Celtic collapse only the tip of the iceberg
Sadly this, allied to the recent decision of William Hill to close 20 shops in Ireland, is, one suspects, only the tip of the iceberg.
I thought Ivan Yates emerged with reputation intact and the manner in which he put his hands up and accepted full responsibility was admirable.
But, unfortunately, such behaviour won’t pay the bills and the recession, together with buying shops he’d have been far better off leaving alone - hindsight has long been wonderful - has done him in.
It will be difficult enough now to salvage anything from the mess. Punters, at least those who like a half- decent wager, will not touch Celtic with a forty foot pole.
You see it all of the time on the racecourse. The minute a bookmaker, no matter how honest he is, fails to pay then he’s in trouble.
Celtic, of course, hasn’t failed to pay and Yates says all bets will be honoured. There seems little doubt such will be case but, at the same time, who would now feel comfortable having a wager with Celtic?
The plan seems to be to save as many jobs as possible, so the sooner a new name appears over the doors of the Celtic premises the better.
It is a virtual certainty that many more shops will close in the coming months. There are a number of factors involved led, of course, by a lack of money on behalf of many punters, the exchanges on-line betting and the continued humiliation of patrons by firms.
We’ve said it here before and will say it again, no matter how much they protest that such is not the case, they are all the same and the bottom line is ‘thou shalt not win.’
And that’s why the exchanges will continue to flourish and see more and more punters driven to bet that way.
No one knows your business, there is no humiliation involved - you know standing at the counter for a couple of minutes prior to being told to get lost, and you can get buckets on.
Anyway, the Celtic crash and the William Hill reduction have told us what we already knew anyway, that there is absolutely no scope for increasing taxation in the betting offices.
So how is Irish racing to be funded in the future? We’re told taxing bets online is the government plan.
But how is it going to work? I mean if someone in Ireland has a €100 bet with Paddy Power online - say Manchester United to beat Arsenal - will that be taxed with a view to financing Irish racing? How ridiculous does that sound?
Essentially, this is a complicated business and one really cannot wait for the government to reveal it’s hand.
YOU should never back a four-year-old against older horses in January, or indeed for the first couple of months of a new year, is an old rule of thumb. And it is something well worth following and generally serves punters well. Horses who have just turned three usually face an impossible task when taking on seasoned older rivals.
The Bumper at the Cheltenham Festival, for instance, is hardly ever won by a four-year-old and that’s why Cue Card’s eight lengths demolition of a high-class field last March was greeted with mild astonishment.
On to Cork last Monday and a maiden hurdle for four and five-year-olds. Two five-year-olds totally dominated the market, Duc de Savoie and High Chaparral.
Neither, however, got a look in from the second last with a pair of four-year-olds, Instant Pur (16-1) and Speed Steed (40-1) respectively, filling the first two places. The layers must have been almost tempted to break into song!
THERE are two jockeys well worth having on your side right now, Andrew McNamara and Andrew Lynch.
They are not flash, do not have massive reputations, but don’t half get the job done. McNamara won two races at Leopardstown at Christmas, on Shot From The Hip and Sailors Warn, and followed with Jumbo Rio at Punchestown. They were quite simply good rides.
Lynch has been impressing for a fair while now and, I felt, was especially good on Sublimity and Byerley Bear at Cork on Monday.
He’s a classy pilot, who often exercises plenty of patience and seems to have good clock in his head. I don’t know, I just feel comfortable when they are handed the responsibility of looking after the ‘hard-earned’ from this quarter.
