Nothing is sacred.

[RED-DOG]

http://bbc.in/1P9C21M

[Archer]

All over the press now and Andy Murray has tweeted the Buzzfeed link:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/heidiblake/the-tennis-racket#.dbkBpNNKZ7


Coincidentally I've been reading about irregular betting patterns and the link with certain Premier League referees.

[TightEnd]

cliffs

[TightEnd]

A date has not been properly redacted - 25/07/08

 Matches on this date:

Nadal d Andreev
Gasquet d Ferrer
Kiefer d Blake
Simon d Cilic

[DungBeetle]

Blimey.  I never thought a Grand Slam match would be impacted.  They play 48 weeks a year, so plenty of backwater smaller tournies to chuck.  Still plenty of money riding on those games.

[arbboy]

There is a lot of mis information in this article (Mark Davies was not a co founder of betfair for example - he was the former PR director and son of BBC comm Barry Davies fwiw.  When people get stuff like this wrong in articles i instantly question how much they actually know about the betting markets - usually not that much).  Not quite sure why this is suddenly hitting the mainstream media press right now.  It has been going on for years and most people are well aware of it.

There is a big factor in professional tennis below the elite level which most people even in the betting industry don't realise occurs to the level it does which explains why there is so much of this going on which relates closely to poker.  Staking.  The vast majority of pros on the circuit below elite level are staked by financial backers in a pretty similar way to poker players.  Without staking hardly anyone would be able to afford to play on the tour given the exs and the levels of prize money they receive.  Obviously GB/LTA funding doesn't apply here but for most 'dodgy' countries in the world ie Eastern Europe/SAmerica this is pretty standard practice to give kids a chance.  That is why there will be mystery 'financial' advisors in centre court boxes for players who have suddenly come from nowhere and look totally out of place.

Obviously a lot of these types of backers are not the most honest operators and when their charges are not giving them the financial return they expected from their junior talent, they are told they need to help out their backer who is losing money to fund their career and throw a match/set etc.  This is the reason it goes on in the vast majority of cases.  Sometimes players have family emergencies and have to fly home immediately and will just put in a shocker to get out of the event and get home.  Again this information finds it's way into the hands of serious punters who move markets.  Is this match fixing?  They will argue if they drop out and don't play the match they would lose either a) appearance money b) prize money from the event.  If you had a normal job and this happened to you you would throw in a stinker to still get paid before you rushed home to sort out the family issue.  Is it wrong?  Probably?  Is it just human nature to do so and protect your own income?  Probably?

I know people who stake tennis players in this way via friends who are involved in both tennis betting and/or are tennis players on the main atp tour/challenger tour and the WTA/female challenger tour.  I have been asked numerous times if i could facilitate spot fixing/match fixing on lower grade games by other tennis pros who know friends of mine who are looking to pay for their exs for the upcoming year who don't have backers and are trying to do it themselves.  The vast majority of these players see they can bet on their low grade games on sites like 365 but have no idea you simply can't get 50 large on their game which is being shown in a barn on a live stream only at 365.

If the tennis authorities really want to sort out corruption they need to understand why it is happening in the same way as horse racing punters know class 6 horses running at ling/kemp on the all weather for £1200 a race are not making the game pay the 'proper' way.  Prize money needs to be levelled out across the tour if they really want to reduce this.  You will never stop it totally because of the way so much tennis talent from the dodgiest parts of the world are funded/'sponsored' in their early years.

These articles love putting in a 'top 50' player or a 'grand slam finalist' into the headlines to grab the attention of the casuals.  These will usually be a grand slam doubles finalist from Eastern europe who is not even involved at the major money end of the singles events where all the money is.  The 'top 50' player will be someone who has only hit the top 50 just once in their life.  Otherwise they would call him a top 20 player if he was ever in the top 20.  Sounds exciting to casuals but the reality is they are trying to hype it up to make the story as big a deal as possible when in reality in most cases it isn't.

There will be a select few idiot top tennis players who get greedy but it makes no sense longer term for a top 50 player to do this.  The vast majority of this goes on with low grade talent.  Just the same as horse racing.  The tennis authorities turn a blind eye to it because without these potless grinders playing the qual's etc there wouldn't be a major slam to profit from ultimately and instead of the ATP tour effectively having to pay these grinders a wage via the prize money system they can get their wage 'elsewhere' so to speak and it is a win win situation for everyone.  Hence why it is hushed up imo.  Obviously they will never admit this.

[arbboy]

Blimey.  I never thought a Grand Slam match would be impacted.  They play 48 weeks a year, so plenty of backwater smaller tournies to chuck.  Still plenty of money riding on those games.

You can get 20 times more on a GS 1st round match than most other events and the player losing the game on purpose usually won't be expected to win anyway so it is so much easier for it to go under the radar.  The vast majority of 'dodgy' betting patterns on the top players are just sharp pro punters who know certain players preferences for certain parts of the tour at certain times of the year.  Certain players have to attend certain legs of the Asian tour for example for corporate/sponsorship reasonsbut have no interest in being there.  This is well known by certain people who influence markets.  These players will put no preparation into this surface etc and turn up receive the appearance fee.  They will not deliberately lose but they will not be fully wound up shall we say.

There is a player my friend knows personally who hits with him on the main ATP tour who never wins a match in January on purpose in order to pay for this ex's for the tour for the rest of the season and treats the Aussie swing as an extended pre season training camp in the sun in between the 3 tour events.  This allows him to have a longer off season over Xmas and rest better in order for him to be fresher later in the season.  Is this match fixing or just financially smart for him to do this because it gives him an edge physically later in the season in his opinion?

[TightEnd]

Novak Djokovic says he was offered $200,000 to fix a match http://gu.com/p/4fqt2/stw 

[TightEnd]

the tennis authorities had the bases of this report years ago, and have done nothing

they don't understand the betting markets?

their life is too cushy to properly deal with it?

[arbboy]

the tennis authorities had the bases of this report years ago, and have done nothing

they don't understand the betting markets?

their life is too cushy to properly deal with it?

Money talks.  They don't want to upset the apple cart of the big money events where the top players make all the money for the sport. 

[tikay]

Argue's explanation of this matter were fascinating.

[horseplayer]

the tennis authorities had the bases of this report years ago, and have done nothing

they don't understand the betting markets?

their life is too cushy to properly deal with it?

As arb says like racing

There are a large number of jockeys who are making a maximum of 20k a year after tax slogging their guts away for a few rides a week (and that's a generous interpretation of their earnings).

I am sure there are some tennis players who play due to backers/family support but when either a journeyman tennis player/jockey spend 10 years making minimum wage if that it pays to be suspicious.

[horseplayer]

As I have posted before the excellent dw sport on twitter worth a read

https://mobile.twitter.com/sportdw

He has been reporting and putting reports on these games for years and sending to the investigation unit. They blanked him.

[arbboy]

As a random poll, how many people on here even due tennis players were 'staked' in a similar fashion to poker players with a % of their future earnings going to their backer for their whole career in return for the upfront investment at the start?

[horseplayer]

As a random poll, how many people on here even due tennis players were 'staked' in a similar fashion to poker players with a % of their future earnings going to their backer for their whole career in return for the upfront investment at the start?

Only because of reading sportdws stuff I was aware.

Not the same but syndicates masking as agents owning big groups of young footballers and taking a big percentage of their wages as fees,similar happened there.