Comment
If you build it, will they bet?
andrew mccarron viewpoint
T
he soon to be launched Indian Premier League Soccer (PLS) will
provide another interesting new betting opportunity for bookmakers. The Indian Premier League Cricket (IPL) was an unexpected hit in certain betting shops around the country given that it con- sisted of short Twenty20 matches in a tournament format, that were played in the early business hours of betting shops and on free to air TV thanks to ITV4. Betting markets, especially in-play markets, encourage cricket fans to come into LBOs early and watch and bet on the matches and then perhaps stay in for other betting events.
Now if the six team PLS
tournament, which starts on 24 March and ends with a grand final on 6 May could find a similar TV deal then the smattering of recognis- able names to the UK punter - Robbie Fowler, Hernan Crespo and Robert Pires are all playing alongside coaches such as John Barnes, Peter Reid and Marco Etcheverry - then the football might also become a draw. It should at least be easier to create a market for than the six a side Masters tournament.
The only downside might be concerns over the integrity of the competition, with the Indian sub-conti- nent heavily implicated in other fixing scandals and the disparity in pay between the bought in stars and their team mates. And especially when the whole event is overseen by an organisation called Celebrity Manage- ment Group. But it also comes under the remit of the Indian Football Association, so the dangers are no greater than several other international football leagues - Italy, for example. It is another fine example of a more commercially- minded company coming in and shaking things up in the world of sports administra- tion and making something exciting and interesting to watch. And bet on. In the UK this model has been
embraced by Barry Hearn’s Matchroom Sport. His firm has dealings with snooker and boxing and is also involved in pool, bowling, golf, fishing, darts and poker. He also knows the power of gambling given his appear- ance at ICE last month pro- moting the Professional Darts Corporation’s licens- ing agreement with OpenBet for slot games.
So how long will it be
before a bookmaker gets in on the act and develops its own sporting event? Cut out the middle man and sell the rights to yourself - it already happens to some degree with the bookie owned grey- hound tracks. It must be worth the hassle if a certain scale can be achieved. These pages have long mooted the creation of a football tournament to fill the gap years between World Cup and European Champi- onships so that sharehold- ers of the listed companies need not be too down- hearted by the phrase ‘strong comparatives’. A Home Nations tournament could fill this gap, although it would probably have to include England and be far better and more tightly organised than the recent Carling Nations Cup, which didn’t have the opportunity to build up any momentum and suffered a lack of credi- bility. The match between Wales and Northern Ireland was only attended by 529 fans.
The flip side of the coin is for the sporting authorities to ask bookmakers for their input as to what they would like to see, although it can be argued that British racing damaged its product by spreading its horse numbers too thinly across an increas- ing number of races put on to cater for demand from the LBO.
A shaking up of the format in the shape of T20 has done wonders for cricket’s popu- larity, if not its finesse. Could the same not happen in other sports with the tacit approval from the authorities for extra, sanctioned betting opportunities?
40 BettingBusinessInteractive • FEBRUARY 2012
Bad luck rather than bad
John Samuels of IBAS explains that for all the controversy surrounding gaming machines in betting shops, they don’t actually create too many disputes with players.
IBAS I
t is well documented how gaming machines have been the saviour for some licensed betting offices. They are the primary reason for a number LBOs remaining profitable and as such they have protected many jobs in the high street
betting industry.
It could have been anticipated that their popularity amongst the betting public would have something of a down-side. You would imagine that as surely as night follows day, any betting medium used by the betting public would usually come with a proportionate degree of dis- putes. The gaming machines sector however has, over time, proved to be the exception to the rule. Considering the many millions of transactions that take place on gaming machines, the level of disputes presented to IBAS continues to be minimal. During 2011 and in line with previous years, there were less than thirty gaming machine disputes presented to the IBAS Panel. This compares with the many hundreds of disputes, involving horseracing, grey- hound racing, football and other mainstream betting sports over the same period. Indeed, 2011 was a record year for IBAS with over 3,000 dispute forms dispatched to disgrun- tled punters, thus making gaming machine disputes account for less than 1 per cent of the total; remarkable, given the scale of their contribution to turnover.
The types of gaming machine disputes that do come the way of IBAS have changed over the years. In previous years the submission would more often than not consist of the player accusing the gaming machine winning numbers of
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