Apparently a betting tax proposal for offshore Bookmakers was passed to the Commons this week to try to get Bookmakers who run their business tax-free in Gibraltar and who take custom from UK punters to pay UK tax. I didn’t really know what this might mean for Bookies or Punters to be honest but Scott Ferguson has a very informative post on this on Sportismadeforbetting.com. Basically, if Bookies do get forced to do this it’s a good thing that punters bets would all be under one regulatory body but the latter part of the bill apparently tries to argue that punters who make money laying on betfair should pay this too as they are acting as a bookmaker. It’s unlikely that this bit will get passed, I mean what about people who haven’t layed over 100% or people who have dutched selections at the bookies would they pay too?! It sounds like this bill is at the very early stages currently and it would be a long time before anything like this could happen, if indeed ever.
This week also saw cycling star Alberto Contodor banned for drug use. I am always saddened when a champion or great sportsman is revealed to have taken drugs. They will always be tarred with the drug cheat brush for the rest of their lives even if they manage to clear their name. The trouble is, you have blatant cheats, those who took something on the advice of coaches and those that took something unknowingly because it was in a particular food or drink. The authorities and the public don’t care either way but there must be many cases where the athlete in question didn’t intend to cheat and it’s pretty sad that everything they’ve worked for is meaningless or at least in question.
The fact is elite athletes are offered lots of different substances to get a competitive edge over their rivals and it must be difficult to know if you are breaking a particular rule or not and a great deal of trust is put in coaches and Nutritionists. The question is how do we clean up our sports and make it fair for all. The 2 extremes are 1) to ban everything that might help you 2) to allow all substances but neither of these would work 1) because it’s possible too much of a natural occurrence of something may be present in one athletes body as opposed to another and 2) if you allowed everything then aside from the health concerns, the poorer athletes would also be at a massive disadvantage because they can’t afford all the performance enhancing drugs. So we are stuck in the middle of these two extremes where there’s a grey area as to what defines cheating and what doesn’t.
Lastly, with the resignation of Capello all the talk is about who will become the Next England Manager? Harry Redknapp has conveniently been found innocent of tax evasion just in time and is a big odds on favourite and he too would be my choice. Stuart Pearce also looks set to be involved too and I don’t think the F.A. will look any further than these two for the position. The Next Manager Market is not on Betfair yet for some reason but these are often good markets to make decent money is because of various rumours flying around. Don’t expect too much excitement with this one though because the job is Harry’s if he wants it and by all accounts he does! Everyone except Harry and Pearce are worth laying though if you have a big enough bank! The F.A. would have to be crazy not to go for Harry or indeed an English Manger as the views of the English public, the press and even some of the players have been made very clear.
Premier League Predictions will be posted tomorrow.