Providing options in dwindling market

The entire country is going to the dogs. Or at least that's what the bookies hope.

All bets aren't off just yet, but there are plenty of string pens lying idle beside those yellow slips. As Irish sport more or less closed down this week, betting offices busied themselves with presenting alternatives for the die-hard punter.

In a new departure, odds were being given on pole position in today's early morning Formula One qualifying session in Melbourne. Michael Schumacher is yours at 5 to 4, while Jordan's Heinz Harold Frentzen is listed at 40 to 1. Paddy Power are offering 1 to 8 on the Cheltenham Festival being cancelled for the year and 9 to 2 on some sort of meet going ahead.

Suddenly, the Dubai Desert Classic has been all tuxed up and presented as a must-bet event. It boasts, after all, that rarest of breed: the Irish competitor. Padraig Harrington and Darren Clarke are among the few domestic sports stars not forced underground by the national crisis.

Hundreds of our athletes, from marauding prop forwards to upright clay pigeon shooters, will find themselves idle this weekend. Jockeys may, in their boredom, binge on that extra half slice of toast. GAA players will have the option of confession as well as early Mass. Surfers may still do it standing up, but not on the water: the agricultural crisis has even ruled out the freedom of the waves.

So with Irish sport simply erased, vanished, the gentle regulars of Ireland's much loved gambling dens are being asked to sample foreign fare.

"Obviously this has cut into us, but we will carry on regardless," vowed Kevin Egan of Paddy Power's bookmakers. "Even if the international rugby in Wales and the soccer friendly had gone ahead, it would have taken the sting out of it. But we are trying to provide options for our customers insofar as possible. "The golf in Dubai is a big help - that tournament normally marks a pick-up for Irish interest in golf anyhow as the tournaments are closer to home from now on."

So on Thursday the offices sang with racing commentaries from Nad Al Sheba in Dubai and Clairwood, South Africa. Pine Dance, trained by Dermot Weld, provided a bit of local colour in the four o'clock from Dubai. The occasion looked the same - the grass was green, the nags had four legs and the commentary sounded as if it was being delivered through a long paper funnel - but still . . . there was something missing.

Punters are creatures of absolute habit. Form, familiarity, educated rumour and gut feeling: these are the survival pack tools used for even the most occasional flutter. All were rendered obsolete by Thursday's strange locations.

"Oh, we are in trouble now," sighed one baffled old sage from his stool as some outsider romped home in some warmer time zone. He spoke for many.

"There are some people who simply won't be interested in new race meets and strange names, people who for years have been used to their regular punt at local meetings or regular cross-channel events," admitted Egan.

"But against that, other folk will simply have a go on anything, and there has been reasonably brisk interest in some of the today's races. Dermot Weld has Pine Dancer in the four o'clock against China Visit, for example, so that provides a bit of local interest."

For the major betting retailers, the crisis means riding a rough few weeks, but the feeling is that it will be survivable.

"Even with the current collapse here at home, the resumption of racing in England will take up some of the shortfall. If it occurs Cheltenham will obviously be a significant loss for everyone in this business: it accounts for three to four per cent of turnover," said a spokesman for Baggot Racing. "But while it is a phenomenally busy three days, it is still a short meeting. That loss can be recouped through the more long term events. It is the independent operators who will possibly bear the brunt of Cheltenham more severely than than the national offices."

Recent years have seen a dramatic upsurge in bets placed on dog racing, and the hope is that this will further increase given the absence of local events.

Sigerson Cup aside, the postponement of the GAA calendar will not have a serious affect - unless it cuts into the championship. "The league has been very difficult in recent years, even in terms of team lineouts," says Egan.

"It was becoming all but impossible to predict the form because it wasn't a question of whoever gave it 100 per cent would win but whoever gave it 70 per cent would win. So only if the crisis affects the championship Sundays in a few weeks time will we be seriously affected."

For all bookmakers, national and local, the next few weeks will simply mean a matter of adapting. Foreign influences are limited. America, for all its great gambling tradition, has limited appeal for sporting fans here.

"Football is quite popular, but of course that's just ended. Basketball is the main sport there at the moment and NBA never really took off as a betting sport here. People just don't like points spreads or handicap systems. "Even if the baseball was up and running, we would pick up a bit on that because it has grown in popularity in recent years."

But the World Series is a full eight months away. In the meantime, it's golf and foreign ponies. Or, for the desperate, the University boat race. Oxford are quoted at 5 to 4 with Cambridge at 4 to 7.