Hewitt is gone as a player if he keeps that up

The late night epic against Baghdatis was no excuse - the simple fact is his gameplan is not good enough to match the likes of Djokovic. That grip with heavy topspin on the forehand may have served him well for 10yrs but he needs to find the killer shot to finish points. The younger, stronger blokes like Djokovic will eat him for breakfast every time. Considering the betting was 1.2 Djokovic before the match, punters and bookies are onto it as well, at least against the top players. Watch for anomalies in prices against lesser players at other events. He can still beat up the small fry, but anyone with a decent game will really trouble him.

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It's all gone Pete Tong at Betfair!

The Christmas Hurdle from Leopardstown, a good Grade 2 race during the holiday period. But now it will go into history as the race which brought Betfair down. Over £21m at odds of 29 available on Voler La Vedette in-running - that's a potential liability of over £500m. You might think that's a bit suspicious, something's fishy, especially with the horse starting at a Betfair SP of 2.96. Well, this wasn't a horse being stopped by a jockey either - the bloody horse won! Look at what was matched at 29. Split that in half and multiply by 28 for the actual liability for the layer(s). (Matched amounts always shown as double the backers' stake, never counts the layers' risk). There's no way a Betfair client would have £600m+ in their account. Maybe £20 or even £50m from the massive syndicates who regard(ed) Betfair as safer than any bank, but not £600m. So the error has to be something technical. However, rumour has it, a helpdesk reply (not gospel, natur

What shits me about match-fixing 'journalism'.

The anti-wagering media bandwagon has dozens of new members this week, all weighing in an industry they have absolutely no idea about. I'm all for getting the betting industry into the mainstream but it shits me no end when they roll out reports and celebrities who simply don't have a clue what they are talking about and don't bother to check basic facts which key arguments in their story. If this was the financial industry, making errors like this would have them in all sorts of trouble, but the same level of regulation doesn't apply because finance stock markets are supposedly all legitimate and serious, whereas sports betting is just a bit of fun for people who can never win in the long-term... according to the media. This week we have seen the sting by the Telegraph which, on the face of it, looks to be a tremendous piece of investigative work into fixing in English football. But the headlines around it are over-sensationalised yet again. Delroy Facey, a former pla

The Cup review

James McDonald feels the emotion of winning the Melbourne Cup on Verry Elleegant. (photo credit Darrian Traynor/Getty Images) With every man and his dog doing Cup previews these days, perhaps a postmortem of the race provides more value - at least for these more serious about the game or want something to refer back to in 363 days' time. It was great to see Flemington basking in the warm spring sun, with no threat of rain which buggers up the confidence you have in the state of the track, an integral part of betting on horses. The crowd was back, at least about 10% of the normal Cup day crowd, but 10,000 more than were allowed last year. Let us never have to deal with these restrictions again in our lifetimes. The TV coverage - well, um, ugh. On Derby Day, I was able to watch the racing.com stream in the UK while Sky Sports Racing kept to their normal NSW-controlled Sky Racing Aus coverage which denies that Victoria and South Australia exist. For Cup Day, they switched to the Chann

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