G1 Climax 31 Betting: The Final

After weeks of round robin tournament action, the thirty-first edition of the G1 Climax concludes today with the final which will pit A Block winner - Kota Ibushi - against B Block victor, Kazuchika Okada.

Leading into the tournament, and during it, Kambi customers were able to wager on numerous things to occur during the event. One of those markets was a special in which it was possible to gamble on what the final would end up being.

The eventual winner - 'Kazuchika Okada .vs. Kota Ibushi' -  started out at 9/1 when the market was put up in mid-September. A week later, it had lowered into 7/1 and continued a descent into late-September when it was available at 7/2. There was a slight increase, at the start of October, when it rose to 4/1 on October 3rd. However, a couple of days later, it was back to 7/2 and then fell - for the last time - into 5/2 on October 16th. Betting was suspended three days ago.

Ibushi and Okada have both won previous G1 Climax tournaments. Therefore, a proposition market - which asked whether or not there will be a first-time winner this year - will be settled with 'Yes' as the winning selection.

When the market was first installed, Kambi had 'Yes' at 9/10 while 'No' was a slight 4/5 favourite. There was a slight back-and-forth in the early stages of the tournament. However, by the latter stages, 'Yes' began to decline and was then at 1/8 when the market was last made available.

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The final has now ended. It did so in an unfortunate manner with Kota Ibushi suffering an arm injury of some kind which forced a ref stoppage.

Following the decision, medics and young boys came into the ring to assist Ibushi. The bottom rope was even released to make it easy for Ibushi to leave.

Such a sad way for this tourney to conclude.

Okada was a 7/2 joint-second favourite to be the tournament winner when Kambi published its market in September. He closed as a 1/4 favourite after Kambi republished the market yesterday with the two finalists as the remaining selections.

With Okada representing B Block in the final, a prop market which asked customers whether the A Block winner would claim the G1 Climax trophy, will be settled with 'No' as the winning option.

'No' started off as a slight favourite, at odds of 4/5, over the 9/10 for 'Yes' when the market opened a week before the tournament commenced. There were back-and-forth adjustments along the way. When the market was last made available, 'No' was 21/50.

Such a gutting way to end this series of G1 Climax 31 posts. I look forward to hopefully doing the same next year back during its regular season of the summertime.