Comment
Ambiguous bets
Unsurprisingly, there is not much consistency about how
bookmakers deal with illegible betting slips, according to IBAS’ John Samuels.
I
Don’t blame bookmakers for football corruption
andrew mccarron viewpoint
he number of scandals emanating from football leagues around the world, seemingly on a monthly basis, would appear that corruption is rife in some areas where the world’s most popular sport is played.
T
Italy has seen another wave of arrests, in China a top referee has admitted fixing games during a wide- ranging corruption trial and there are questions over some high scoring games in last summer’s Concacaf Gold Cup.
On top of that, both ARJEL and
UEFA have looked at Dinamo Zagreb’s 7-1 capitulation at home to Lyon in the Champions League, which improbably saw the victors squeeze Ajax out of the qualification spots on goal difference. One of the most concerning com- ments about the Champions League match, though, came the following day from UEFA when talking about its Betting Fraud Detections System (BFDS): “For the time being this system has not shown any irregular betting patterns around yesterday’s
games or their outcome that would justify any inquiry on that front.” There seems to be a mindset that all match fixing must be inextricably linked to betting, which is just not the case at all. The relatively recent Cal- ciopoli scandal (again in Italy) showed that corruption in football could occur without any mention of betting. By arranging ‘favourable’ referees, several clubs received sporting wind- falls rather than financial ones - at least until they were found out. It’s all well and good to use a ‘detec- tion system’ with information from bookmakers to detect corruption for gambling purposes, but don’t use it as a catch all for all types of match fixing. There are palpably many reasons for manufacturing a result in a sporting event, not just betting.
Having watched the goals from the contentious Champions League match, there doesn’t appear to be a great deal of suspicion. While the Dinamo Zagreb goalkeeper looks par- ticularly unmotivated for some of the concessions, there could be a variety of sporting reasons for that, given the lack of protection from his defence. The team conceded 17 goals in their final three Champions League ties, so it’s not like they haven’t got form for shipping a hatful against more moti- vated opponents. And negotiating a seven goal swing across two matches would be a serious logistical feat in any case.
Of course, the involvement of a Croa- tian team has raised suspicions. Only a week after the fateful last round of CL ties, a court in Zagreb sentenced fifteen officials and players of three clubs, Croatia Sesvete, Varteks and Med- jimurje for rigging eight first division matches and trying to fix another four.
Indeed, the Italian news agency that reported on the case added: “Football match rigging is widespread in the Balkans, especially in Serbia, Croatia and Macedonia, but few cases wind up in court for lack of evidence.” Now is this a betting issue or some- thing endemic in European football? The sport needs to address its own failings rather than constantly go cap in hand to politicians, pleading that it needs more money from the betting industry as their beautiful, pure as the driven snow game is being blighted by gambling.
The sports is happy enough to culti- vate the ever widening gap between the haves and the have nots in football, which many speculate is one of the reasons behind a willingness to rig results in the lower leagues. Maybe the game should use its own not unsub- stantial funds in order to address some of these underlying problems rather than constantly demand cash from betting firms to tackle an issue they should be dealing with themselves. Or, of course, the officials at FIFA could lead by example and make all decisions transparent and elections open. But while the main administra- tive body is mired in scandals sur- rounding bungs and back-handers - obviously all of which is related to the betting industry (!) - is it any wonder that a small percentage of those that play the sport are not whiter than white? If European politicians do fall under the sport’s rhetoric and force a payment out of bookmakers to ‘police corruption’, as a financial contributor the gambling industry should be in a position to nurture regime change if it feels its contributions are being squan- dered by a less than sound administra- tive body.
t may be a New Year but it is still same old same old regarding the way bets are being written by betting shop customers. The IBAS postbag, possibly by the very nature of what we do, is full of bets that can either be hardly read or can be interpreted in more than one way. So it is interesting to see how bookmakers’ rules deal with ambiguously written bets.
Illegible bets are relatively easy to deal with inasmuch as if no sense can be made of a person’s handwriting than the fairest outcome would be to make the transaction or selection void and return the stakes. However, say if some sense can be made of the writing, but the selection can be read as more than one runner. It is interesting to note how different operators deal with this situation. Many operators use the first letters or first word written on the slip to determine what the selection will be. Hence a bet written as ‘£6 win Red Dan’ will be settled as £6 win on Red Rum should there be a Red Rum, a Led Dan and a Jed Dan running. Other operators will split the stakes if there
are only two possibilities, but will make the bet void if the interpretation can be three or more. So in the example the £6 bet will be made void. Others will split the stakes over all possibilities. Hence the bet in the example will settled as £2 on each of the three selections.
Also, at least one major operator refers the bet to their security department for consideration. Hence a measure of subjectivity comes into the matter, which is perhaps not an ideal scenario in these times of much-publicised transparency, fairness and openness in betting.
In addition, no mention is made in any operator’s rules as to what would happen if one of the possible alternatives is a declared non runner or has already run by the time that the bet is placed. From IBAS’s perspective any possible interpretation of a selection that had already run or was a non-runner would be disregarded.
In adjudicating over previous disputes, the Panel has on occasions found that stating an actual time and meeting restricts ambiguously named selections to horses engaged in that particular race. Depending on the legibility of the scribble, each case much be treated on its individual merits. Finally, it is worth considering that many
current operator rules were penned before the expansion and current day popularity of novelty races and events. Some rule books, which make reference to settling some bets on the ‘next race’, may have been written before the first virtual stone was laid at Portman Park. One wonders if operators ever envisaged putting customers with ambiguously written bets onto the closest match, where it was a ‘horse’ named to compete in one of dozens of back-to-back virtual races. Maybe an item to consider for operators’ rules committees.
BettingBusinessInteractive • JANUARY 2012 61
ACTION IMAGES / MATTHEW CHILDS LIVEPIC
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76