If you tend to keep yourself abreast of what is happening in the racing industry, you might well have head the phrase ‘courtsiding’ every now and then. Just because you’ve heard of it, though, doesn’t necessarily mean that you understand what it is or what the fuss is about it.
In simple terms, courtsiding is a way that some punters have found to try and give themselves an advantage when it comes to betting. Whilst some have done that by using identical looking horses to trick the bookmakers or develop an algorithm that can take them on, others try to use more simplistic methods.
In essence, courtsiding involves someone at an event communicating with someone who isn’t, allowing them to place bets before the bookies can adjust their odds to what is happening – often by exploiting the delay between the result being known and it being officially recorded in a computer system.
It is very much a modern take on the manner in which some people attack the profits of bookmakers, getting its name from the fact that tennis is the most common sport what courtsiding occurs on. This is because the result of a point is often obvious several seconds before the umpire presses a button to record it.
What makes it complicated is the fact that it isn’t illegal but it isn’t seen as being totally ok either. That is in the United Kingdom, whilst other countries have made it illegal already to protect the bookies.
The Practice Explained
There is a slight delay between what is happening in real life and the bookmaker’s ability to keep their odds up to date. As a result, there is a moment when some people are able to take advantage of that slight delay, especially if they are able to gain live information from someone else that is actually there.
If you’ve ever been to a popular sporting event, you’ll know that it is all but impossible to get on the internet, let alone place a bet in a hurry. As a result, the people placing the wagers usually aren’t physically present at the event, instead getting someone else to be there.
The person at the event communicates with the person placing the bet, who will tend to have access to super-fast internet. As soon as they are told what has happened, they will place a bet on the outcome that they know has already happened before the bookmaker’s betting site is able to respond.
The most common sport for it to take place on is tennis, especially the In-Play betting market. This is because someone at the event can see the result of a point a few seconds before the umpire records it officially, if they can relay that over the phone and someone can bet quick enough they can guarantee they win.
Courtsiders even scout tennis events looking specifically for slow umpires who take longer to record official results. If the person is caught, and many are, they will be ejected from the venue but it isn’t necessarily a criminal offence.
What Is the Legality Of Courtsiding?
Given the fact that you are using someone at an event to relay information to you somewhere else using fast internet, you might well wonder whether it is legal to engage in courtsiding. The answer is a complicated one to give.
In the United Kingdom, courtsiding is legal at the time of writing. That doesn’t mean that it is something that is entirely approved of, however. In the majority of cases, courtsiders don’t actually take on the bookmakers. Instead, they tend to bet on the exchange, taking advantage of the fact that they know something that other punters don’t.
Most people know that there is a delay between what is happening on the pitch and what you’re seeing ‘live’ at home. If you’re betting against someone whose signal is also delayed then there is a degree of fairness in that. If, on the other hand, you’re betting on something that you’re watching on a delay and someone else is getting live information, they have a clear advantage that is unfair. There is a morally questionable nature to courtsiding, which is why it is that it is strongly disapproved of by most betting sites and punters that bet on the exchange.
Whether you think courtsiding should be banned will largely depend on how you place your bets and what you think of the bookmaker. Most people would agree that courtsiding should be illegal when it comes to the exchange, but it is likely to only be the bookie that think it’s not right when it comes betting on the fixed-odds market, but they get everything their own way anyway. Of course, it would be all but impossible to allow courtsiding when people are betting against the bookies but ban it for people that are placing bets on the exchange, so an overall ban is probably the fairest thing to do.
It Certainly Contravenes The T&C’s
While the practice of courtsiding isn’t illegal as such you can guarantee it breaks the terms and conditions of the betting site you use. It will get you suspended, limited or banned if you are discovered, with winnings likely witheld too.
One problem with the practice is most courtsiders are known and so they often resort to ‘buying’ accounts from other people to place these bets. That is fraudulent and certainly is illegal. You can’t use someone else’s betting account, even with permission, and you can’t even give someone money to bet with that isn’t a gift.
Quite often, as with most things that are ‘dodgy’, it isn’t always the act itself that could land you in hot water it is the associated elements that go with it, like using other peoples accounts, that will lead to issues.
Courtsiding Examples
Now that we know all about it, it is worth looking at some examples of courtsiding. The first such example comes from Australia in 2014, which was when a British spectator was arrested and charged with courtsiding at the Australian Open.
The 22-year-old was engaging in a practice that is illegal in Victoria thanks to specific legislation that deals with it. What he was accused of doing was ‘engaging in conduct that corrupts a betting outcome’, which make it sound like he had some influence over the actual outcome of the tennis match. In the end, it turned out that he was part of a company.
Daniel Dobson had an electronic device sewn into the material of his shorts, linked to a mobile phone that allowed him to communicate with Steven High, Martin Pendlebury and Simon Allen at Sporting Data. They placed 148 bets, spending £74,346 betting on the outcome of games between Nick Kyrgios and Benjamin Becker.
What makes the entire thing even more interesting is the fact that High claimed that the company actually lost £2,763 on the outcome of the various games that they were betting on. The company, meanwhile, claimed that Dobson had done nothing wrong.
The problem for those that oppose courtsiding is that it isn’t always easy to spot people who are engaging in it. In this day and age of mobile phones being used by virtually everyone everywhere, how do people know that someone one there phone is part of a courtsiding syndicate? That is exactly the situation that Daniel Mawer found himself in when an ‘undercover security guard’ approached him during Hull City’s match against Reading.
Mawer was sending messages to his family and friends but was accused of courtsiding and told that he’d be kicked out of the stadium if he carried on doing it.