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Aussie
Rules
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Centrebet Capers
AUSTRALIAN RULES Only six weeks ago, punters were climbing over each other to take the $8 for St Kilda to go through the season undefeated, but how things have changed over the past few weeks! Having lost four of their last five games, the Saints have blown from $2.50 out to $8 to win the premiership, and a top two finish looks remote with the draw they have. Even at that price, we haven't found too many takers this week as punters will sit back and wait to see if St Kilda can regain some form. Their 57 point loss to Melbourne didn't come as a major shock to some who had backed Melbourne from $1.85 into $1.60, but that was also on top of St Kilda losing two players at the tribunal. What did come as a surprise though was the late money for St Kilda, particularly with the 9˝ points start. One Sydney punter placed $25,000 on St Kilda with the start, and there was also three separate bets of $5000 with the start. Following on from that win, Melbourne have joined St Kilda on the third line of premiership betting at $8. The money was on Collingwood to continue their faint premiership hopes on Friday night, but Geelong came away with the four points in an awesome display. Early Saturday morning we took two bets of $1000 for Geelong to win the premiership at $13, the first time this season that we have seen any serious money for the Cats. We were glad that we gave Richmond another chance against Essendon on Saturday. Not! The Tigers held a slender lead before Essendon lost Scott Lucas and the all important James Hird, yet that seemed to inspire Essendon who went on to record a 13 goal victory ! We took a bets of $15,000 and $10,000 for Essendon to win, as well as close to $30,000 in four bets to cover a 16 point handicap. That's it with the Tigers for us, they have run out of chances! Fremantle's loss to the Kangaroos was the only 'real' upset for the round. They let a let a big lead go as the Kangaroo's kept their finals hopes alive, and at the same time brought about the demise of several punters who had Fremantle in their multiples. The Dockers were the only 'shortie' to miss for the weekend. One punter placed $15,000 on Fremantle at $1.45, but did recoup some with a bet of the same size on Sydney ($1.45), who defeated Adelaide by 13 points in one of the season's worst spectacles. Sunday saw all three favourites win, and cover the handicap, but the late money for St Kilda meant that it wasn't totally a bleak day. This week is an important week as many sides on the verge of making the eight, or even some in the eight, may have their season decided. One of those is Fremantle, who travel to Adelaide as $2.80 underdogs. We are badly hooked up with bets on Fremantle to make the eight, including one of $50,000 at $1.90, so the Crows can do us a good turn by beating them, just to make it that little bit harder! Essendon travel west in a crucial game against the Eagles, they won last week without James Hird, but this will be different, hence the odds of $2.60. Punters agree that the Bombers will struggle as we have taken less than $2000 for them at this stage of the week. St Kilda are struggling, but surely they can't be going that badly that Richmond can beat them? Some think so, as we took nearly $1500 worth of bets for Richmond early in the week at $3.60, and there has also been nearly $8000 fro the Tigers with 26˝ points start. Brisbane ($2) and Port Adelaide ($4) dominate premiership talks at the moment, and we also have a new Brownlow Medal favourite in Warren Tredrea at $6 Jeff Whit from Melbourne is in to $8, and he has had the type of year that will see him go very close. ENTERTAINMENT As predicted by our form analysts, Monica ($1.01) was evicted from the Big Brother household, but we got the second evictee wrong when Ashalea was also thrown out. Ash was $4.50 fourth choice to be evicted, with most of the bets centred around Catherine, who started $1.40. There are five left in the house now, and it looks certain that a male will win. This week, Trevor opened at $2.50, but several bets, including one of $1500, saw that price cut to $1.90. Then a wave of support came for Ryan at 3.00 and $2.50. This was the first time that Ryan hadn't been favourite, but by Monday afternoon, Ryan was back vying for favourtism after nearly $6000 was placed on him. Paul has attracted a few bets at $6, and there is no interest at all in the girls, Catherine ($9) and Bree ($17). The eviction this week sees Catherine at 1.40 to be on her way and she has been best backed. Paul has attracted some support at 4.00, whereas Ryan who had been the favourite to win the major prize since betting opened is the outsider at $6. CRICKET Sri Lanka started to put it all together in the second test in Cairns, but unfortunately for us they picked the wrong time to find form with the willow. Australia went into the match as red hot fav's at $1.45, carrying bets to the value of $40,000, all from Indian clients. At the end of the first days play, we estimated that the Aussies would compile a healthy total, and given how poorly Sri Lanka batted in Darwin, we took a bet of $25,000 from another Indian cricket enthusiast for the draw at $3.70. As it turned out, that was a bad error, as the Sri Lankan's did find form, and eventually finished just 62 runs shy of Australia's first innings total of 517. At the end of the fourth day, we took another bet of $15,000 on the draw at $1.37 in the hope that captain Ricky Ponting would get daring on the final day and set Sri Lanka some sort of target. The target that was set was too high, but then the interest centred on whether or not Shane Warne would break the world record or not. At the tea break the draw was $2.50, but the Sri Lankan tailenders held it together to escape with a draw. Warne finished the match with seven wickets to equal the Muralitharan's world record. GOLF Butch Harmon did not bet a cent on his former protégé winning the 133rd Open Championship at Royal Troon but our clients could not resist the inflated odds on Tiger Woods ending his barren spell on the Scottish links. Woods has not claimed a stroke play title since October 2003 and the world number one has not tasted success in a major tournament since June 2002 but that did not stop our punters backing him at 8.00 to lock away his ninth career victory in a Grand Slam event. We laid Woods to lose $140,000 in one hit but, despite a steady flow of four-figure wagers, he did not tee off on Colin Montgomerie's home course as our worst result. Our punters thought even more highly of Ernie Els (biggest bet of $22,000 to return $170,000), Vijay Singh (largest wager of $15,000 to clear $200,000) and Davis Love III (biggest bet of $6000 to make a profit of $200,000). Love was the roughie onto which most of our recreational clients latched, presumably because of the American big hitter's Open Championship record. Since finishing tenth at Royal Troon seven years ago, Love had run fourth, seventh (twice), 11th, 14th and 21st in his next six appearances. You may remember that Ben Curtis won last year's Open Championship. Our punters did not think that lightning would strike twice and left him alone even though we quoted the title holder at $151. No-one wagered more than $30 on the American journeyman retaining the Claret Jug. Until next week, good punting. For further information contact Gerard Daffy at Centrebet on 08 89555800 or centrebet@centrebet.com.
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