on the cards

English

Alternative forms

• in the cards

Etymology

Originally referring to the predictions of fortune-tellers using cards.

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU)

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Prepositional phrase

on the cards

1. (idiomatic) Likely to occur, probable.
   • 2011 January 15, Saj Chowdhury, “Man City 4 - 3 Wolves”, in BBC‎^[1]:

     Wolves, sensing the comeback of all comebacks was on the cards, kept pressing and set up an exciting finish when Ronald Zubar's header was judged to have crossed the line, even though it appeared that Nigel de Jong had successfully cleared the effort.