Gambling News - June 2005 Edition

"Sportsbook.com Reports Record Betting for French Open Tennis"

Tennis is the latest topic fascinating gamblers and Wimbledon and the U.S. Open are ideal for online betting.

“We’re seeing a steady and consistent growth in the popularity of gambling on tennis”, says Marketing Director of Sportsbook.com, Alex Czajkowski “Most encouraging is that it has been an off year for American stars like Agassi, Roddick and the Williams sisters. These players will no doubt play at Wimbledon and the US Open and we expect fan interest to soar to new levels. The betting numbers will only go up this summer”.

Sportsbook.com, with its headquarters in London, England and is the main brand for Sportingbet PLC, reports a growing trend in the online gambling community. The tendency to wager on major world tennis tournaments became very evident during the French open, when a record number of bets were placed during the last weekend of the tournament. Sportingbet, the world’s largest publicly traded online betting, gambling and gaming company, offers in addition to sports betting, products such as horse race betting, casino games, poker, and virtual games, expects even increased wagering on tennis tournaments because of the huge public interest in Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, the largest events in the world of tennis.

The women’s final this year between Justine Henin-Hardenne of Belgium and Mary Pierce of France, pulled in 25 percent more in wagers than did the final in 2004. The men’s final this year between Rafael Nadal of Spain and Marianno Puerta of Argentina, showed a slightly higher amount of money wagered than the previous year, but the real surprise was the increased amount of betting on the men’s semi-finals. Betting on the semi-finals increased this year by an amazing 48 percent compared to the amount of money bet on last year’s men’s semi-finals.

Another indicator of the increase in the popularity of betting on the tennis is the dollar amount of the average bet wagered. In this year’s men’s semi-finals, the average bet placed was about fifteen percent higher than it was in 2004 and the average bet placed on the men’s final was twelve percent higher this year than the previous year.

“Sportsbook.com’s odds makers work very hard to break down the entire field before coming up with their odds,” added Czajkowski. “We cannot any longer rely on just looking at the top players. We look at every player and offer our fans the best odds anywhere in the world.”

The growing equality between the players in both men and women’s games makes it very exciting to bet on the results of the games and the tournaments as well. It was easier in the past to predict who would win, but now that the competition is much stiffer, it makes the betting much more interesting.

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