[JoshW]

Gamblers won millions from Spurs 'food bug' match
Maurice Chittenden



ASIAN gambling syndicates made a killing by placing large bets on West Ham four hours before it became public knowledge that their opponents in last weekend’s critical Premiership game had fallen ill.
Bookmakers believe that even if a criminal gang did not sabotage the Spurs players’ food, there was a leak of vital information that gave the syndicates a head start.



Most of the money was waged on Asian betting exchanges, some as early as 8am when the Spurs’ management was still debating whether to ask for a postponement of the game. Up to 10 of their players had been ill during the night with suspected food poisoning.

The match went ahead and Spurs lost 2-1 at West Ham. The defeat meant they slipped to fifth place in the Premiership table and failed to win the final place in next year’s Champions League, worth £10m.

Bookmakers and betting exchanges in Britain noticed a similar surge in betting on West Ham when they opened on Sunday morning. Many switched their odds. Even so, bookmakers are believed to have lost several million pounds when West Ham won. The biggest losses were among illegal bookmakers in Malaysia who take single bets of hundreds of thousands of pounds, according to a lawyer for a British bookmaker.

Scotland Yard said it would launch an investigation if it received an official complaint about a leak of inside information. Sources among former police officers in Hong Kong said Malaysian syndicates in Penang or Kuala Lumpur, both dominated by Chinese, were the most likely suspects for any foul play. Football betting is illegal in Malaysia.

Tests are still being carried out at the Health Protection Agency (HPA) laboratories in Colindale, north London, on scraps of lasagne and other food collected by police officers from the Marriott hotel in Canary Wharf, east London, where the players were staying. The results are expected tomorrow and are likely to clear the hotel. The HPA now believes the players were hit by a virus.

The Spurs team dined at the hotel at 7.30pm on the Saturday night prior to their match against West Ham at 3pm on Sunday. At 5am on Sunday Martin Jol, the Tottenham manager, was awoken by one of the club’s doctors who told him several players had been violently ill.

By 8am staff in the hotel’s restaurant noticed that while some of the Spurs’ management had emerged for breakfast, many of the players were missing. The staff is largely Polish but there are a few Asian workers.

British bookmakers who opened for business at 10am checked internet sites and noticed that betting exchanges in the Far East had started to receive heavy bets on the game two hours earlier. The first public disclosure about the health of the Spurs team was not made until 12.14pm.

A lawyer working for a London bookmaker, who asked not to identified, said: “The big money on West Ham started just before 8am. Serious chunks of cash were being waged, enough to win £1m or more on a single bet. Millions will have been won in Asia.

“We think it is suspicious because at that time there had been no public announcement about the illness. We don’t know if it was a gambling syndicate trying to ring the game or inside information.”


Additional reporting: Michael Sheridan in Bangkok

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...179384,00.html

[SquareShooter]

What?! Do you call that a problem for bookmakers?
Even 10000x smaller bets are cancelled every day without notice, without regrets.
"Sorry our line got obvious error in it, we had to cancel it, your money is refunded to your account, can i help you with anything else sir?"

[BuddyBear]

interesting....

[bigboydan]

very interesting indeed double B.

[JoshW]

Originally Posted by SquareShooter

What?! Do you call that a problem for bookmakers?
Even 10000x smaller bets are cancelled every day without notice, without regrets.
"Sorry our line got obvious error in it, we had to cancel it, your money is refunded to your account, can i help you with anything else sir?"

First movers get more love. Bad lines are one thing, but if you beat a book with info most usually pay without too much complaint.

[tacomax]

Bookmakers believe that even if a criminal gang did not sabotage the Spurs players’ food, there was a leak of vital information that gave the syndicates a head start.

Wow - gamblers having a headstart on the books and the books throwing their dummies out of the pram. What a shocker.

Don't know when the article was written but I thought that food poisoning had been discounted days ago as a reason for the illness.

[Dark Horse]

Food poisoning. VERY interesting.

Guess what. Right before the 1998 World Cup final between France and Brazil superstar Ronaldo also fell ill with food poisoning. He was useless during the game and France easily won 3-0.

[Illusion]

Damn, that makes you really think. Interesting, thanks laker.

[Dark Horse]

This same club - the Spurs - is now sponsored by ... Mansion.

*twilight zone music*

[tacomax]

It would surely cost Mansion more money to sponsor Spurs if they had Champions League football next year so that's another suspect to add to the list.

And that's today's conspiracy theory.

[natrass]

I read somewhere that the malaysian owner of mansion used to be a chef.

Hmmm......