IRFU's insurance Power play a bit of a gamble

TIPPING POINT:The union betting on Ireland in the rugby World Cup is fine legally and technically, but how it plays with the public is a different matter, writes BRIAN O'CONNOR

PERCEPTION IS a bugger. It’s a fact of life that how things look isn’t necessarily how they are and when it comes to sport perception is often more mirror than fact. But appearances remain vitally important. Anyone in any doubt about that only has to examine the public self-flagellation that the racing industry is indulging in now over the whip issue.

The furore over use of the stick in last month’s Grand National rumbles on with suggestions that jockeys should in future only be allowed to use whips as a tool for control instead of coercion, arguing that only in racing can humanity be legally seen to “beat an animal”.

That in turn has provoked the ire of plenty of “in my day” merchants whose only beef with the whip is it isn’t being used often enough and who seem incapable of understanding that no activity, certainly not an industry as massive as racing, can exist in some air-tight incubator where the outside world is rigidly kept at bay.

But the whip is a perfect example of the importance of perception. It suits certain agendas to present jockeys as slashing sadists, and there is no doubt that the sight of a horse getting hit at the end of a marathon event like the Grand National is not particularly edifying.

But there is a world of difference between a National Hunt jockey getting stuck in at the end of four miles and a flat rider urging his mount forward in a six furlong sprint, so any sort of blanket ban of the stick is a desperately unwieldy response to an immensely nuanced problem.

It is also a reality that the whips used today are padded to such an extent that their effectiveness is as much about the thudding sound as it is about stinging encouragement.

There are plastic-bag wearing pillars of the political and legal establishment whose response to six of the best from such instruments would be to unchain themselves from the cellar wall, remove the Outspan from their mouths, and complain about the lack of punishment.

But that reality doesn’t prevent the visual aesthetic of a whipped horse being unsavoury. It’s how it looks.

So how to explain then the recent revelation that the Irish Rugby Football Union are betting their brains out on the upcoming World Cup in order to cover any bonuses that might or might not have to be paid out to the players?

It being the IRFU of course, it isn’t really betting. No, the blazers don’t indulge in anything so coarse. Rather they are taking out insurance – by gambling with Paddy Power. And one can’t really imagine the chief executive nipping into a shop and scribbling out a docket, not that there would be anything wrong if he did, nor indeed is there anything offside about backing their side to win.

The IRFU are hot on that. They and their counterparts in England point out that no rules are being broken by such activity.

In fact, they argue it is prudent to “cover themselves,” getting all insurancey again.

But how it looks is another matter, something they must realise since they have been doing this for the last number of World Cups without muttering a peep about it.

Maybe that’s because International Rugby Board regulation 6.2 prohibits “player, referee, touch judge, coach, trainer, selector, health professional (associated with any team or player), member of team or club management, or any match official” from entering “into any wager, bet or any form of financial speculation, directly or indirectly as to the result or any other dimension or aspect of any match, tour, tournament or series of matches (international or otherwise) in which he is participating”.

The one glaring absence from that long list is a governing body. And that allows the IRFU punt to their heart’s content. But in perception terms it looks a bit much threatening to come down like a ton of bricks on some poor schmo of a linesman with a 50 cent each way lucky 15 while at the same time happily betting with Paddy Power, their official betting agent, sorry, insurance agent.

This takes place against a backdrop of sports organisations and governments all over the globe getting hot under the collar about the remorseless rise of illegal betting on all sorts of sports, due partly at least to a lack of regulation, but also presumably because they can’t get a slice of it.

Governing bodies such as the International Olympic Committee and Fifa have warned of the dangers of illegal betting and the threat to the fundamental credibility of sport when it comes to possible match-fixing and corruption.

In an environment where punters invariably manage to find someone other than themselves to blame for losing, it is vital for the credibility of sporting organisations that they not only are snow white but that they are seen to be snow white.

Legally and technically, the IRFU are on rock-solid ground with their betting to win.

However it is remarkable that a body usually so conscious of its public image hasn’t found a less controversial way of generating revenue. Any blurring of the lines between sport, and the betting on those sports, can be inherently dangerous and open to misinterpretation.

It is racing, for all the bandy-legged, syringe-wielding stereotypes thrown at it, which realises that only too well.

Britain’s top jockey Ryan Moore has been prevented from providing a regular column with the internet betting firm Betfair because the racing authorities have expressed concern over integrity issues in relation to Moore receiving payment from a gambling organisation.

Such a move casts no slur on Moore or Betfair. In fact Betfair ran a similar column through the winter with the top jumps trainer Paul Nicholls without any misgivings being raised. There is also a long history of ghosted jockey columns in newspapers. But in perception terms it is easy to see where the British Horseracing Authority is coming from.

A jockey is the most visible link in the human chain of attempting to make a horse run fast. Sadly there have examples in recent years of riders profiting from links with unsavoury characters all too eager to bend the rules to suit their betting.

It has been a hard lesson learned but the public perception of the sport is now factored into most major decisions. That could ultimately aid racing in its efforts with use of the whip. The IRFU might take note too next time it takes out some insurance.