Recently, during the trial in London of Pakistani cricketers accused of match fixing, the prosecution lawyer made damaging revelations about illegal betting syndicates in India, run by “shadowy figures”. These syndicates were the conduits of $50 billion worth of bets in the cricket economy, he said.
Separately, but perhaps relatedly, the International Cricket Council has been urging authorities in India to legalise cricket betting. It argues regulated betting syndicates will be less prone to fixing matches and bribing cricketers. While cricket betting should certainly be legalised in India, will this alone end the fixing challenge? This belief ignores how contemporary fixing works.
In the 1990s, fixing was straightforward: You paid a cricket team to lose a match. The captain — maybe both captains — was essential to pre-deciding the result of a game. To ensure success, you had to coordinate buying off a number of influential cricketers playing a particular match. Sometimes a bribed cricketer may not have known that his team mate too had been paid money by the same syndicate.
This was an expensive operation simply because it depended on a number of actors (cricketers) delivering on their individual deals. If some honest and incorruptible cricketer decided to bowl a great spell or score a fabulous, game-changing hundred, the fixer’s best laid plans would crash. All this made match fixing extremely difficult; it depended on too many variable inputs.
Resultantly, ‘episode fixing’ arose as a product that the market needed. This entailed pre-determining or rigging specific episodes related to specific bets. For instance, if a batsmen was 99 not out at tea, you could bet on him not reaching a century and, in fact, getting out in the first over after the break. This would appear a legitimate bet. If you managed to make contact with the batsman while he was sipping tea and settled on the right price, you would be very rich within a few minutes. This was the genesis of spot fixing.
Yet, that is not all. Between 2000 and now a new animal has taken over the betting business: Online betting. Betting websites are fascinating in their operations and in many ways approximate trading in the stock market. The odds for a match are set not by an individual bookie or a consortium of wise men but by the market.
Take a simplistic example. Australia is playing England at Trent Bridge. My friend and I place the first bets on an online betting site. I bet £100 on England and my friend bets £50 on Australia. Instantly, the odds are set at 100:50 or 2:1. A third man comes in and places £10,000 on Australia. Immediately, the odds change and lopsidedly favour Australia.
That aside, online betting sites can function as betting exchanges, allowing you to buy or sell contracts, in the manner of a stock market. You can ‘short the market’ by agreeing to sell a contract cheaper than the market price, but without holding it, only because you know that an event/episode will take place on the field shortly that will cause contract prices to drop and allow you to buy cheap. Now what if you paid money to influence that event/episode? Such a transaction would be at the heart of spot fixing.
What if you disagreed with the odds the market has set for a match or a bet? Online betting companies allow you to set your own odds, within certain limits. The weight of money you bring in and the odds you set also have an impact on the overall, market-determined odds.
Odds keep changing as a match proceeds. You can bet at various stages of the match and fine-tune your bet given your understanding of the game’s trajectory. If your understanding is determined by insider information — as opposed to merely a cricket fan’s assessment — there’s a fortune waiting.
How quickly do odds change in the course of a match? This depends on how fast-paced the game is. An illustration may help. A Test match is being played between England and Australia. England has eight wickets in hand and two sessions of the fifth day in which to score 120 runs to win. The odds are very much in England’s favour.
Now the first three overs after lunch are all maidens. Not a single run is scored. The punters and bookmakers are not moving an inch. They realise three maiden overs mean nothing in the context of the match.
Translate this scenario to a Twenty20 match: England needs 100 to win with seven overs to go and five wickets in hand. Over number 14 is a maiden, not one run is scored. The online betting sites go berserk, the odds change massively. Now suppose the batsman had been bribed to play out that maiden over.
It does not necessarily follow that England will lose the match. The same batsman could bat with commitment and hit three sixes in the next over he faces, taking his team to victory. His deal — and the fixing syndicate’s interest — may have been limited to pre-determining over 14, not on pre-determining the entire match. That is why spot fixing is not always equal to match fixing. Match fixing is often a collateral consequence of spot fixing.
Spot fixing is most lucrative when the odds are volatile and when there are high chances of one bad or good over or one dismissal affecting the odds. As such, T20 is better suited to this industry than a five-day Test match.
Market statistics bear this out. Cricket — especially T20 cricket — is one of the most bet on sports on betting sites. Betfair (www.betfair.com) is the world’s leading sports betting company. According to insiders, a top golf tournament, say the US Masters, would attract bets worth £2 to 3 million on Betfair.
Cricket seems to do better. During the 2010 T20 World Cup in the West Indies, each match drew bets worth £3 million to 4 million. In contrast, the Indian Premier League, which preceded the T20 World Cup by a few days, saw betting amounting to over £12 million per match on Betfair.
This is betting, it could be contended, and betting on a legal site. How does it suggest fixing? To be fair it doesn’t. It does indicate though that Indian and Pakistani and South Asian punters — who clearly bring the incremental bets to the Betfair site during marquee cricket tournaments — are investing a king’s ransom on cricket gambling. The motivation for some of them to rig events is strong. The legal status of the betting site makes no difference.
Source: The Pioneer
Separately, but perhaps relatedly, the International Cricket Council has been urging authorities in India to legalise cricket betting. It argues regulated betting syndicates will be less prone to fixing matches and bribing cricketers. While cricket betting should certainly be legalised in India, will this alone end the fixing challenge? This belief ignores how contemporary fixing works.
In the 1990s, fixing was straightforward: You paid a cricket team to lose a match. The captain — maybe both captains — was essential to pre-deciding the result of a game. To ensure success, you had to coordinate buying off a number of influential cricketers playing a particular match. Sometimes a bribed cricketer may not have known that his team mate too had been paid money by the same syndicate.
This was an expensive operation simply because it depended on a number of actors (cricketers) delivering on their individual deals. If some honest and incorruptible cricketer decided to bowl a great spell or score a fabulous, game-changing hundred, the fixer’s best laid plans would crash. All this made match fixing extremely difficult; it depended on too many variable inputs.
Resultantly, ‘episode fixing’ arose as a product that the market needed. This entailed pre-determining or rigging specific episodes related to specific bets. For instance, if a batsmen was 99 not out at tea, you could bet on him not reaching a century and, in fact, getting out in the first over after the break. This would appear a legitimate bet. If you managed to make contact with the batsman while he was sipping tea and settled on the right price, you would be very rich within a few minutes. This was the genesis of spot fixing.
Yet, that is not all. Between 2000 and now a new animal has taken over the betting business: Online betting. Betting websites are fascinating in their operations and in many ways approximate trading in the stock market. The odds for a match are set not by an individual bookie or a consortium of wise men but by the market.
Take a simplistic example. Australia is playing England at Trent Bridge. My friend and I place the first bets on an online betting site. I bet £100 on England and my friend bets £50 on Australia. Instantly, the odds are set at 100:50 or 2:1. A third man comes in and places £10,000 on Australia. Immediately, the odds change and lopsidedly favour Australia.
That aside, online betting sites can function as betting exchanges, allowing you to buy or sell contracts, in the manner of a stock market. You can ‘short the market’ by agreeing to sell a contract cheaper than the market price, but without holding it, only because you know that an event/episode will take place on the field shortly that will cause contract prices to drop and allow you to buy cheap. Now what if you paid money to influence that event/episode? Such a transaction would be at the heart of spot fixing.
What if you disagreed with the odds the market has set for a match or a bet? Online betting companies allow you to set your own odds, within certain limits. The weight of money you bring in and the odds you set also have an impact on the overall, market-determined odds.
Odds keep changing as a match proceeds. You can bet at various stages of the match and fine-tune your bet given your understanding of the game’s trajectory. If your understanding is determined by insider information — as opposed to merely a cricket fan’s assessment — there’s a fortune waiting.
How quickly do odds change in the course of a match? This depends on how fast-paced the game is. An illustration may help. A Test match is being played between England and Australia. England has eight wickets in hand and two sessions of the fifth day in which to score 120 runs to win. The odds are very much in England’s favour.
Now the first three overs after lunch are all maidens. Not a single run is scored. The punters and bookmakers are not moving an inch. They realise three maiden overs mean nothing in the context of the match.
Translate this scenario to a Twenty20 match: England needs 100 to win with seven overs to go and five wickets in hand. Over number 14 is a maiden, not one run is scored. The online betting sites go berserk, the odds change massively. Now suppose the batsman had been bribed to play out that maiden over.
It does not necessarily follow that England will lose the match. The same batsman could bat with commitment and hit three sixes in the next over he faces, taking his team to victory. His deal — and the fixing syndicate’s interest — may have been limited to pre-determining over 14, not on pre-determining the entire match. That is why spot fixing is not always equal to match fixing. Match fixing is often a collateral consequence of spot fixing.
Spot fixing is most lucrative when the odds are volatile and when there are high chances of one bad or good over or one dismissal affecting the odds. As such, T20 is better suited to this industry than a five-day Test match.
Market statistics bear this out. Cricket — especially T20 cricket — is one of the most bet on sports on betting sites. Betfair (www.betfair.com) is the world’s leading sports betting company. According to insiders, a top golf tournament, say the US Masters, would attract bets worth £2 to 3 million on Betfair.
Cricket seems to do better. During the 2010 T20 World Cup in the West Indies, each match drew bets worth £3 million to 4 million. In contrast, the Indian Premier League, which preceded the T20 World Cup by a few days, saw betting amounting to over £12 million per match on Betfair.
This is betting, it could be contended, and betting on a legal site. How does it suggest fixing? To be fair it doesn’t. It does indicate though that Indian and Pakistani and South Asian punters — who clearly bring the incremental bets to the Betfair site during marquee cricket tournaments — are investing a king’s ransom on cricket gambling. The motivation for some of them to rig events is strong. The legal status of the betting site makes no difference.
Source: The Pioneer
