at +10,000 after starting out +2,000.

And then there is Drew McIntyre. I wrote enough about why he could be a good choice to sell his soul to Dwayne Johnson in yesterday's post. 

With all that said, I am still sceptical about McIntyre's chance of winning the Chamber. Especially after last night's Smackdown. I kind of find myself returning to the thought I had upon viewing the promo between Cody Rhodes and The Rock last week.

Back then, I guessed Cody would turn down The Rock earlier in the night and then, with The Final Boss having power within the company (as he has made clear constantly), he could add himself into the match right at its conclusion and go on to win.

I could see Punk and McIntyre selling their souls. Either choice would make sense. But, what if the real elephant in the room is The Rock?

View BetOnline's WWE Markets

BetOnline Takes Elimination Chamber Market Off The Board

BetOnline is currently not accepting wagers on the men's Elimination Chamber match set for tomorrow night's WWE event from Toronto.

The market, which had been available to wager on since last week, had recently been seeing action coming in on Drew McIntyre.

The Scot was +1,600 on February 19th but had drifted out to +2,500 by the following day due to punters siding with John Cena and CM Punk.

However, on Wednesday evening of this week, I noticed McIntyre's price had fallen into +900. It was then at +350 this morning before dropping down into +210 earlier this evening.

As of the time of writing, the market has been taken completely off the board by BetOnline.

I surmise the wagers siding with McIntyre could have something to do with The Rock returning to WWE TV last week.

In an angle which aired on Smackdown, The Rock asked Cody Rhodes to join him. Or something. The talk focused on Dwayne Johnson stating that he figuratively wanted to own Rhodes' soul.

My initial suspicion was for this to lead to CM Punk siding with The Rock, but - after seeing McIntyre's odds move in - it's made me acknowledge there's a good story with McIntyre selling his soul to Johnson. 

It would be the ultimate sale of a soul, in WWE storytelling, because McIntyre has been on the warpath against all members of the Bloodline family since as far back as 2022 when Solo Sikoa cost McIntyre a win against Roman Reigns in the main event of WWE Clash at the Castle in Cardiff.

I keep thinking back to the night of the first Raw on Netflix. Dwayne Johnson was backstage talking with Drew McIntyre live on Instagram. At one point, McIntyre whispered something to Johnson. At that point in time, it could have not meant anything at all. But now, there is a chance this could be turned into an Easter egg. If McIntyre is the person who sides with The Rock in the 'Soul' storyline, of course.

With all that said, McIntyre winning the Elimination Chamber - to set up a bout against Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania - would be a contradiction to some of the reports from the past few weeks. There had been talk about the Scot wrestling Damian Priest at Mania. As well as that, the reports indicated Cody Rhodes would defend the Undisputed WWE Championship against John Cena.

There's also the fact that CM Punk has a favour due from Paul Heyman which also could be WrestleMania main event related.

BetOnline is still accepting wagers on the other bouts on the card. Bianca Belair is currently an odds-on favourite to win the women's Elimination Chamber match.

Visit BetOnline's WWE Page

How Jey Uso And Charlotte Flair Were Backed Leading Into The 2025 WWE Royal Rumble

It's almost twelve hours removed from the 2025 WWE Royal Rumble and one of the main talking points coming out of the event is Jey Uso's win and the odds potential gamblers could have found for him in the months, weeks and hours leading into the show.

As I mentioned in the most recent post, which was published shortly after the PLE ended, Uso was available at +1,800 in BetOnline's Rumble '25 outright markets on November 26th. 

His peak came on and around 25th January when BetOnline pushed the Jey Uso price up to +6,600. This coincided with Uso set to face Gunther for the World Heavyweight Championship later that evening on Saturday Night's Main Event.

By Thursday of this week, Uso's price had dropped into +2,500 and then - sometime in the early hours of yesterday morning - his selection was backed again, forcing BetOnline's system to temporarily take Uso off the board before readjusting the eventual winner into +2,000.

Uso remained at +2,000 right through to the close of the market at 11PM GMT.

Following the result, I noticed speculation on social media that the 66/1 price may have been a 'record' for WWE betting. From the top of my head, I can recall Mansoor was also 66s to win the 50-man battle royal which took place at WWE Super Show-Down in 2019, so - Jey Uso's win at least tied THAT price.

But, just like with Uso last night, Mansoor's price was shorter by the time the market closed for that match.

The Women's Royal Rumble winner was easier to follow.

BetOnline's market for the female version of the match was installed in December. At the time I began to keep record of each selection, Charlotte Flair was a +275 joint second-favourite alongside Rhea Ripley (this was slightly over a month before Ripley regained the Women's World Championship). 

Unlike with Jey Uso's selection, which went up before a late drop, Flair's selection went in one direction - down. 

As you'll be able to see, by yesterday's closure, Flair was the odds-on favourite to win the match. Her price fell from +100 into -200 between the evening of Thursday 23rd January and the following afternoon. That would have been hours before Flair confirmed her place in the Rumble in a video which aired on the 24th January episode of Smackdown.

The final price I have for the eventual winner is -500. After starting out the final day of wagering at -375, Flair's selection fell into her closing number early yesterday evening and remained there until the 11PM GMT cut-off.

BetOnline's 2025 WWE Royal Rumble markets were published in late 2024 and were available right through to 11PM GMT on Saturday 1 February. All prices were collected from the BetOnline Website on the dates noted.

Jey Uso Wins 2025 WWE Royal Rumble

Jey Uso has just won the 2025 WWE Royal Rumble.

From a betting perspective, it should come as a surprise because he closed at +2,000 in BetOnline's outright Rumble winner market.

It is worth noting that Uso was backed on Friday night because his price was at +2,500. There was a period in the early hours when the sportsbook had taken Jey's selection off the board.

The selection had returned by the time I accessed the website at 10:15AM GMT. 

UK sportsbook - Sky Bet - also had Uso at the equivalent of +2,000 when its market closed ahead of the PLE's start.

Uso started off at +1,800 when BetOnline's market was first installed in November, but had drifted out to +6,600 around the time when he was set to challenge Gunther on last week's edition of Saturday Night's Main Event.

Earlier in the evening, Charlotte Flair won the Women's Royal Rumble as an odds-on favourite.

2025 WWE Royal Rumble Betting Favourites

Here are the betting favourites for the 2025 WWE Royal Rumble event.

• Cody Rhodes
• Charlotte Flair (Women's Royal Rumble)
• CM Punk (Men's Royal Rumble)
• #DIY

The selections are ranked in order of strength starting with the wrestler with the shortest odds that were available from the BetOnline Sportsbook.

Punk Now Odds-On At BetOnline

CM Punk is now an odds-on favourite - with BetOnline -  to win tonight's Royal Rumble.

As of 10PM GMT, customers could find Punk at -400. He was at +100 earlier this evening, but was a +190 joint second-favourite when I looked over the markets this morning.

This morning's favourite, John Cena, is now up to +240.

Charlotte Flair remains at -500 in the market for the Women's Royal Rumble.

View BetOnline's Markets

Punk Now Rumble Favourite At BetOnline

In a brief update to this morning's post, the BetOnline Sportsbook has now placed CM Punk as its favourite to win the Men's Royal Rumble.

Punk, who was a joint +190 second-favourite this morning, is now at +100.

As a result, the previous favourite - John Cena - has drifted out from +100 to +150.

The top portion of the market now looks like this:

In this morning's post, I noted that Punk had become a favourite to win the battle royal with betting sites across Europe. 

View BetOnline's Wrestling Markets

A Saturday Morning Look Over BetOnline's WWE Royal Rumble '25 Markets

BetOnline's markets for this year's WWE Royal Rumble were first installed in November when the company published an outright market for the Men's Royal Rumble. The oddsmakers followed that up, around about a week later, when they opened a book on the Women's Royal Rumble.

Both markets are still available as of this morning. They have also been accompanied by odds for the two other matches that have since been added to the card.

BetOnline's market for the WWE Tag Team Championship match - which will see DIY defend the straps against former titleholder, The Motor City Machine Guns, in a two-out-of-three falls contest.

I first came across the market on Tuesday afternoon. At that point in time, the champions were priced as -700 favourites over Shelley and Sabin (+400).  I returned to the website later that day and noticed the odds for the challengers had slid into +300 while those for Gargano and Ciampa has moved up to -500.

By the following afternoon, close to twenty-four hours after initially seeing the market, I once again noticed the Motor City Machine Guns selection had shortened. BetOnline had them at +200 with their opponents up to -300.

As you'll be able to see in the table above, the odds for DIY had dropped into -500 when I visited the BetOnline website yesterday morning. However, on the first viewing for today, I noticed their odds had moved up to -400.

When DIY's price moved in, the Motor City Machine Guns' selection was pushed out to +300, but was cut into +250 overnight.

Betting for Cody Rhodes' defence of the Undisputed WWE Championship - in a ladder match against Kevin Owens - also began early this week.

Rhodes was -1,500 initially, but - as you'll be able to view below, he has been backed down into -4,000 as the week has progressed.

Those looking to back Kevin Owens will presently find him as a +900 underdog. That number is up from the +600 he was on Tuesday afternoon.

BetOnline's market for the Women's Royal Rumble winner was installed in early December with Becky Lynch a +200 favourite. She is no longer in that position due to bets appearing to come in on Charlotte Flair who was a +275 joint-second favourite in December but is now an odds on -375 favourite.

Charlotte Flair will be entering the ring for the first time in over a year as a participant in tonight's match.

Lynch, who has not been confirmed for the match but remains with the company because she was at a WWE/Netflix press event in the latter part of 2024, is still available to gamble on. However, her price has now been increased to +450 and sits below Flair, Bianca Belair (+250)  and Iyo Sky (+325) in the upper part of the table.

Bianca Belair, who has been talked about as a potential future opponent for Rhea Ripleys Women's World Championship, was +350 when the selections were initially published. Iyo Sky's price has plummeted from +10,000 since December.

Now, onto the first market which was published.

John Cena was BetOnline's outright favourite to win the Men's Royal Rumble, with a price of +375, back in November. The retiring superstar - who has set his sights on winning his final Royal Rumble in order to main event his last WrestleMania as an active participant - is back at the top of the market albeit with odds of +100 following a period when Seth Rollins was favoured.

It's worth noting that, over here in Europe, the betting favourite is CM Punk following a surge over the past few days which saw Cena drop into second.

Punk is BetOnline's joint second-favourite at +190. He was a sole fave, with a price of +400, in November.

Seth Rollins is the other second favourite in BetOnline's market. As noted, there was a time when the sportsbook positioned Rollins as the favourite. And an odds-on one at that. 

Roman Reigns is fourth in the betting. As of this morning, those looking to back him can find The OTC at +300. He was +700 back in November.

It's worth acknowledging Reigns (do you see what I did there?) is third in the betting on European sportsbooks' websites. I have created a table contrasting the positions at the top of BetOnline's market to the consensus of European books.

As you can see - The Rock sits fourth with both BetOnline and the combined European books I've used to create the consensus.

BetOnline listed The Final Boss' selection as a +600 third-favourite when its market was created last year. He has since drifted out and is currently +1,000.

Tonight's event begins at 11PM GMT. I hope to add some more posts bearer to bell-time.

Visit BetOnline's Wrestling Markets

My Rumble 2025 Favourite(s)

We're more than a day away from finding out who this year's Royal Rumble winners will be, so I thought I'd do my semi-annual post where I write about the bets I have going into the two battle royals.

This year is an unusual for my wagering. That's because, as I write this post on Friday morning (hours before tonight's Smackdown, I should add), I have only ONE bet on for this weekend.

It's a 4/1 (+400 US) wager on John Cena to win the men's Royal Rumble. The bet was struck in the latter part of 2024. 

Regular visitors are sure to know that, over the years, John Cena and The Rock have always been the first two selections I seek whenever Royal Rumble outright markets are published. The former is one I have done the most because I have strongly believed WWE would go in the direction of Cena having a run to break the 'record' of sixteen world titles.

Quite a while back, I had a spirited debate with somebody in the comment section of a post here on the blog about Cena going for 17. The commenter was adamant WWE would not do the record chase story. It's more obvious now, in Cena's final year, the company will indeed write that narrative.

The elephant in the room with this idea, however, is the fact that Cena could fall at the Rumble and enter the last chance saloon - through an Elimination Chamber victory - in four weeks from tomorrow night.

At the time I placed my wager on Cena, I had discounted Cena .vs. Cody Rhodes because I felt Rhodes' WrestleMania opponent would be The Rock. My opinion at the time was Cena would go after the World Heavyweight Champion - Gunther.

As of right now, the reported potential WrestleMania matches have Cena challenging Rhodes and for Roman Reigns to wrestle CM Punk.

Which leads me to some out there ideas I have which contradicts those news reports. Some have been re-erupted after seeing CM Punk and Cody Rhodes having a promo together on Monday night.

In yesterday's post, I wrote about the BetOnline sample study which points to over half of the US favouring John Cena for the Rumble win. The next person liked by the US public, per the research, is CM Punk.

I keep being drawn into thinking what the favour Paul Heyman now owes CM Punk after the latter helped the Bloodline win at the Survivor Series will be. The conclusion I keep reaching to is the favour will result in Heyman delivering Punk one of the things he has clamoured for in his career as a professional wrestler - to main event WrestleMania.

There are a number ways to get there, but the one which I fantasy booked is for Roman Reigns to win the Royal Rumble, thus setting up a third consecutive WrestleMania contest between Reigns and Cody Rhodes - which would main event night two - but, here's the plot twist: Punk calls in the favour from his mentor forcing Heyman to have to honour his word and add Punk to the match.

I suppose a similar, yet also dissimilar, angle was done to add Shawn Michaels to the World Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania XX after Chris Benoit won the 2004 Royal Rumble and chose Triple H as his opponent. Michaels ended up adding his name to the contract. I envision Paul Heyman doing something along those lines. Minus a Superkick. 

A triple threat would make a fresh match for the WrestleMania main event after having already seen singles contests between Reigns and Rhodes closing out the shows of 2023 and 2024.

It would be ironic considering one of Punk's gripes from his last run with WWE was the fact he (a) didn't main event WrestleMania and (b) was not added to the WrestleMania XXIX main event between The Rock and John Cena.

A Roman Reigns Rumble victory could then mean my initial guess of Gunther .vs. Cena would be in play.

But, like I've already stated, the reports have Reigns .vs.  Punk in singles and Cody Rhodes defending the Undisputed WWE Championship against John Cena.

Another thing from Monday night was we - once again - saw Seth Rollins and Gunther in a promo. Last year, Gunther came out and vowed he would challenge Seth Rollins for the World Heavyweight Championship upon winning the 2024 Rumble. On the most recent episode of Raw, we witnessed a similar exchange to last year. This time, however, Gunther is the titleholder and Rollins is setting his sights on a Rumble win.

I do not rule Rollins out from winning tomorrow night. Neither do the bettors and sportsbooks because Rollins is currently a +175 second-favourite. That's a drop from the +1,400 BetOnline was offering back in November.

With only one bet, that means I have evidently given the women's Royal Rumble a miss this year.

For most of 2024, I envisioned Jade Cargill as a potential winner (and challenging Bianca Belair) but that has not panned out with Cargill currently written off TV and Belair holding the tag straps with Naomi (who replaced Cargill as co-holder).

Cargill's odds have moved out from +600 to +4,000 since December.

It has been reported that WWE is looking to have Rhea Ripley and Bianca Belair wrestle each other some time in the future. With Ripley holding the Women's World Championship, that news has evidently made Belair a potential Women's Royal Rumble winner. She is a +180 second-favourite with BetOnline. The earliest price I have Belair is at +350 (3rd December).

Charlotte Flair is odds-on. She is returning from injuries that have kept her out of action since 2023. As of this morning, a win for Flair will pay out at -200. That's a drop from the +275 customers could have picked her up at in December.

The obvious match for Flair is to challenge Tiffany Stratton for the WWE Women's Championship - a bout that has also been discussed in the writers' room.

So - to close: I have only ONE bet and that's a gamble on John Cena securing a WrestleMania title shot now rather than in doing so via the Elimination Chamber.

If not Cena, I would like Roman Reigns as it would mean the scenario leading to a triple threat main event with Cody Rhodes defending against CM Punk and Reigns could turn into a possibility.

As for the women's Rumble - I think the safe option would be to predict Charlotte Flair or Bianca Belair although I'd enjoy the bragging rights I'd garner from my friends if Jade Cargill won it.