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A unique take on sports news, updated several times throughout the day.
8/03/2007 03:14:00 PM

Fixed sport of the day

If you had tennis in the office pool, you win. Officials are investigating suspicious betting patterns in Thursday's match between top-seeded Nikolay Davydenko of Russia and Martin Vassallo Arguello of Argentina at an ATP tournament in Poland.

Frankly, I'd be suspicious of anyone who wagered on a tennis match at all, but a British online gambling company voided all bets on the match because of a surge of wagering -- most of it for the 87th-ranked Arguello. And wouldn't you know it, but Arguello rallied to win the second set after dropping the first and was ahead 2-1 in the third when -- oops! -- Davydenko retired with an injury. Now the question is whether anyone was hoping to retire by betting against Davydenko, such as, say, Davydenko himself. (Curiously, the English translation of "Davydenko" is "Donaghy.")

This can't be good news for tennis, which has been plagued for years with claims that players sometimes tank matches. Still, that was typically attributed to immaturity and churlishness on the part of particular players, not allegations of a fix. Actually, I’m not sure which is worse, come to think of it.

• Remember that voting ends today in the American Mustache Institute's poll of top sports mustaches. I still encourage you to write-in Keith Hernandez. The winner will be revealed Saturday at AMI's Mustache Bash 2007 to be held in the St. Louis saloon of nominee Al "The Mad Hungarian" Hrabosky. You can cast your last-minute ballots here up until midnight. As of press time, the top four (in order) were Hernandez, Rollie Fingers, Lanny McDonald and Hrabosky.
posted by SI.com | View comments |  

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Posted: August 3, 2007 5:36 PM   by Anonymous
Betting on tennis, what's next, betting on horse races?
Posted: August 3, 2007 10:13 PM   by rhymeister
"(Curiously, the English translation of "Davydenko" is "Donaghy.")" - buwahahahaha!

It wouldn't surprise me if some tennis players tank like that to collect a little extra dough...
Posted: August 6, 2007 6:45 AM   by JB
Jon Wertheim (SI) had this to say in his mailbag a few days ago:

"At a time when it seems that moral bankruptcy is afflicting some other sports, let's hear it for tennis. No dogfighting or outcome-fixing officials or doping or steroids-o-rama."

Way to jinx tennis. If people compete, and there is money to be had, people will cheat. End of story.
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