Singapore Pools Promotes Illegal Betting with Inaccurate and Unfair Odds

It's coming to 2 decades since legalised soccer betting was allowed in Singapore. Of course there's only 1 approved betting source - Singapore Pools (SP). It started out with just bets on the local S-League and matches involving the national team, then it moved on to the major European Leagues like the Barclay's Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, European club competitions and of course the big 2 international football competitions - the European Championships and the FIFA World Cup.

 

 

 

Now bets are offered on a lot of other leagues including the US, Japan, Australia and also motor-racing. However despite all this, several fundamental flaws have not been corrected since its inception. This revolves around 2 key features - a) inaccurate and b) unfair odds. The reason for introducing legalised betting was to stamp out illegal betting and bookmaking which were rampant throughout our Malaysia Cup days. Singapore Pools continues to trumpet the fact that it's the only legitimate source of gambling (in any form, horse-racing, sports and lotteries) and undertakes numerous campaigns to encourage people to bet with it instead of illegal bookmakers or foreign ones, which remain offences in Singapore.

 

 

With the European football season nearing its climax and the World Cup about to start, there's been a concerted effort to promote its range of bets for the latter tournament. For the World Cup (WC), you can open temporary accounts (from $250 onwards) and bet 'live' on matches via the telephone instead of placing your bets at the various outlets. While I'm not encouraging people to bet, it remains a foregone conclusion that the World Cup generates tremendous excitement and many people will want to bet, regardless of any advice to the contrary. As such my advice in such cases is that, one should be very cautious about betting with the Singapore Pools. I cannot obviously encourage people to bet illegally (even with legitimate foreign betting sites) on the one hand, but I can certainly question Singapore Pools refusal to offer proper and fair betting odds, or simply the kind of odds that people here are accustomed to, from betting in the past and even now. It's shocking that a service provider simply refuses to give the customer what he wants, and instead tapers its services that place the customer at a wholly unfair disadvantage from the get go. Simply put - if you bet with Singapore Pools on soccer, be prepared to lose money consistently. 

 

 This chart explains what the Asian Handicap for football is all about.

 

Even major international betting houses have revamped their structure to offer Asian gamblers the kind of bets they want - the Asian Handicap. In addition they offer odds that reflect the dynamics of the opposing teams, and when offering odds, they give the punter a fair chance of succeeding and at an acceptable percentage. They are not primed to rake in the percentages even before a ball is kicked. In essence a bookmaker doesn't really care whether a punter wins or loses, the important thing is for them to continue betting and in the long run, the small percentages they take for accepting bets add up to make a hefty profit. But not Singapore Pools. Let me give you an example with Saturday's FA Cup Final between Arsenal and Hull City as a case in point. Their odds are as follows:

 

http://www.singaporepools.com.sg/en/sp/Pages/football_bybet_odds.aspx?matchNo=0401 

 

Now let's see the odds of a popular international site, SBOBet for the same match:

 

 

Let me start by pointing the most incorrect odds offered by Singapore Pools since Day 1 that has not been changed - their 1/2 goal bet type. Here it's always -1.5 goals or +1.5 goals, and the only times it changes, it becomes more ridiculous -2.5, +2.5 or even higher. The 1/2 goal is supposed to be similar to the Asian Handicap (AH), where the stronger team gives out a handicap to the weaker team, based on their respective strengths. The whole idea of the AH is to restore parity between the teams. Face it, if there's no parity, very few people will want to take Hull. The AH offers parity and at a reasonable percentage, so those who fancy Hull or dislike Arsenal, can take them and have a chance at winning as close to their staked amount as possible, with some room for the bookmaker to rake in a percentage for organising the bet.

 

 

 

The 1/2 goal doesn't do that, it instantly makes every favoured team, no matter how close in strength the 2 teams are, to always be dishing out a -1.5 goal handicap. The actual AH for the Cup Final is Arsenal -1.25 at $2.09, while taking Hull at +1.25 sees you win $1.83 for every dollar wagered.  -1.25 goals here means Arsenal has to win by 2 clear goals for you to win the $2.09 for each dollar wagered. If they lose or draw, you lose the full amount. However if they win by just 1 goal, you  will not lose $1 but around 46cts. If you took Hull you would still win 41.5cts despite them losing by 1 goal. But SP doesn't give you this chance. If you took Arsenal and they won by 1 goal, you lose everything. If you took Hull, you only win 55cts for each dollar.

 

 

 

And this kind of odds are offered for other matches too. In the recent final league games, Liverpool were giving a handicap of -2.5 goals against Newcastle, Man City likewise against West Ham. The correct AH for those games was around -1.75-2 for Liverpool and around -2-2.5 for City. City didn't need to go out and thrash West Ham, they just needed a draw or to match Liverpool's result (in the event Liverpool lost). Many punters I spoke to strongly believed Man City would win, but they were not sure that they would clear the -2.5 goals handicap offered by Singapore Pools. They wanted to take City and expected to give out a reasonable handicap, yet have a fair shout of winning their bet, or at the least drawing (no loss) or losing just half. Their was no incentive to wager on West Ham who had little to play for, despite getting that handicap from SP, because the returns were not attractive. Imagine you support or want City to win, and want to wager, but the only offers you have are -2.5 at $2.20 or a simple win at $1.08. To risk hundreds (some bet in the thousands) and win just 8cts for each dollar offers no value, and to wager such amounts at -2.5, instantly puts you at a huge disadvantage because you worry City being aware of Liverpool's match score, would not see any need to go out and score a lot, so long as they were in control of the match. Liverpool indeed went in half-time a goal down, City a goal up. They scored a 2nd early in the 2nd half, well aware of events at Liverpool and were satisfied with their 2 goal cushion as West Ham hardly looked like scoring, let alone winning. Remember City only needed a draw, and even when Liverpool came back to lead, West Ham needed to score thrice - a virtual impossibility.

 

 

Because there is no correct AH on offer, punters are forced to look elsewhere to get fairer odds and more reasonable winning percentages even at the risk of breaking the law. Once again let's look at the Arsenal v Hull game. SBOBet (SBO) offers the correct AH at -1.25. If you want to be a bit cautious and feel Arsenal under huge pressure to win their first silverware in 9 years, might just scrape through, they offer a -1 AH at $1.78. This means if Arsenal win by 1 goal, there's no winner or loser, you get back your staked amount. If you want to be a bit gung-ho and take the same kind of odds offered by Singapore Pools at -1.5, you'll win $2.40 for each dollar (SP only offers $2.20). If you take Hull, you would win 63cts compared to the 55cts by SP, for each dollar. Or if you go for the straight forward 1X2 bets (home win, draw, away win), the odds are $1.44, $4.10 and $7.00, compared to $1.37, $4 and $6.80 by SP.

 

 

Even in these, SP wants earn more in percentages. If you take SP's odds offered for favourites in the WC in these 1X2 bets and skip their ridiculous 1/2 goal odds, you'd need them to win between 2-3 games in a row before you can actually earn back each dollar you wagered. However just 1 slip, say a draw by a favourite and you lose that dollar and more. This is not the way to bet. Betting on soccer is different from buying a 4D ticket, buying 4D means your chance of 'striking' is always at 9,977 -1 (23 winning numbers each draw). That is purely chance. Betting on soccer while involving some chance, is making a correct forecast, either you expect the favourite to win or falter. You can choose either way, and the AH makes it that way.

 

Another favoured bet by punters is the total goals over/under (O/U). In the AH it again reflects the strength of the 2 teams and their recent form. SP always offers O/U 2.5 goals or more, like 3.5 for the City v West Ham game. Proper bookmakers vary the odds to reflect the teams, you could have O/U at 2 goals, 2.25 goals, 3 goals, even sometimes at just 1.5 or 1.5-2, not always O/U 2.5 goals. In the Europa League Final between Benfica and Sevilla, the correct O/U was at 2 goals to 2.25 goals. SP offered only 2.5 goals, but if you took under you'd only win around 60cts.

 

 

 

Every time you bet on such odds with poor returns, you'll need to win a few consecutive bets to see you win back the full staked amount, But if you get it wrong once, you say bye-bye to profits and your staked amount, even if you had wagered thrice, won twice and lost just once. Despite winning 2/3 of your bets, you could still end up at a loss. This is what happens when you bet with SP on the 1/2 goal and O/U total goals. In the FA Cup Final, SP's O/U of 2.5 goals is correct, but their returns are absurd - over nets you just $1.77, while under is $1.87. SBO and others offer it at $1.98 over and $1.92 under. Suppose you bet $1000 on over with SP, you'd win $770 if the games finishes with 3 or more goals, if you bet with SBO, you'd win $980, a difference of $210. That's 21% more that SP makes.

 

The list of crazy odds and percentages goes on and on. Take SP's odd/even bet for the score-line. It's forever at $1.82 whichever way you bet. Yet logic will suggest that even has a slighter advantage because the game starts so. If no teams score it remains even, if a team score twice it's also even. So taking the odd score-line should give you better returns, For the Cup Final, odd on SBO is $2.02, while even is at $1.88, much higher than SP's $1.82. So even before the match starts, SP will rake in 18% just to organise and accept your bet. If 2 punters wager $100 on odd and even respectively, SP happily pockets $18 before a ball is kicked.

 

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For total goals, SP separates each one from 0-9+. Legitimate bookmakers elsewhere may offer this as a separate bet, but also offer a fairer system with just 4 bets for total goals , 0-1, 2-3, 4-6 and 7 or more. In the local papers, you have sports writers like Brian Miller and Gary Lim suggesting wagering on 2 bets each for this category, eg: they'll suggest you take 3 and 4 goals or maybe 4 and 5 goals. Their reasoning is by doing so, you might win 1 and still make a profit. SP is offering odds at $3.60, $5 and $9 for these 3 totals. So if you bet $10 each on 2 bets, you'd win $16 (3 goals), $30 (4) and $70 (5). But don't forget, if the score line has any other combination you lose $20. And double betting is stupid, because when you bet, you want to have a chance of your ticket winning. Betting on 2 different goals total, means that even before the match starts, 1 of your tickets is a definite loser. SBO and others offer 0-1 ($3.05), 2-3 the most common total score line ($1.85), 4-6 ($3.40) and 7+ ($25). You don't need to double bet, you just choose 1. Instead of betting $20 on 3 and 4 goals, to win $16 or $30, if you bet $20 on 2-3 goals, you'd win $17 (3 goals) and if you bet $20 on 4-6, you'd win $48, but you have an additional score total in the first and 2 more in the latter.

 

 

 

Every single odds offered by SP is lower than international bookmakers. Even in choosing the Cup winner, if it's Arsenal ($1.18) and Hull ($4) lower than $1.21 and $4.44 on SBO. Every bet winnings is under cut by SP. It follows the same pattern with the others whether it's the HT/FT bet, Pick the Score, Team to score 1st, the various 1st half bets etc. Every single bet whether you take the favourite or under-dog almost always sees you winning at a lower percentage. And forced to accept unfavourable odds if the team you want to bet on are the favourites. If you choose the under-dogs, they may offer supposedly better handicaps but at very unattractive rates, meaning you need to bet more often usually at a ratio of 2:1 (sometimes even 3:1) to win back your staked amount, which in football betting is the basic principle. Serious punters want a 50-50 chance to win back the staked amount (whilst accepting forgoing a small percentage to the bookmaker). They may not even want to take the favourites. They want a fighting chance and accept that sometimes the wager will end in a loss, but also hope in such cases to lose less (half the stake) or even not win or lose (when the handicap is a prime number like 2, 3 or 4 and the score line falls exactly there). They don't want their hands tied, be held to ransom or being openly fleeced by a bookmaker who ignores their preferred choice of betting, and continues to operate with impunity because it has the sole monopoly.  

 

In medium (hundreds) and especially big bets (thousands), a few percentage points can have a huge impact. But even the small punter wagering say $5-20 per game, hopes to have a fair shake at winning. Small amounts can add up, and sometimes just to recoup this, people bet even more and beyond what they normally do. Yet because the choices are limited and odds unfavourable, they end up losing further, sometimes to a point when they have no chance of ever recouping their losses. It's easy to say gambling is bad and this should be a lesson, but Asians like to gamble, it's in their culture and betting makes games more exciting for some.

 

 

 

Anyway that's beside the point, we are not talking morals here, but the principle of being fair and providing services that customers demand. Singapore Pools did not start legalised betting yesterday, last month or last year. They are approaching their 20th year. They have no excuses not to make changes, to be more fair and honest. They are not unique, the types of bets offered elsewhere all fall within a tried and tested system that's open and fair to all. Singapore Pools can so easily study and follow the international standards, they certainly can afford to. They can employ and train staff, they can operate a licensed online website or offer the various odds for viewing online. It will not mean so much additional work or upgraded hardware that would incur a loss.

 

They cannot use the Law for their campaigns and slogans to promote their business on the one hand, whilst on the other hide behind the Law to openly fleece punters and make huge profits at their expense. They cannot condemn illegal betting, when their odds while legal are grossly unfair, unattractive, incorrect and designed to maximise their monopoly and put punters at a disadvantage, even before a single ball is kicked. If they continue in this fashion, inadvertently it's making punters who want to bet legally, to choose between following the Law and losing money, or to break it in order to have a fairer chance at winning. Illegal betting will continue to thrive if Singapore Pools refuses to reform and change. The ball as the saying goes, 'is in their court.'