Jack Houghton's Betting Challenge Week 46: Cursed?

Internationals / Jack Houghton / 20 June 2010 / Leave a Comment

South Korea's Park Ji-Sung could be vital for the Betting Challenge this week

"Perhaps there’s a feeling that African success will translate into progress off the field: ending poverty, corruption and the cyclical merry-go-round of civil war and slaughter. It wouldn’t."

Jack's getting no help from the African teams at the World Cup but at least the French are struggling. Can South Korea provide the Betting Challenge with a timely boost and will Roger and Serena rule Wimbledon again?

There is a truth professional gamblers hold to be self-evident: to be profitable, you must specialise. Losers gorge themselves of all that the great buffet of betting has to offer; winners only ever eat the cheese and pineapple sticks. Who knows what might be lurking in that couscous salad? Therein lies uncertainty, and winners have no truck with uncertainty.

Jack Houghton was a long-time follower of the specialisation theory. Many learned academics credit him with its invention. But now he's turned his back. August 2009. Armed with a £1,000 bank and oodles of likely misplaced confidence, he sets out to prove that, in a year, betting on everything Betfair has to offer, he can turn a profit.

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This Betting Challenge is cursed. What other explanation is there? Two blogs back, I told you I had noticed a trend in recent years: the betting markets were overvaluing African teams playing international matches. I told you that I would, in my own betting, be laying every African team to a level stake, in the hope the strategy would eke out a profit over the tournament.

So how am I doing? Well, personally? Phenomenally. At the time of writing, African nations have played 11 matches at the World Cup, and only one has managed a win, when Ghana beat Serbia at [3.5]. Even with that loss accounted for, a healthy pot is left, further supplemented by a hefty lay of France in Group A.

And for the Betting Challenge? Well, you guessed it, the sole World Cup investment made on behalf of this column, following my own anti-African strategy, was to back Serbia to beat Ghana. That's right: I backed the team who later went on to beat Germany; to beat the team who later went on to draw against the ten men of Australia; and I lost. You see - cursed.

No matter. I did manage to lay France in Group A on behalf of the column, and Mexico and South Korea might just bring further profit from their group performances. Furthermore, the Betting Challenge isn't yet finished opposing African teams.

On Tuesday evening, South Korea take on Nigeria in an attempt to secure qualification to the knock-out stages. Assuming Greece will struggle to beat Argentina, all South Korea need is a draw. However, given Nigeria will likely throw everything forward in a last-ditch attempt to qualify, it's likely that South Korea - with their solid defence and counter-attacking potency - will be able to nick at least one goal and end up winning the match.

To best profit from this, the Betting Challenge is looking to the Half-time/Full-time market on Betfair, having £30 each on South Korea/South Korea [5.3] and Draw/South Korea [6.6].

It's worth pausing to consider why, to date, the markets seem to have been skewed towards African team success. Because looking at the FIFA World Rankings coming into the World Cup, no African team featured in the top 10, only five made the top-30, and the best of them - Egypt at number 12 - hadn't managed to qualify for the World Cup.

Using my own ratings, which do not give anywhere near the same credence to the African Cup of Nations as FIFA do, only two teams - Ghana and the Ivory Coast - make the top-40, suggesting that, if only considering the footballing prowess of the continent, the current allocation of six African World Cup representatives far outweighs what is deserved.

FIFA are not the only ones bigging-up the Africans. The television pundits are falling over each other in their attempts to tell us that this World Cup will be a disaster unless Africa does well. Why? Why is it such a bad thing if African nations fail to outperform their lowly rankings? And why do the pundits care so much? Perhaps there's a feeling that African success will somehow translate into progress off the field: ending poverty, corruption and the cyclical merry-go-round of civil war and human slaughter. It wouldn't, of course. There's very little evidence sport has anywhere near the power to influence political and economic change Hollywood would have us believe.

Pretending it would, though, works for the pundits. Perhaps it assuages some deep-seated European guilt over what we've done - and continue to do - in Africa. Or perhaps it just gives them something to talk about when ball- and vuvuzela-debate has died its death.

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Before I go, Wimbledon starts Monday and the Betting Challenge is having £20 on Federer at [2.4] and £40 on the Serena/Federer double at [7.4]

This week's bets:
£30 BACK South Korea/South Korea at [5.3] in Half-time/Full-time market.
£30 BACK Draw/South Korea at [6.6] in Half-time/Full-time market.
£20 BACK Federer at [2.4] at Wimbledon.
£40 BACK Federer/S Williams at [7.4] at Wimbledon.

Already recommended:
£20 LAY France at [2.2] to win Group A - 18/04/10.
£20 BACK Mexico at [4.7] to win Group A- 18/04/10.
£20 BACK of South Korea at [3.8] to qualify from Group B- 18/04/10.
£20 BACK of Honduras at [6.0] to qualify from Group H - 18/04/10.
£20 BACK Netherlands at [10.0] to win World Cup - 10/06/10.
£20 BACK Germany at [15.5] to win World Cup - 10/06/10.