Sport is made for betting

Now for people in the UK this mightn't seem a big deal, but in Australia, you've never been able to get a fixed-price off-course on harness and greyhound racing, with the exception of a handful of feature meetings. Smaller gallops tracks really take the piss with book percentages, so the tote has always been the more favoured option because of the strength of the interstate pools. Will TABCorp be setting all their own prices in advance, or just waiting for the track bookies to do all the work for them? We'll fix everything Betfair will be loving this - one of the big things holding back their Aus racing volumes is the lack of early fixed-odds markets. If prices will be available early, not just 15 mins before the race when the first call comes from the track, then Betfair's markets will fire up, particularly from international customers who have long demanded early prices to trade from and use to lay-off. Fair play to TABCorp for doing it, considering they've made a...

Same fool, same tired argument. Robert Nason, the muppet who can't handle the concept of competition, is at it again... Bookies bleed the bush What he conveniently fails to mention is the sponsorship now open to corporate bookies (at least in Victoria because NSW still has legislation or a contract banning it) which doesn't count in the funding pot, and the fact that these corporate bookies are actually some of the biggest customers of the TABs! If you simply cut off the corporates, it will not mean all the money goes straight across to the tote pool directly. Competition builds interest in the sport. Australia will never be a monopoly like Hong Kong. A better analogy would be New Zealand where prizemoney is pitiful and any decent horse or jockey moves to Australia. High takeouts means punters lose money quicker. If you bleed the punters dry, then they can't bet next week or next month. And that has to be worrying during a worldwide recession. When is someone going to hold ...