Bookie suspends betting on Titans
A bookmaker has suspended betting on the NRL wooden spoon after fielding several bets on the fourth-placed Gold Coast Titans, but the NRL says there's no reason to expect a salary cap breach announcement.
Sportingbet Australia stopped the betting after taking a series of wagers on Tuesday morning on the Titans to come last this season.
It noted similarities to a flurry of bets before then-premiers Melbourne were hit with huge salary-cap breach penalties, including loss of all competition points in 2010.
However, the NRL says there is no special salary cap investigation underway concerning the Titans.
"The salary cap is an ongoing investigation but there is no major investigation into Gold Coast or anyone else," said an NRL spokesman.
The NRL cleared the Titans last month after looking into an alleged property deal involving captain Scott Prince.
Sportingbet Australia chief executive Michael Sullivan said his company's new market had been up for less than five minutes when three bets were struck on the Titans on Tuesday.
"This is very similar to what led us to suspend spoon betting initially when we saw bets come for Melbourne although we reacted a lot faster this time to suspend betting," Sullivan said.
"We had the Titans in the market at $21 and I can't see punters wanting to take that price for the fourth-placed side unless they thought they knew something.
"The bets we took were only to win a few thousand but the fact they came on top of each so soon after we put the market up, meant we had to suspend immediately and punters were trying to get onto win a lot more."
Post a comment about this article
Please sign in to leave a comment.
Becoming a member is free and easy, sign up here.