PaddyPower to cash in on the "free" PR

Paddy Power decided to pay out on Tiger Woods winning the US PGA at the halfway stage. But nobody told Y.E.Yang about it. He played brilliantly under the pressure of playing in the last group with Tiger, and broke Woods' record of 14 majors won from leading/co-leading into the last round.

The PR stunt is estimated to cost the Irish bookmaker over £1 million, but the worldwide publicity they'll get out of it will more than make up for it, just like when local bookmaker Fred Done paid out early on Man Utd winning the title back in the late 90s. He got so much PR out of it, his local business is now a massive bookmaking firm with shops throughout the UK.

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Spot-fixing - you will never, ever be able to stop it

According to this report , IPL tournaments so far have been rife with spot-fixing - that is fixing minor elements of the game - runs in a single over, number of wides bowled etc. The curious part of that article is that the Income Tax department are supposed to have found these crimes. What idiot would be stupid enough to put down 'big wad of cash handed to me by bookie' as a source of income? Backhanders for sportsmen, particularly in a celebrity- and cricket-obsessed culture like India are not rare. They could come from anything like turning up to open someone's new business (not a sponsor, but a 'friend of a friend' arrangement), to being a guest at some devoted fan's dinner party etc. The opportunities are always there, and there will always be people trying to become friends with players and their entourage - that is human nature. This form of match-fixing (and it's not really fixing a match, just a minor element of it) is very hard to prove, but also, ...

lay the field - my favourite racing strategy

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It's all gone Pete Tong at Betfair!

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