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Cricket Fans Stumped After Match Fixing Scandal Emerges

Thursday, September 2nd, 2010

After the superb opening day performance of the 18 year old Pakistani bowler, Mohammad Amir, who took six wickets and left England on a dismal 102-7, there seemed no way back for England. Step up Jonathan Trott and Stuart Broad, who with their world record eighth wicket partnership, led England to an emphatic win of an innings and 225 runs. After such an entertaining three days of cricket only those ‘in the know’ could have envisaged the headlines which would cast a shadow not only over the fourth day of a seemingly superb test or indeed the series itself but on the whole game of cricket.

Much of the current furore is centred on 3 ‘no balls’ which, were delivered exactly as promised, to an undercover journalist posing as a member of far east gambling cartel. The ‘no balls’ seemingly innocuous at the time did not quite go unnoticed however, with seasoned commentators exclaiming how blatant they were.

It is though difficult to place significance on a ‘no ball’ in the context of a test match, as although the fielding team incur the penalty of 1 run being awarded to the batting team, and the batting team are also able to have a free shot at the ball, ‘no balls’ are not match winners – as a rule. In a gambling context however, there are very significant gains to be made by being able to predict when a ‘no ball’ is to occur and how frequent they are. This is largely owing to the nature of the game and the rise of spread betting.

It is very important to stress here that sports gambling itself, should not be ‘in the dock’. Regulated, legal bookmakers, in the UK and across Europe have nothing to achieve by the public questioning the integrity of any sport. Rather, in countries where gambling is forbidden like Pakistan or highly restricted such as India, illegal betting rings facilitate corruption and exploit sports fans. We must not forget the role that UK bookmakers and betting exchanges have played in exposing corruption or the long-held agreements (or ‘memorandums of understanding’ as they are officially known), that these organisations have with the governing bodies of all the top sports.

Sports gambling is inevitable and should be as legal, fair and open to scrutiny as possible and it should not be forgotten that thankfully most of us will be living in jurisdictions where this remains the case.

Posted in Articles, Sports | No Comments »

Launch of The Lord of the Rings Online Slot Machine Imminent

Wednesday, September 1st, 2010

We’re all very excited here about the imminent release of The Lord of the Rings slot machine, set to be out Tomorrow (2nd September). Why I hear you ask? Well, as well as being based on one of the best film trilogies from the past decade (17 Oscars, including Best Picture & 30 Nominations), it is also going to be the first online slot to use Microgaming’s new feature – Cinematic Spins.

The Cinematic Spins feature means that clips from the movies can be used as the background. According to the press release from Microgaming “Win sequences and expanding wilds also use cinematic clips, instead of traditional animated graphics. The slots feature famous scenes from the film including Ringwraiths during the attack at Weathertop, Balrog in the Mines of Moria, and Uruk-hai in the woods of Middle-earth.” So there.

What this means, is that the graphics on this slot should be pretty cool (we’ve got some screenshots on this page), and as you can see, you can also expect to see the actual characters from the film on the reels, rather than just a caricature or graphic.

Screenshot of the Lord of the Rings online slot

Screenshot of the Lord of the Rings online slot

From what we can tell so far, The Lord of the Rings online slot is going to be similar to Thunderstruck II in that there are no traditional paylines, rather it has the same “243 ways to win” which effectively means that all possible paylines are active when you play. LOTR will also have an expanding wild, which looks set to be the “Eye of Sauron”.

Well, we can’t wait, and there’s not long to go now :)

Try The Lord of the Rings Slot at one of these Microgaming Casinos

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Posted in Articles, Online Slots | No Comments »

High Hopes

Tuesday, August 31st, 2010

The Premier League season has had a wonderful start, and although it is early days there seems to be three teams that everybody is talking about.

Up until their game with Stoke, Chelsea had only played two games and had already scored 12 goals. The Stoke game saw a slowdown in the number of goals scored, although Chelsea still managed a respectable 2 – 0 win. Chelsea look very impressive and are definitely the team to beat this season, the bookmakers agree and Chelsea are 6/5 favourites, ahead of Manchester United who are currently 2/1. Nevertheless, it is worth bearing in mind that the opposition Chelsea has faced thus far aren’t exactly world beaters.

Perhaps the team generating the most column inches pre-season was Manchester City. This summer City have spent approximately £120 million, much more than the other Premiership teams who are all feeling the effects of the recent economic downturn. Yaya Toure and James Milner look like great buys and City’s season began well. A draw with Spurs at White Hart Lane is a credible result, and the 3-0 win over Liverpool was at times, an absolute joy to watch. Additionally City have performed well in the early stages of the Europa League, getting past FC Timisoara with relative ease. So far so good for City, that was until a shock defeat at Sunderland meant that City’s title odds drifted from 13/2 out to 8/1. It could be a little premature I admit, but Mancini is now 11/2 to be the next Premier League manager to leave his club, and this looks like a good punt.

Spurs fans simply couldn’t wait for the new campaign to start, and who could blame them. Having clinched the coveted fourth spot last year, Champions League football was finally on its way to White Hart Lane. Tottenham didn’t exactly get off to a flier recording an opening day draw with City and then losing 3-2 to Young Boys in their Champions League debut, however, a ship steadying 2-1 victory against Stoke and an emphatic 4-0 win in the return leg against Young Boys, and things were looking up for Spurs. A shock 1-0 defeat to Wigan shouldn’t mean that the rails have come off but Spurs fans will be looking forward to the end of the international break and hopefully a good result against West Brom will see Spurs once again looking good value at 40/1 to be unlikely Premier League champions come the end of the season.

If you fancy a punt, why not check out our list of top UK Bookmakers.

Posted in Articles, Betting, Football | 1 Comment »

American Business and the Premier League

Tuesday, August 10th, 2010

American business interests have had a very forceful (but only subtly apparent) hand in the day-to-day of English football for the past couple decades. Every season, it appeared to be only more and more common for Premiership clubs to build connections with American business, financial institutions, and private investors.

American business has focused its sights on a few clubs specifically. Over the last five years, Sunderland, Liverpool, and Manchester United each witnessed the introduction of an American majority shareholder. However, only a few of Arsenal’s minor stakeholders are from the United States (for now).

Today, some of the Premier League’s chief sponsors are American companies. The ball provider, of course, is Nike, whilst other everyday operations are funded by Wrigley’s, Topps Merlin, and Sporting iD, to name a few.

Slowly, over the last five years, American business has moved its way into English stadiums. Now, in 2010, the time appears perfect to bring those stadiums much closer to home. Last week, officials from the Premier League announced that EA (Electronic Arts) Sports will no longer just be the owner of the League’s games license—instead, they will be the official sports technology sponsor.

For EA, this augmented sponsorship role will provide branding rights to every game or league statistic that is shown on screen. The deal results in an estimated £10-15 million for the Premier League, as well the installation of new cameras for the purpose of collecting previously unattainable statistics for each player, including running distances, leap heights, and the speed of their shots.

On the surface, these statistics may seem only beneficial to the creation and marketability of EA’s football games. That is definitely one positive aspect of the deal for EA, but is most assuredly not the motivating factor: EA wants to collect statistics on every player, every match, every team, and every stadium to make football more appetizing to the American sports fan.

The manner in which American sports are regulated, played, and officiated, as well as the behaviour and demeanour of those who play it, are quantifiably influenced by statistics.

For those American businesses that are attempting to market football back home, it is irrelevant whether the sweeping systemic utilization of statistics is beneficial devoid of its marketability. The American public’s appetite for statistics in sports is insatiable; this unending craving has fostered and encouraged the prevalence with which statistics are used (and broadcast) in baseball, basketball, American football, and now, inevitably, football.

EA will have to wait until the 2011 season to use their new statistics-nabbing cameras, and will also have to wait until 2012 to know whether or not goal line technology will be implemented.

“EA Sports Official Goal Line Camera” anyone?

Posted in Articles, Football | 2 Comments »

South Americans shake up their coaching staff

Monday, August 9th, 2010

South American Football Associations put changes in place for 2014

Even though the next men’s World Cup is nearly a full four years away, many leagues, teams, players and coaching staff are already strategizing about how their nation can be the 2014 champions. Brazil, who are the hosts of the next tournament, seem especially anxious to take back the crown that has not been theirs since 2002. Another South American team, Argentina, is also making fast changes to its coaching line-up at least, in preparation for the 2014 games. Both of these teams, especially Argentina, are known for tumultuous turns of events in regards to their team’s leadership.

As of July 24, Mano Menezes—who previously held head-coaching positions with Brazilian professional football clubs Grêmio and Corinthians Paulista—will relieve Dunga of his duties as the head coach of the most successful national football team in history. While Dunga publicly announced that he would stand down from his position after Brazil’s 2-1 loss to the Netherlands in the quarterfinals of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) officially removed him on July 4.

Menezes will make his first appearance as the Brazilian national team’s coach on August 10, 2010, when they go head-to-head with the United States at the New Meadowlands stadium in New Jersey. Menezes has been welcomed with open arms so far, despite other questions about his appointment, due to his preferred playing style, which is similar to Dunga’s. The only significant difference between Dunga’s and Menezes’ teams is the average age of players on the squad—Menezes has kept only four players that took the field from Dunga’s 2010 team, none of whom are over 27 years old. The youngest player on the team that will play in New Jersey is 18-year-old Neymar da Silva.

Argentina, who lost to Germany 4-0 in a surprising slaughter, went away from the 2010 games with generally good marks. Unlike other known powerhouse teams like France and Italy who performed poorly throughout the games, Argentina played as they always did until their final match. Coach Diego Maradona is a contested figure among worldwide football fans—but when Argentina returned home from South Africa, they were welcomed back to Buenos Aires as heroes. Even before leaving the African continent, Julio Grondona, the Argentine Football Association (AFA) president, allegedly patted Maradona on the back after the final match against Germany. Then, the AFA publicly offered Maradona the coaching position at the 2014 World Cup.

The AFA rescinded that offer this week, however, and Maradona isn’t going down without a fight. The Argentine team was in shambles 21 months prior, and Maradona came in and pulled the group back together. But from the early stages, it wasn’t all easy with Maradona. He wanted to choose his assistant staff, but since he had no experience as a coach, the AFA didn’t approve. National team director Carlos Bilardo, who Maradona played under in the 1986 World Cup that Brazil won, was called in to assist.

Now Maradona is pointing fingers and calling AFA officials liars and conspirators. “Treason is everywhere,” he said to reporters, according to the New York Times. While throwing a tantrum certainly won’t get Maradona back on the coaching squad, his fate doesn’t seem as sealed as that of Brazil’s Dunga, who himself said he was not willing to coach Brazil for the tournament on home turf.

Whether they are doing it intentionally or not, it seems advantageous for these South American teams that this coaching drama is taking place now in 2010, still just weeks after the conclusion of this year’s World Cup. Perhaps four years will be enough time for each of these football giants to work out their enormous issues, and finally get back to winning again.

Posted in Articles, Football | 1 Comment »

Tour de France 2010

Friday, August 6th, 2010

For the third time in four years, twenty seven year old Spaniard Alberto Contador has taken the yellow jersey in cycling’s most prestigious match-up, the 3 week 3500km Tour de France. Second and third place went to Luxembourg’s Andy Schleck (+00:00:39) and Russia’s Denis Menchov, (+00:02:01) respectively; the green jersey for best sprinter was awarded to Alessandro Petacchi of Italy, the polka dot jersey for best climber was awarded to Anthony Charteau of France, the white jersey for best young rider was awarded to Andy Schleck (for the third time now).

Highlights of this year’s Tour include the uncharacteristically plentiful number of crashes (for what it’s worth, riders had to endure about 13km of cobblestone – the longest distance since 1983), fresh new doping allegations from 2006 Tour ‘winner’ Floyd Landis, the unfortunate performance of Lance Armstrong in what he claims to be his last Tour, and a 15 minute delay of the Tour’s last stage as a result of an arguably justified publicity stunt from Team RadioShack.

The tour has always been one of professional sport’s most accomplished distributors of disaster and destruction, this year it seemed to dish out an uncomfortable amount of pain to its participants: all but one of the twenty stages witnessed a crash of mentionable severity. In Rotterdam, host of the Tour’s prologue, Tour de France first-timer Manuel Cardoso broke his jaw and a collarbone during a wipe on a technical corner. Mathias Frank was also on the losing side of a confrontation with Rotterdam’s pavement – he suffered a broken right thumb, a badly lacerated lip, and a torn left thigh muscle.  Both of these riders were not able to get back into the saddle for the next stage.

In the summer of 2006, American Floyd Landis won the Tour de France. In the fall of 2006, Landis hired a defence attorney in response to testing positive for testosterone. On May 20th of this year, after millions of dollars, Landis finally admitted that he had been doping all along. Floyd also mentioned the names of all the other pro cyclists that he had been doping with – included among them, Lance Armstrong.

Armstrong nonchalantly passed the allegations off as false and malicious in nature. When questioned about it, Lance would causally respond by mentioning something having to do Floyd’s frustrated state as a result of the revocation of his trophy. These allegations had the potential to entice public interest enough to ensure that media efforts would be focused solely on the seven-time Tour winner, but he didn’t need any outside assistance. He had enough terrible luck all by himself.

Armstrong fell three times, two of which resulted in serious injuries; countless pictures of Lance bleeding profusely from his forearm, thigh, and face appeared next to articles writing about the depressing performance, ability, and aura of cycling’s champion. The media had something else to talk about after Lance and the rest of Team RadioShack 86’ed their red jerseys for a couple of fresh black tunics sporting the number 28 – a symbol representing the 28 million people living with cancer. The second to last stage started 15 minutes late, after officials forced RadioShack to either switch back into red or be disqualified.

Despite the fact that, during stage 15, Contador may have zoomed in front of the then leader Schleck while he was having a chain problem, from a purely competitive standpoint, the premier spectacle of the 2010 Tour de France was the tight and unrelenting competition between them. Fans witness cycling’s two hottest riders battle it out for a good 2 of the tours 3 weeks, and in the end, were humbled by their display of friendship and mutual appreciation as they stood next to each other on the podium.

Posted in Articles, Cycling | 2 Comments »

FIFA Women’s U-20 World Cup final comes down to Nigeria and Germany

Thursday, August 5th, 2010

African nation first to show in this tournament’s final match

Just as this year’s World Cup in South Africa did not treat the men’s USA team very kindly, so too did the females suffer in the U-20 World Cup, which is currently being held in Germany. The women’s youth team lost to Nigeria on July 25 during penalty kicks after an exciting match that concluded 1-1 at the end of regulation time. Nigeria is now continuing on to the final match against Germany after barely defeating Colombia 1-0.

Nigeria claimed the lead over Colombia after a quick two minutes of play on Thursday, July 29, but the Africans were then forced to defend vicious offense by Colombia for the rest of the match. At the end of regulation, however, Nigeria ultimately came out victorious, and became the first African team to reach the final game in this tournament.

The triumphant Africans are the first team to make it not only to the finals, but also even to the semi-finals for this competition. The adult men’s World Cup also saw firsts for Africa—the South African hosts were the first host nation not to make it past group play, but in a happier first, the Ghanaians (who sent the U.S. home) were the first African team to make to the round of 16.

The FIFA U-19 Women’s World Championship, which is now the U-20 Women’s World Cup, was first held in 2002 in Canada. The final match of this first competition, which was played between the Canadian hosts and the United States, culled a massive crowd of nearly 47,000 people. The Americans beat Canada 1-0 after a golden goal, although Christine Sinclair of Canada scored the most goals of the tournament (10), winning the Golden Shoe.

The upper age limit of the competition was raised to 20 in 2006, and then it was officially titled the U-20 Women’s World Cup in 2008, when the USA took the title for the second time. The only other teams that have won the championship in this tournament are Germany and Korea DPR, each only one time each, although if Nigeria fails to overcome in this year’s final match-up, Germany will have two titles to its name.

Posted in Football, WP | 1 Comment »

IFBA to trial additional match officials

Tuesday, July 27th, 2010

In response to the plethora of erroneous goal line rulings during this year’s World Cup, those who decide the rules of the football have witnessed harsh scrutiny from fans, member associations, and confederations.

On July 21st, 2010, proposals from Coupe de la Ligue, the UEFA Champions League, and seven other member associations and confederations were accommodated when the International Football Association Board (IFBA) voted in favor of the expansion of the experimental use of two additional field officials, positioned at each goal.

This is not a novel experiment. Every match of 2009-2010 UEFA League tournament (previously the UEFA Cup) was officiated by one main ref, two sideline refs, and two goal refs.  At a special meeting in Zurich earlier in May, the board reviewed this experiment and decided to see it through until 26th IFAB Annual General Meeting in 2012.

Instead of continuing the experiment for solely the UEFA League, the IFBA decided to permit any member association or confederation that requested to take part, under a couple of conditions: associations have to do it for every game, they have to pay for it, and they have to do it long enough to assist in a final decision about the experiment in 2012.

The member associations and confederations that will utilize two addition assistant officials between now and 2012 are Campeonato Baiano de Futebol Feminino, Campeonato Carioca de 2011, Federación Mexicana de Fútbol Asociación (FMF), Torneo Clausura 2011, Torneo Apertura 2011 and Torneo Clausura 2012, Fédération Française de Football (FFF), Coupe de la Ligue 2010/2011 (League Cup) Union des associations européennes de football (UEFA),UEFA Champions League 2010/2011 and 2011/2012, UEFA Europa League 2010/2011 and 2011/2012, and UEFA Super Cup 2010 and 2011.

While many consider the recent IFBA ruling to be a productive push towards the elimination of mistaken goal line judgments, others consider it to be a superfluous delay of the inevitable introduction of the technologies used in Tennis, Basketball, and American Football. According FIFA’s press release concerning the new ruling,  “…the Technical Sub-Committee confirmed that goal-line technology will be on the agenda of the next Annual Business Meeting of the IFAB in October 2010.”

More people around the world are tuning into football games each year, and the quality of the broadcast (including the camera angles and resolution definition) is only witnessing dramatic improvements. If football wishes to preserve its technologically unadulterated officiation, it will have to prove demonstratively to its fans that the additional goal refs can do as good of a job.

Posted in Articles, Football, WP | 1 Comment »

Serena Williams to miss out on upcoming tournaments due to foot injury

Wednesday, July 21st, 2010

According to the WTA tour, Serena Williams – the world’s premier female tennis player – will miss the upcoming tournaments in Istanbul, Cincinnati, and Montreal due to ‘a necessary procedure on her right foot’. The foot injury – a laceration caused by a piece of broken glass – is reportedly bad enough to require major surgery. Said injury occurred just days after Williams decimated Vera Zvonareva 6-3, 6-2 in the Wimbledon finals, resulting in her fourth Rosewater Dish and thirteenth grand slam title overall.

This unfortunate injury (and the resultant surgery) will also keep Williams from competing in the year’s final grand slam, the US Open. The decision to have the surgery, though, came out of Brussels, Belgium – just hours after Serena was schooled in front of 35,681 spectators in straight sets (6-3, 6-2 ) by none other than Kim Clijsters. Clijsters was, of course, William’s better in last years US Open tournament – sort of.

If you’re having trouble remembering what happened during the final set of the 2009 women’s US Open semi-final, allow the following to be a brief reminder. Williams to tiny line judge: “I swear to God I’m [expletive] going to take this [expletive] ball and shove it down your [expletive] throat, you hear that? I swear to God.”

This astonishing (but refreshingly dramatic) bout of rage took place while Williams was serving 5-6, 15-30. She faulted her first serve, and was called for a foot fault on her second serve. Instead of simply serving again to come back from 15-40 (like she has many times before) – using what most consider to be the best serve in women’s tennis – Williams started cursing and shaking a tennis ball at the line judge. Once the umpire caught wind, 15-40 quickly turned into a 7-5 second set and overall match victory for the then unseeded and unranked Kim Clijsters.

If you were looking to enjoy another dramatic US Open semifinal, you’re probably going to have to wait till 2011. Clijsters (7) and Williams (1), with a hyper-extended elbow and cut-up foot respectively, will both be absent from this year’s 2010 US Open.  In the meanwhile, Williams will appease her fans in the only other way she can right now, with tweets; “hi guys! thanks for all the get well wishes. it really means a lot :) can’t wait to get out of bed & back on the courts & do what i do best!”

Posted in Articles, Tennis, WP | 3 Comments »

They think its all over… it is now (well at least until 2014)

Tuesday, July 13th, 2010

After a full month of head-to-head match-ups, heartbreaking losses, exciting victories and unbelievable flops, the 19th FIFA World Cup has come to its dramatic finish, with Spain reigning victorious for the first time in history. The final match itself, which saw Spain defeat the Dutch national team 1-0 after extra time, was a historical event because the entire football-watching world knew that regardless of who took home the World Cup trophy this year, it would be a team that had never done it before.

The 2010 World Cup saw many other interesting firsts, the most significant of which started before the players ever stepped foot on the field. In 2004, FIFA announced its selection of South Africa as the host nation over Morocco and Egypt, making South Africa the first African nation to host the tournament. South Africa’s World Cup also was to become the most-watched television event in history—FIFA estimates that about 700 million people witnessed the final match on July 11, 2010.

As exciting a time this Cup was for the entire population of South Africa, “Bafana Bafana” (the national team that goes by the Zulu moniker that means “the boys”) failed to make it past the group stage—making them the first host nation to do so. Since 1938, host nations have automatically qualified for the final tournament and many champions have won the World Cup title on home soil, including Uruguay, who hosted the first tournament in 1930.

Other upsets in this year’s series came from 2006 defending champions Italy and runners-up France. These teams, which have each won four and one World Cup championships respectively, failed to advance past the group stage—yet another first for this international tournament. Not only did these two international superstar teams not see play in the knockout stage, they each also finished last in their respective groups.

More notable record-making statistics from this year’s World Cup include:

●    It was the first time a European nation won the championship outside its home continent

●    It was also the first time two different European nations took the title in back-to-back tournaments (Italy in 2006, Spain in 2010)

●    The 2010 tournament is tied with the 2008 Summer Olympics for hosting the greatest number of nations in a sporting event (204 entrants)

●    Just six teams from the Union of European Football Assocations (UEFA) made it to the round of 16, a record low since 1998, when FIFA expanded the World Cup to host 32 teams in the tournament

●    The national teams from Ghana and Paraguay made it to the quarter-finals for the first time

The 2014 World Cup will be held in Brazil for the first time since 1950, making them the fifth country to host the tournament twice. This World Cup will also be the first one held in South America since 1978, when it took place in Argentina.

Posted in Articles, Football, General, WP | No Comments »

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