Sport is made for betting

....But it wasn't over sporting integrity, it was over a voting & betting scandal on the X Factor... Virgin Media staff in X Factor bet scam Three Virgin Media employees have been sacked after using internal data on X Factor voting to bet on the show. The three staff members bet on the outcomes of the show's weekly eliminations. The Gambling Commission investigated after being alerted to suspicious activity by online bookmaker Betfair. "We are satisfied that the bets placed were substantially unfair as the individuals involved had inside information," the commission said. .... According to the Gambling Commission, £16,000 worth of bets have been declared void, the first time such powers have been used under the Gambling Act 2005. Nice to see them doing something but how about investigating something important, like bent football or snooker matches?

News breaking tonight of another betting scandal involving the Pakistan cricket team and the News of the World, an English tabloid newspaper. A middle-man is alleged to have arranged no-balls at specific times in the England first innings in the current Test match at Lord's, in return for substantial amounts of money. The no-balls in question bowled by Mohammed Amir were not even close, at least a foot over, which is curious, the one for Mohammed Asif wasn't so blatant. But is it as clear-cut as it seems? For me, it sounds too perfect. Pakistan are easy targets - they don't have a great reputation for integrity, and linking it to illegal bookmakers on the sub-continent is the perfect modus operandi as they have no licence or audit trail. People say that millions get bet on this stuff, despite all sorts of previous allegations about these markets, but there's nowhere to prove it is true or not. Was the evidence shown to anyone before the event, or did it only emerge co...

Not a good day for snooker ahead of the World Championship final, with world #1 John Higgins seemingly exposed by a News of the World investigative report. Let's see him get out of this one.... How world snooker champion John Higgins plots to betray his fans for cash MILLIONAIRE World Snooker champion John Higgins is captured here on camera shaking hands on a disgraceful deal to fix a string of high-profile matches after demanding a £300,000 kickback. The scandal will cast a dark shadow over the final of this year's championship which starts today and disgust the millions of fans tuning into the BBC to watch their sporting idols. John Higgins caught on camera agreeing to a massive bribe to fix World Series snooker matches After 34-year-old Higgins' shock defeat in the tournament at the hands of veteran Steve Davis, he flew to the Ukrainian capital of Kiev and in a meeting with undercover News of the World investigators on Friday shamelessly: * AGREED to deliberately LO...

About time something was done on this one. As posted here last year , something was very fishy with this match - people don't go out of their way to be betting on correct frame score unless something is up. Duo detained by police Stephen Maguire and Jamie Burnett have been detained by police looking into alleged irregular betting patterns during a UK Championship match. Both were helping Strathclyde Police with their inquiries in connection with the outcome of the game in Telford on December 15 last year. A Strathclyde Police spokesman said: "Our economic crime unit can confirm that two men, aged 28 and 33, have been detained and are assisting Strathclyde Police with their inquiries into the alleged irregular betting pattern associated with the snooker match involving Stephen Maguire and Jamie Burnett." The first-round match, which was subject to investigations by World Snooker and the Gambling Commission, was won 9-3 by Maguire. The problem is, with allegations like thes...

Snooker has been a sport dogged by match-fixing scandals in recent years. Not just who will win the match, but correct score betting. It's far too coincidental when a match with dozens of correct frame scores just happens to land on one particular score that every man and his dog had backed! SportingLife article Finally snooker now have data-sharing arrangements with Betfair and othe betting firms to get to the bottom of these instances and determine if there's fire amongst the smoke. Jamie Burnett and Stephen Maguire will be sweating.

Snooker has been one sport marred by betting scandals in low-level events in recent years. After years of knocking back Betfair's offer to share data with them in a memorandum of understanding, they might finally take it up after yet another scandal.... Guardian article