Tuesday, February 20, 2007
The Underworld of Tennis Gambling
We all see signs of it, we all know it exists, internet websites. For most of us, it's the same type of thing as betting on the superbowl, right? Well, in fact not exactly. When you bet on matches that are on big courts, there's no difference really.
But the fun and interesting part is betting on matches on outside courts, matches where you see exactly what's going on, how a player is reacting to a losing point, matches where even though one player is down a set and a break, you have a clear feeling that they could rally back any second? In most events, the way fans do it is simply by dropping by a betting website the morning before they leave for the tennis courts, just to get an extra bit of excitement from the matches they intend to see. Now there are a few events where that is extended a bit.
Take the Australian Open, where there is a kiosk in the grounds, where you can go bet. But that can (and is) taken to a greater extent by certain people. I was quite lucky on a small outside court, lucky because the guy next to me for the Razzano-Bondarenko match was a guy speaking French, and little did he know the guy next to him could understand every single word he was saying. He spent the whole match on his mobile phone (please note he had ear plugs and was speaking very softly, or else I would have became crazy). So anyway, yes throughout the match he was giving match updates to his friend (I'm guessing in France), and asking for odds on the match, eventually, he did put a 1000 euro wager on Razzano (he lost), but seemed to be saying they were having some good success (they had put a 1000 euro bet on Stepanek the previous day while the guy was 2 sets down). And I guess I can see why in a way. You have these matches on small outside courts, and you can take bets on the match against people who have no idea what is actually happening. Sure they have the scoreboard, but sometimes that's really not that representative of the match. So anyway, I kind of knew it existed but perhaps not to this extent (the guy seems to be more than a one man or one tournament operation). I'd be very curious to see what kind of numbers they get.... Labels: Australian Open, betting
# posted by Pierre : 4:07 AM
