{"id":332,"date":"2016-02-10T11:03:29","date_gmt":"2016-02-10T11:03:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scscsussex.wordpress.com\/?p=332"},"modified":"2021-10-05T09:18:38","modified_gmt":"2021-10-05T08:18:38","slug":"tennis-court-siders-and-the-challenge-of-dealing-with-sports-betting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/centre-for-the-study-of-corruption\/2016\/02\/10\/tennis-court-siders-and-the-challenge-of-dealing-with-sports-betting\/","title":{"rendered":"Tennis, court-siders and the challenge of dealing with sports betting"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anyone who\u2019s spent any time watching sport on British TV will be more than familiar with the dulcet tones of Ray Winstone.\u00a0 Sport is, so the actor famous for his hardman persona will tell you, \u201call about the in-play<\/a>\u201d as he plugs the odds for the self-proclaimed<\/a> world\u2019s largest online gambling company.\u00a0 According to one of their competitors \u201csport means more when you bet on it<\/a>\u201d whilst a third betting company ratchets up the excitement by claiming that \u201cright now, anything could happen<\/a>\u201d.\u00a0 If you believe the adverts, the sporting world is a fast-moving, emotionally-charged adrenalin rush where banter and pay outs dominate.<\/p>\n

Glamorous though it may look (to some), there is plenty going on beneath the surface that the watching punter won\u2019t be aware of.\u00a0 Indeed, even investigative journalists who spend their lives looking in to how sport works know that things go on that even they can\u2019t really get a handle on. \u00a0\u00a0It is, for example, one thing having a five pound flutter on five correct results to keep yourself amused on a Saturday afternoon, it is quite another to be in regular contact with participants to try and get ahead of the game.\u00a0 And, as we know, that happens far more frequently than sport purists have traditionally been prepared to admit.<\/p>\n

Where once football<\/a> and cricket<\/a> led the way, tennis now seems to be the focus of attention.\u00a0 Indeed, recent reports give the impression that tennis is a sport beset by betting problems.\u00a0 As Sean Ingle revealed<\/a> in the Guardian on Tuesday 9th<\/sup> February, there is an ever-growing body of evidence that shows tennis umpires, for example, in an increasingly worrying light.\u00a0 In the lowest ranking tennis tournaments, umpires can be asked to use hand held devices to automatically update scores.\u00a0 These scores naturally flash up in the stadium but, with data systems such as those developed by Sportradar, they can also instantly flash up in the betting shops and on to computer screens around the world.<\/p>\n

In a world ever more obsessed with sport, this is great for someone who thinks they\u2019ve spotted a diamond or can see a shock coming.\u00a0 They can back their judgement and bet as the game continues (\u2018in play\u2019).\u00a0 Just like stock market traders, they are putting their money where their mouth is and, if their hunches are right, reaping handsome rewards.<\/p>\n

The problem comes in that with ever-increased amounts of data comes the potential for (quick and skilful) manipulation of it.\u00a0 As Sean Ingle notes, if an umpire takes 30 seconds or so to update the score in a tennis game, then that gives someone at the match the chance to place bets whilst the \u2018old\u2019 odds are still in place.\u00a0 The \u2018court-sider\u2019 is either placing a bet on something that has already happened or is advising others to do the same.\u00a0 In worlds of big revenues these time-lapses can make real differences to who wins and how much they win.\u00a0 It\u2019s also not surprising that some inside tennis (and tennis won\u2019t be alone) look upon it as a chance to make a quick buck.<\/p>\n

In corruption terms this is a classic principal\/agent challenge.\u00a0 The paying public provide the funds that help the sport remain viable.\u00a0 They do this either by going to the events themselves, or prompting sponsors to underwrite them (the events) in the hope that the connection will help them in their business activities. They are the \u2018principals\u2019 who, in theory at least, have the power to decide whether tennis as a commercial entity ultimately has a future or not. \u00a0The agents \u2013 the players, the officials and those who are involved in getting the game played \u2013 do their best to provide a genuinely competitive product to appeal to the watching public.<\/p>\n

There is, however, always the option of doing things that whilst often insignificant for the final result, undermine the very ethos around which sport is played; deliberately bowling a no ball in cricket, trying to ensure there are a set number of throw ins in a football game and so on.\u00a0 The agents have, in other words, discretion as to how the game is actually played, and it is often the human touch \u2013 the inspirational moments and the mistakes \u2013 that make sport what it is.<\/p>\n

The challenge for those interested in tackling the corruption that underpins some of the betting scandals is how best to regulate this discretion.\u00a0 In a world where it is simply expected that people \u2018do the right thing\u2019, then there is no problem.\u00a0 But that is not a world that we can take for granted. Rules, regulations and procedures, however, only ever get us so far in this regard \u2013 in the end, decisions are made, actions are taken, and they are, at least in some part, at the discretion of the participants involved.\u00a0 If they weren\u2019t, we\u2019d be watching robots going through the motions.<\/p>\n

What, in other words, do we do when an athlete has a breakdown and loses from a seemingly impregnable position?\u00a0 Or what do we do when somehow a victory is pulled miraculously from the jaws of defeat?\u00a0 In the true Corinthian spirit we should applaud all the actors involved and be pleased that sport is providing such great entertainment.<\/p>\n

But in a world of dark corners, rapid data flows and lots of money, that Corinthian spirit simply cannot be taken for granted.\u00a0 The sharp-eyed and unscrupulous will use the discretion that is inherent in all sporting contests to make their living.\u00a0 Furthermore, we shouldn\u2019t be surprised when they concentrate on (1) sport at slightly lower levels, (2) sports where individuals (as opposed to teams) have rather more leeway to shape outcomes and (3) where data is available in abundance.\u00a0 An awful lot of sport falls in to those categories.<\/p>\n

The world of anti-corruption analysis has long been warning that sport needs to up its game.\u00a0 A world without corruption is impossible, but a world where sport is a multi-billion pound business needs to adopt the same standards of compliance and oversight as do other global businesses.\u00a0 As things stands, sports such as tennis are illustrating more or less exactly how not to do that.<\/p>\n

By Dan Hough<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Anyone who\u2019s spent any time watching sport on British TV will be more than familiar with the dulcet tones of Ray Winstone.\u00a0 Sport is, so the actor famous for his hardman persona will tell you, \u201call about the in-play\u201d as…<\/span><\/p>\n

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