RWC Preview

Right, the warm-ups are completed, the teams are winging their way over (or in South Africa’s case, going home for 5 days – WTF is all that about?), so it’s time to put the stake in the sand, … well, at the TAB at least.

I’m not going to get the Einstein prize for rocket science, but fear not fellow Kiwis, the All Blacks ARE going to win the Rugby World Cup. Probably. From what I’ve seen over the last few months, there are only 2 – OK to be kind to my friends across the ditch - 2.5 realistic contenders to knock the AB’s off Mission Win That Fucking Trophy We Haven’t Had For 20 Years.

Do not argue – the facts are NZ are Numero Uno in rugby union, have been for some time and they’ve lost F.A. matches in the past 4 years. But (and this is a big but, a Serena Williams butt if you like – gawd did you see her fall over yesterday on centre court? No? Lucky you), rugby is a complex sport and combined with a knockout tournament structure New Zealand is not a put your mortgage on them betting proposition. In fact, the RWC is a shit avenue for betting but more about that another time. Let’s get back to the teams.

After NZ, you can really only count South Africa, France and maybe Australia as genuine possible winners. The main argument against other teams such as Wales, England and Ireland winning is while they have the ability (actually, ability is the wrong word, potential is more like it) to knock over one of the big guns, the probability they can do that three times in a row is entering the territory of fat pink things flying past your window.

Let’s get rid of the Breast Brigade first. Diggers, you’ve won your game against us this year. Lightning doesn’t strike twice. If you get to the semis, prepare for an arse-whipping of 1970’s proportions.

Which leaves two teams to be worried about – the Frogs and the Boks. Thankfully we’ll probably not meet either of them until the final, and currently I’m more worried about the hosts than the Saffers. Their warm-up games have been a bit like the ABs through June and July – not setting the earth on fire but winning games comfortably enough without looking like they’re digging deep. The one thing I have been impressed with them is their defence – remember when France C came out here earlier this year they weren’t missing many tackles?; well, their A and B teams don’t miss many either. In three warm-up games they gave up one try – admittedly two of those games were against a clueless (on attack) England, but nevertheless impressive. The Frogs also have good depth in their squad with perhaps their only (slight) weakness being having quality back-up grunt in the engine room.

The only nagging doubt I have about the French is lining up northern hemisphere form against that from south of the Equator. The SAF-Scotland game is the only form guide available since a full-strength NZ team went to Europe 12 months ago. And that game is a glass half-empty half-full kinda thing – the Saffers won comfortably enough but if you take out the three-try burst in the first half, South Africa only won 6-3 in 74 minutes of rugby.

One of my fears some time ago was NZ would have a series of too-easy pool games before meeting a fired up Irish in the quarters. Funny how things change – the Scots and the Italians will both give us a reasonable game and the scoreline will be closer than most people will expect, while the Irish look rudderless without their talismanic captain. That fear has now been erased and I really do feel the planets are aligning well for the Kiwis.

The RWC is not known for producing upset results. If the quarters aren’t NZ-Ireland, France-Scotland, South Africa-Wales and Australia-England, I’ll be surprised. Ditto for the semis where we can expect NZ-Oz and Frog-Boks. And that, my 4 regular readers, is when it will be time to turn the TV on. For all the dross that the tournament will serve up in the first month, there will be two monumental games to round it off – the Fra-SAF semi and the winners of that against the ABs in the final. And while I’d say on the balance of probabilties NZ will beat France (or SAF) in the final, it’s a knockout tournament and at the end of the day it will come down to who can hang onto the ball better and who gets pinged the most by the ref (yes, refereeing is a significant variable to factor into calculations). And also not to lose sight of who is sitting in the stands watching the game injured.

That’s enough entertainment for you lot for one day. I’ll knock up a betting guide in a few days.

Weekend Wrap

Awww shucks - if there were more than 3 of you begging I might keep going. But here's one last wrap for the weekend, because there is something I want to get off my chest ...

I love Valerie Vili. No, not in a sexual way - get your minds out of the gutter. To me, she encompasses all that an elite sportsperson should be - a touch of arrogance spiced with at the right times humility (yes I know that's a contradiction), emotion worn on the sleeve that is not scripted for the public a la Sharapova (and yes, let your minds wander into the gutter for a brief sec at this point ...), and I guess it helps she's spent part of her life on the wrong side of the railway tracks.

But do you know what I really love about her? EVERY time - bar one - she's stepped up to the plate in a major competition she has done a personal best. The exception was the 2004 Olympics, where a hospital stay prior was a reasonable excuse. She is one tough cookie and given her age she has the potential to dominate her chosen sport like no other, so long as drug testing regimes stay one step ahead of the cheats.

So as our other famous female field athlete rides off into the sunset (Queen Bea couldn't qualify for the Discus final today), salute our World Champion and make a note to vote for her in the People's Choice awards - she deserves it (no matter what the All Blacks do).

And before I leave the World Athletics Champs, let's dissect the comments of Kimberley Smith, our 10,000m runner who came a more than creditable fifth. The newspaper started their article with the following:

Kimberley Smith came away from the track after finishing fifth in the 10,000m at the world track and field championships yesterday disappointed at not winning a medal but happy with her placing.

Now my interest is piqued. A medal after all, is just another term for a top 3 placing, so how can you be happy with your placing but disappointed at missing a medal? Further on, we get to her quotes:

"Fifth place is very good, I mean I know that. Not many New Zealanders have gone quite fifth on the track. I don't know when the last was, so I mean I'm happy with that, but it's very disappointing."

Now I know it's hot in Osaka and she could be suffering from heatstroke, but there is one big mixed message in there. And then the penny dropped.

You see, thanks to a certain CEO of a certain government department who told us in no uncertain terms 18 months ago that a fourth = failure, our athletes have to be careful not to appear overly satisfied with these tin placings for fear of a Heineken bottle shoved where the sun don't shine and having their mental toughness questioned.

So to paraphrase - Kimberley is bloody stoked to finish fifth - and so she should be, because it is a meritorious performance in a sport where chicken-leg Africans dominate. But she can't say so, because Nick or Trevor will tell her off for being soft.

Comments on the rugby will follow in a couple of days, right now I've got to get my head around another all-nighter in front of the TV trying to work out which of the two most inconsistent sides in ODI cricket is going to come out on top. Pass me a coin someone.

Lack of ...

motivation to post. In fact, the time has come to knock this blog on the head me thinks. I'll be back in a week or so with a preview of RWC for betting, and then that'll be it. In the menatime, the match to watch this weekend is Scotland v South Africa - I have a sneaky suspicion Scotland may be just a little better than most people are expecting for the RWC (although they field a slightly weaker lineup than the one that took on the Irish), while the second-stringers for SAF can't have had much sleep on the plane judging by their performance against Connacht. Hopefully their first XV will have their minds on the job. In any case, it's the most interesting of the warm-up games period and the one and only chance we get to see a north v south match-up.

Weekend Wrap

Ahhh this explains everything. The Aryan looks, fierce competitive streak, insatiable sexual appetite, even the taking of banned substances. Just not the portly figure.

Yes, Shane Warne is German. Or at least it appears he wants to be. Thanks to the birth place of his mother, the man who would probably sell his mother for thirty pieces of silver is looking at getting a German passport so he can play as a "local" in English county cricket. Of course, this has not gone down too well with our friends across the ditch. Prime Minister John Howard is "amazed" that he would consider such a course of action, "and so would a lot of Australians"

Listen, Digger John. You've helped create the monster that is Australian sport where winning is everything and you bend the rules at every opportunity to create an advantage. The correct Australian reaction should be "Fuck off Shane, you've retired from playing for us - become a German, Namibian, Argentinian or Moldavian - we don't care". That I could understand.

Anyway, back to the weekend. Thanks to the NZ Herald putting up a countdown clock for the Rugby World Cup I'm aware it's less than 20 sleeps to go. So I made the effort to watch the warm-up games over the weekend (and did last weekend as well) to see if I should continue holding my breath for our beloved AB's.

Not really. The Northern Hemisphere sides are waking up from their summer slumber looking surprisingly lethargic (and in Wales' case, at times clueless) and I'm struggling to come up with a viable alternative to the ABs winning Billy. If it wasn't for our previous record at RWC we'd be Australian-like confident. So I guess we should give the other sides a few weeks longer to show their wares before casting the prediction in concrete.

However, what has been occupying my mind more than the forthcoming RWC and NZ tennis player Adam Thompson's loss in the semi-finals of a Tier 3 tournament in Peru (thanks again NZ Herald - I lost my cornflakes again), is the playing of netball on concrete.

In case anyone hasn't noticed, it rains a lot here in NZ during winter. And concrete netball courts get a tad slippery. So put 10 y.o. females who haven't fully developed their co-ordination onto them and it's like a stalled car on train tracks with a big light approaching. I saw more crying on Saturday than during a season of English Premier League.

I don't know what the alternative is - but young girls taking a tumble on concrete more akin to a skating rink can't be all that enjoyable - and when you add in the parents standing in the pissing rain getting chillblains, smiling through gritted teeth - yep, there has to be another way. Or am I getting soft in my old age?

Petulance

While New Zealand gears up for a month and a half of fingernail chewing (only 22 more sleeps to go boys and girls), there is another World Cup starting soon. OK, the cricket 20/20 World Cup is not to be taken seriously (except as an opportunity for this punter to make money) and judging by the squads selected, most of the participants throw it into the Mickey Mouse category as well.

Which makes the brouhaha over the non-selection of South African's premier batsmen Jacques Kallis intriguing. Here in little ol' NZ, our Coach told our premier batsmen his services were not required and he'd be better off spending more time in England scoring runs for his county. Whether Stephen Fleming agrees with that, or has been muzzled, the point is nary a peep has been heard out of him.

Compare that to what's happened in South Africa. Kallis isn't selected, who promptly throws his toys out of the cot, resigning as South African's vice-captain and "reconsidering" his international future. You have to wonder at the lines of communication between the player and selectors/management - for all his reputation as a slow scorer in all forms of the game, he is one helluva player and not one you'd want to piss off lightly.

But it doesn't end there. Enter Mark Boucher (SAF's wicketkeeper) who vents his spleen in a newspaper column.

According to Cricinfo, Boucher was quoted by the Business Day newspaper as suggesting there were ulterior motives for his omission: "It is either those who have an issue with him, and have a chip on their shoulders, or those who have ulterior motives." He did not elaborate.

Further along the article, we learn Boucher is lukewarm about the tournament. "First prize for those of us who love cricket is to be Test world champions," he said. "Second prize is to be 50-over world champions. Twenty20 only comes after those, really."

Which is what puzzles me about the whole thing. The 20/20 tournament is a bit of hit and giggle and not that serious for anyone, players included. So why get all hot under the collar over Kallis' non-selection? The over-reaction by both Boucher and Kallis suggests all is not well in South African cricket and you wonder what is going on behind the scenes. One thing for sure, I wouldn't be backing them to win the tournament next month, even with it being held in their backyard.

Can we have some fun please?

I thought PC-nonsense was bad enough in NZ. Seems like it has spread to Australia as well, or at least their Cricketers Association.

You see, someone has lampooned Shame Watson on MySpace by setting up a fake entry, and having a profile as follows:

"I'm Shane Watson, but you probably recognise me cause I'm hot. I like to model, especially nude. I like hot chicks. I like to play cricket, but I'm usually injured." Under the subject title: "Who I'd Like To Meet", it simply states "Blonde chicks".

Now most of us would recognise this as a bit of harmless fun, probably by a teenager judging by the quality of humour. But oh no, the Australian Cricketers Association describe it as a "pathetic exploitation" and a plague.

Enter David Boon, cricketer and drinker extraordinare and current Australian selector. There's one of him, too, with the identifying tag "Shit, did I put ice in my Esky?"

His reaction? "If someone wants to have a bit of fun, good luck to them."

Hallelujah. At least someone hasn't lost their sense of humour.

Weekend Wrap

Some things stay the same ...

(Eldrick wins a golf tournament)

Some things change ...

(Roger loses a tennis tournament)

And some things are so fucking head scratching frustrating.

I completely understand why India didn't enforce the follow-on against England; but then to take 60 overs scoring 180 led by their marvellous captain whose scoring rate would make a snail look like the Road Runner was pathetic.

Yes it is my wallet talking. I have understimated India's complete and total fear of returning home without the series win. They would rather reduce England's chances of winning the test from 1% to 0.5% than trying to win the bloody thing.

A nailed-on draw fk it. India don't have the motivation to win, and they will only do so if England chuck it away. Which I don't think they will. In fact, if there is any justice in this world Pietersen will smash 150 off 120 balls to lead England to the biggest comeback since Lazarus.

Sigh, dreams are free. But I can't respect sporting teams and/or persons whose fear of losing is so great they would rather not win than lose. Doubly so when it costs me money :)

Day 2

Yes, ahem, well (more embarrassed coughing), my optimism that England could keep this match competitive has proved ill-founded. We're down to two possible results now, and the pitch, weather (showers are forecast tomorrow) and the Indian bowling performance will dictate how this match ends up.

The overnight prices (England 70 India 2.08 Draw 1.96) are not too far out of line with what they should be. It looks like the remainder of the match may be boring from a betting point of view - although if England look half decent batting there will be some price volatility.

Thankfully I didn't tinker too much betting as when I did I got it wrong. Backing England at 20's when India were 450-6 was a masterstroke (NOT) as Dhoni went ballistic shortly thereafter. And bailing on half my draw lay at a loss ($1.70) shortly before the end of India's innings did not factor in Strauss' brain-fade before the close of play.

Still, I'll make money on this test - currently Eng +145 India +145 Draw +50; hopefully some price volatility will allow me to eke out a few more shillings.

Day 1

300-odd for 4 is what I'd describe as a normal first day of test cricket, but perhaps one of the reasons why it is difficult sometimes to lose money betting on cricket is the short-term horizon that punters seem to possess. If you wind back the clock four years to when the South Africans played at Kennington Oval, the Saffers ended the first day 362-4 yet ended up eventually losing (badly, by 9 wickets). There are countless other examples.

I'm not complaining. I'm also not suggesting India will lose, they are in the box seat but much will depend on factors other than performance such as overhead conditions (there was a time yesterday when it clouded over where the ball seemed to swing a bit more) and how much the pitch will deteriorate. Questions that cannot be answered ahead of time, and why keeping an open mind in test cricket is fundamental.

England were a bit lucky to take 4 wickets - 2 of them were shocking umpiring decisions and if you throw in Jaffer's brain explosion you can make a case that England only took 1 wicket all day. Yet one or two wickets early on Day 2 and they'll have their noses in front, so it's not yet time to write them off. I quite liked the way the Indian batsmen (apart from Tendulkar) showed intent - the run-rate was above 4 for a large part of the day, so I have reasonable confidence we'll see a result. But (here comes the open mind again), you can't write the draw off either.

My post-toss prices were England 3.3; India 2.6; Draw 3.1 - with the score a fairly normal looking 316-4 I wouldn't change them much - at a rough guess England 3.7; India 2.4; Draw 3.1. Yet the Betfair market has England 7.4; India 2.86 and the Draw 1.92 (immediately post-toss they were 3.1, 3.65 and 2.42).

So a common situation occurs - the draw will trade far too short for the duration of the test.

Betting-wise, I laid England prior to the toss, for two reasons: one, I felt their price was a little short, and two, there was not much downside - if they won the toss and batted they would shorten but the price of the team batting has the least volatility so there would be plenty of time to go to Plan B. If India win the toss and bat their price would drift (but not as much as I was expecting), and the only way to get in the crap would be if India got rolled cheaply, but the pitch and weather conditions suggested that was unlikely.

I don't wait too long to start backing them at higher odds to cover the arse a little (the open mind philosophy), and that coupled with the draw lay is about all I did. I've learnt over the years not to unnecessarily tinker and just let the game develop and reassess at important points during the game (which for me are end of day, change of innings and taking of the new ball).

Day 1 Bets:

Laid England 150 @ 2.70 (Eng -255, Ind +150, Draw +150)
Progessively backed England for 50 @ at an average of 6.1 (Eng 0, Ind +100, Draw +100)
Laid Draw 100 @ 1.80 (Eng +100, Ind +200, Draw +20)

Nice to end the day in a no-loss situation, but no doubt that will change as I get greedy :)

Eng v India Preview

Cricket afficionados should keep a close eye on the third cricket test starting tonight (NZT), as I believe an intriguing battle is in store. For once the miserable English summer is unlikely to have any influence, which presents to us the not uncommon conundrum of assessing how likely a result will be in conditions likely to suit batsmen more than bowlers with five fullish days available.

The other influence to factor, as with all final tests in a series, is the series score and the motivation each team will have to force a result. Here the home team enter the Oval 1-0 down and rather keen to ensure they don't suffer their first home series defeat since 2001, while India no doubt would like to show they can win a test series away from home (ignoring the West Indian one last year, that doesn't count), as they have shown over the last few years an uncanny knack of dropping the final test while touring.

Notwithstanding England's collapse here last year (partly helped by the conditions), the Oval can be a rather nice place to swing willow as opposed to a red ball, with - again ignoring the West Indies - only two instances of first innings scores of under 300. The bowlers likely to have the most influence are seamers who can extract bounce out of the pitch (e.g. Chris Tremlett) and I suspect Kumble might enjoy rolling his arm over, but I don't think they'll be taking 5-60 in an innings.

It's difficult to set prices for the game, as the toss, and who gets to bat first, is significant. In a place where you are not expecting the team batting first to collapse, they have the advantage of setting the tempo for the game. And in batting third, they can have the greatest influence of deciding how probable a result will be.

So if England bat first, a result becomes more probable and my rough odds would be:

England 2.6 India 2.9 Draw 3.7

If India bat first, don't expect any generous third innings declaration and thus the odds change to:

England 3.3 India 2.6 Draw 3.1

One trick I like doing in final tests where the score is 1-0 is looking at the odds on offer and predicting what will happen to the prices based on the two potential outcomes of the toss. Currently on Betfair, the market has England 2.7 India 4.0 Draw 2.58 - if England win the toss and bat their odds will shorten but I can't see such a move been dramatic, whereas if they lose the toss and India bat I expect a much bigger correction to the prices currently offered. I'll leave it to you to work out what this means and how you can take advantage of it.

But if you're looking for a bet on the game, India are definitely a bit big and the draw as usual underpriced - but in all probability the draw price will be a lot shorter during the game and there should be opportunities to oppose it as the game progresses (depending of course on circumstances).

I might - depending on how bad the sleep deprivation is and how my book is looking - provide an update of each day's play and provide an insight into how this "professional" bets during a cricket test. If you hate cricket, see you in 5 days' time.

The Fix - the Facts

I guess I should blame my parents and the values they have instilled in me, but nothing makes my blood boil faster than dirty cheating scumbags making easy money by foul means rather than fair. So when the match fixing cries came raining down after the Davydenko v Vassallo-Arguello tennis match last week I took more than a little passing interest even though (thankfully) I had no financial involvement.

Tennis has a problem, and it's a problem that has the potential to drag the sport's credibility down to Tour De France levels. Fixing a tennis match is relatively easy - it's a contest between only two players and if there is a nudge nudge wink wink agreement it is easy to arrange and difficult to prove. Suspicions of match fixing rear their head from time to time, but what should worry the ATP is the frequency of these suspicions are on the increase, with more than a few examples recently in the lull between the grass swing and the North American hardcourt circuit, as players kick their heels (or in Davydenko's case, stub their left toe) in a few meaningless clay court tournaments.

The subject has found its way into the mainstream press rather than the dark hallways of betting forums as Betfair took the extraordinary step of voiding all bets on that match last week, after the event. When you think about it - it is quite a breathtaking step and it would be easy to devote a full post to this as there is much debate about the rights and wrongs of that decision as there is about the actual match. In many ways a betting exchange is like a stock exchange, yet when financial markets are tainted by insider trading, you send the culprits to jail but you don't recompense the mum-and-dad investors unwittingly caught up in the mess, however that is what Betfair have in essence done.

Another subject for another time maybe, but I want to get back to the dirty cheating scumbags if you don't mind. And in my mind, there is no doubt both Davydenko and Vassallo-Arguello qualify. Let's review the circumstances surrounding the match at Sopot last week:

Davydenko had been in poor form leading up to the tournament where he was defending champion, having lost three first-round encounters on clay since his fourth-round exit at Wimbledon. During his first-round victory at Sopot against Pavel, he reporetdly picked up an injury to his left toe. So it is in the realms of possibility that some people would take a punt that Davydenko would be vulnerable in his match-up with V-A, although that does ignore the fact that V-A is a journeyman at best and his peformance the day before in beating a fellow Argentinian ranked 256 was a struggle. As the preview from Tennis Form noted:

"If the match is straight, then I would expect Davydenko to ... come through with ease"

Yes, it's got to the stage where those who know something about tennis can smell a potential fix - Tennis Form started their preview with "I expect plenty of bookmakers to swerve this one", an admission of both player's previous form when it comes to nudging and winking, but more about that later.

Davydenko opened up a $1.20 favourite for the match but by the time a ball was hit in anger, had blown out to around $2.30. A favourite drifting is nothing uncommon, especially one under an injury cloud, but by that amount? The starting price for Davydenko's first-round losses in the preceding three weeks were $1.37, $1.17 and $1.35, incidentally against higher-ranked opposition. $2.30 is definitely starting to resemble the stench of rotting fish.

But this pales into insignificance compared to what happened during the first set. Let's review both the playing and betting action:

1. Davydenko won the first set 6-2;
2. Vassallo-Arguello was playing so shyte that he could only hit 2 winners in those 8 games;
3. V-A called a trainer for a nose bleed;
4. Davydenko showed no signs of his toe injury;

Yet:

1. Davydenko continued to drift during the set, with V-A remaining the favourite upon its completion;
2. One or more punters kept queueing up with five-figure amounts (that's UK pounds by the way) to back the Argentinian;
3. By the time the match was "complete", the turnover on Betfair was 3.5 million pounds, reportedly 10 times (although I think that's an exaggeration) the amount usually bet on second-round matches in nobody-cares ATP tournaments.

And if you want any more proof, we have to consider prior history. M'lud, I present two exhibits:

1. Davydenko v Sargsian First-Round Gstaad Open 2005

Davydenko retired in the second set (whilst leading 6-1, 1-0) against his reported good friend Sargsian, apparently with a re-occurence of a wrist injury he had sustained at Wimbledon. Australian betting website On The Punt noted a European bookmaker taking a 5000 Euro bet on Sargsian (who was at odds of around $6.50) five minutes before the match started, and traced the IP address of the bet placed over the internet to the official player hotel in Gstaad. Another bookmaker refused to payout winning bets on the match, citing a rarely used rule that protects them "where evidence exists of rigging or some other act which has unfairly affected the result".

(while you're at OTP, read what they have to say about last week)

2. Davydenko v Moodie Second-Round St Petersburg 2006

Perhaps not so conclusive, but when a $1.12 favourite retires with an ankle injury whilst leading 6-2, 3-3 in a best of 3 set match, I smell smoke. Davydenko reportedly suffered a sprain in the first set whilst leading 4-2. Strange, didn't seem to affect him so much - why retire when only 3 games away from winning? And of course, the injury was so bad that the next week, he went out and won the BNP Paris Masters.

There is one final colour I want to use in painting this pretty picture. The ATP website provides a blog by differing players, and last year Davydenko was the blogger from the Beijing Open. Some of his comments in his blog come across to me as quite revealing:

Early in the week, we learn about his girlfriend, her wants of shopping and sightseeing and how Davydenko chose to go shopping "to stay in her good books", instead of resting/sleeping at the hotel. He writes "You might be thinking with a big Davis Cup semifinal tie against the United States coming up, next week, is my focus on that? The answer is no. My mind is only on this tournament in China. I am only interested in what I do now.", then states in the next paragraph "If I lose tonight, I have all day tomorrow to see everything in Beijing! The Chinese Wall and everything that I want to see."

Then after telling us he prefers day matches to those under lights, he retires against Paradorn Srichaphan in a night match (and whaddya know, retiring one match into the second set), saying: "I am sorry that I had to retire tonight but my body did not have any energy. I do not have any injury, but at night because of the 12-hour difference with America, I feel completely dead."

Thankfully the blog doesn't end there. Guess what this "completely dead" tennis player does when he wakes up the next morning? Why, goes to the Great Wall of course!

"We started to go up steps, not knowing how far we could walk. The beginning was steep; every 40 meters we would take a break. Irina said she was dying and couldn’t get to the finish, or at least as far as the eye could see.
The first 400-500 meters were just steps. We spent one and a half hours going up – around 1,000 steps. We recovered and took some photos. "

What amazing powers of recovery - completely dead from a night tennis match to walking up 1000 steps of the Great Wall the next morning with an important Davis Cup tie on the horizon.

I especially like this bit:

"It was hot on the ascent, but our Russian mentality told us to finish."

Pity your "Russian mentality" doesn't tell you to finish your tennis matches, buddy. Which reminds me of a Davydenko quote from last week:

"Normally I never retire because I like to fight."

I'd like to put up the list of matches Davydenko has retired from (mostly early in the second set - which of course has nothing to do with the fact that some bookmakers only pay out on tennis match results if one set has been completed), but this post is already long enough.

Well you don't have to be Einstein to gather what side of the fence I come down on when musing about Davydenko's alleged involvement in fixing tennis matches. And in case you're wondering why a top 10 tennis player earning millions of dollars would feel the need to do this, have a look at who likes to get friendly with Russian tennis players.

Kafelnikov, Sargsian and Labadze are tennis players from the former Soviet Republic who have had suspicions of being involved in fixed matches. You can add another name to the list. And in an ideal world, you'd hope the ATP would have the balls to kick the dirty cheating scumbag (and there are others) out of the sport. But that won't happen, citing a lack of proof.

Still, the shenanigans of last week might sow the seeds of doubt into the minds of the mobsters and the players they control, and they may realise there may be easier ways to scam money than trying to fleece punters who are starting to get sick of the arse-rogering they sometimes take on fixed tennis matches. Here's hoping.

Weekend Wrap

With a week between cricket tests I fell into the trap of watching a bit of sport for fun over the weekend, but this time I'm glad I did after an enthralling 90 minutes of rugby league involving the Warriors and Roosters.

Now I'll admit league is not my favourite sport and I tend to keep my emotions in check when it comes to the Warriors, as like the Wellington rugby union team and women who refuse to sw... (ok, we won't go there), they usually build your excitement up to significant levels before crushing them in ultimate disappointment.

But no matter how the Warriors finish the season, they have given us some serious entertainment and much of it of high quality. So I don't care if they lose all their remaining games this season, they can have a pass mark from me already.

Now I was going to spend the next part of this post bagging the ref, as his dubious sinbinning of Mannering with 12 min to go and missing the ball being punched from Price in extra time probably had a bearing on the final result. But for once in my life, I've stopped to think. To be fair, one of the Warrior's tries was off a forward pass. And, while we can point to 2 or 3 decisions from the ref as having an influence on the end result, what about the influence some players also have? For example, the Roosters were in possession with less than a minute to go, but a dropped ball allowed the Warriors to get their hands on the pill and get down the other end for the field goal to tie the game. If we bag the ref for changing the course of the game, then to be fair that poor mug who dropped the ball should also be lynched (at least by Roosters fans).

The only stats I've seen on the accuracy of officials' decisions in sport come from cricket and gridiron. In both cases, they get it right about 90% of the time. Isn't that good enough from "humans"? While most would agree the Roosters and Warriors played not only an entertaining game, but one of quality, there were still 12 errors from each side, about 30 missed tackles from each side, and they didn't complete all their sets when in possession (although they got pretty damn close).

Maybe I'm mellowing in my old age, but I'm taking a break from criticising those who defend the rules in sport. Hell, why spoil the memory of a great game of footy with a few negative barbs at the plonker who gave the Roosters an 8-2 penalty count? It's not like they have eyes in the back of their head ...

... which is what Wellington prop Neemia Tialata needed. Anyone who saw THAT punch hopefully feels like me - absolutely disgusted. If that was thrown on the street instead of the field he'd be locked up, so I hope Clint Newland gets banned for life. But of course he won't, apparently violence in sport has different rules to violence in the community and I await the inevitable slap over the wrist with a wet bus ticket.

Now people, take note. Be prepared to hear about John Isner. Who? A 6 foot-10 inch 22 y.o. American tennis player who has the most dangerous serve in the game and who has just completed an amazing couple of weeks in tennis, winning a Challenger event (as a wildcard) and reaching the final of an ATP event (as a wildcard, losing to Roddick 4-6, 6-7). Y'know what's funny? Our own Dan King-Turner is ranked ahead of him - well, shortly to be was. To our sporting media who think NZ tennis players have potential, do an exercise and look up the change in Isner's ATP ranking over the past couple of weeks to understand what "potential" really means.

Oh, and Tiger Woods won a golf tournament by 8 shots. A week before the US PGA. Anyone prepared to bet against him?

Back tomorrow or Wednesday when I am going to town on Mr Davydenko.

The Fix

Today, I thought I'd try my hand at a bit of fiction - y'know, story-telling, because if the following actually happened in real-life you wouldn't believe it.

There's this tennis match see, between a real good player called Nick Davedonko and a mediocre journeyman whose name is Marty Vaseline-Redyellow. Nick has been around for years and plays lots of matches and wins most of them and is currently ranked No. 4 in the world. On the other hand Marty struggles to earn a living on the tennis tour and more often than not has to bail out of his hotel room at 4 a.m. to avoid paying the bill.

They're both playing in some tin-pot tournament in the wop-wops of Poorland. Nick hurt his left toe in his first match and doesn't really want to play anymore as he has some real big matches coming up in the United States soon. But he can't pull out of the tournament otherwise he cops a fine from the Tennis Police. Also, Nick's brother who is rumoured to be involved with the Vodka Mafia is in a spot of bother after spending too much money recently on hookers and cocaine.

So Nick comes up with a plan and waltzes up to his next opponent Marty and suggests - NUDGE NUDGE WINK WINK - not to book the train out of the tin-pot town they're in until the day after tomorrow. Then Nick tells his brother his toe is throbbing more than his appendage does at the sight of Maria Sharapova.

Nick puts 2 and 2 together and rings his Mafia boss. "Look Guv, can you spot me a couple of G's for some info?.... Yeah you can? ... Alright, Nick's just told me his toe's in a spot of bovver and he's throwin' the towel in, y'know what I mean?"

The boss certainly did know what Nick's brother meant. By the time the match between Nick and Marty starts, the odds on Nick winning - which he could normally do with one arm tied behind his back - have shifted from an understandable $1.20 to an extraordinary $2.40. Marty the mediocre journeyman is suddenly the favourite everywhere to win.

But there's one problem. Marty actually has to win, and Nick can't retire from the match until at least one set is completed because some bookmakers don't pay out on matches unless one set is played - thanks to the occasional suspicion on the tennis tour that some matches get fixed. But of course they don't, that's just conspiracy theory nonsense.

I should mention at this point that in recent years, a new phenomenon has swept the gambling world where you can bet on sports events during play. A lot of this action occurs at a place called Betngetrobbed. So the match starts out - remember Nick is paying an unbelievable $2.40 to win - and all Marty has to do is hit a few balls over the net for an hour or so and he'll be into the quarter-finals and a healthy paycheque.

Trouble is, someone slipped a note under Marty's hotel room door overnight telling him if he doesn't win this match his cat will be strung up on his clothesline, so understandably he's a little nervous. So nervous in fact, that he starts off playing real bad (even for him) and midway through the first set has to call the trainer for a nose bleed, he's so stressed. He goes back on court with cotton wool stuffed up his nasal passage, but his biorhythm's are seriously out-of-sync and poor old Marty loses the first set 2-6, having hit only two winners the whole set.

Meanwhile, the punters at Betngetrobbed think all their Xmases have come at once - the World No. 4 starts off paying $2.40 against some no-name, Nick wins the first set and he is STILL paying $2.40 to win the match! Now a few of these punters who have been around the block a few times smell a rat, but the vast majority of these lemmings just wade in with maxed out credit cards.

Now Nick starts to worry. He knows his brother's testicles will join the cat on the clothesline if he wins this match so when no-one's looking, he kicks a chair on the sideline with his sore toe and immediately crumples to the ground in agony. The trainer comes over and looks at his toe, applies some first-aid so Nick can manfully soldier on. And Nick does, but eventually has to retire in the third set when the pain becomes too great to bear.

Unfortunately for Nick, his brother and his Mafia boss, the lemmings have this time cried enough and forced the blind mice who run Betngetrobbed to contact the Tennis Police. And here the story must end, perhaps I might write Chapter 2 in a week or two.

DISCLAIMER: This story is purely a work or fiction and any resemblance to actual persons is purely co-incidental. Yes, I know Martin Vassallo-Arguello beat Nikolay Davydenko in the second round at Sopot; wow, was there really 3.5 million quid matched on Betfair for that game? You don't say ...

Bad Beat

Sorry for the lack of posts, but I've been playing a bit of on-line poker to while away the hours. And I have to share this hand with you, as it's one of the very few times I've felt sorry for the guy I stacked:

I'm dealt 10h 10c. First person to act limps in, folded around to me and I raise, get two callers (including the limper).

Flop comes 9h 8h 6h. Checked to me, so I bet. My overpair is probably good and there is a chance someone is on a higher flush draw than me, so I'll take the pot now thanks. Well blow me down - Mr Sneaky check-raises me which induces the other person to fold. I call.

Next card (turn) comes 8d. Great, now I gotta worry about full houses as well as flushes. Mr Sneaky checks on me, and I'm quite happy to check behind.

Well no prizes for guessing what comes sailing down the river, a beautiful and most unexpected 7h. Mr Sneaky now bets, I'm more than happy to push all my money in the middle and to my delight, Mr Sneaky calls and is shown my straight flush as he mucks and gets up and leaves.

I check the hand history - poor bastard had pocket 8's, had made quads on the turn only to get one-outered by me on the river. I won't be complaining about luck in poker for a while.