World of Chig   

7.6.08
The Serbs are coming

Ana Ivanovic's Eurovision appearance must have done her the world of good. She's just won the French Open. She will also climb to be the world's number one woman tennis player when the new rankings are announced on Monday. Her compatriots Novak Djokovic (who started the scoring in the first Eurovision semi-final) and Jelena Jankovic also made the French Open semi-finals, giving Serbia three of the last eight in the singles events.

If you didn't see her in one of the Eurovision semi-finals, you were probably watching the BBC version. I haven't seen it, but I don't think they showed Ivanovic's filmed 'Welcome To Belgrade' tourist information piece, which was shown in countries where they don't have adverts, while the other countries were seeing the ads. I'm told that the UK showed Paddy instead. Never fear. YouTube to the rescue! This produced massive cheers from the locals, even in the sparsely attended rehearsal I attended, when it appeared on the screens.



In other sporting news, Curtain Call and Kandahar Run have just failed to make me any money in the Epsom Derby. I've also bet on Germany (realistic) and Croatia (14-1 outsider because I'm in an ex-Yugo kind of mood) as my each way bets for Euro 2008.

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11.5.07
Eurovision: My bets

I placed bets on the ten songs that I predicted to get through yesterday. It was only for fun, as the financial rewards are practically nil when more than one in three songs will succeed.

I only put one pound each on eight of them, plus two pounds on Belgium, as the odds were longer. (They failed, which was why.) I did put a fiver on Latvia though, so this has bumped up my winnings somewhat. Well, I say somewhat, as my total return on fifteen pounds has been £16.75, making a grand profit of £1.75. I will try not to spend it all at once.

Tomorrow night is where the big money comes into play. I've done the following five bets, all five pounds each way. Only the top 4 pay out, so one will definitely lose, but I decided it was worth the risk. I'm pretty convinced I have the top three amongst these.

Serbia 6-1 (Was 6-1 joint favourite with Sweden and Switzerland a week ago. Now second favourite, between 7-2 and 5-1.)

Sweden 6-1 (Was 6-1 joint favourite a week ago. Has now drifted out to sixth favourite at an average 10-1.)

Ukraine 11-1 (Now favourite across the board, as low as 3-1 on PremierBet.)

Russia 12-1 (Currently fourth favourite, between 5-1 and 10-1.)

Latvia 25-1 (Currently 4-1 second favourite on PaddyPower. Was about 33-1 or 40-1 with all bookies yesterday. I'm tempted to say "the fools!", but we'll wait and see.)

Lots of Eurovision odds here. The UK is currently favourite...to finish last.

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15.2.07
Could've made a killing

If only we'd spotted this page of the BBC website yesterday. Think of the money we could have made at the bookies.

All the winners of last night's Brits listed, but look when the page was last updated; "Tuesday, 13 February 2007, 17:52 GMT". That's over 24 hours before the awards ceremony took place. Curses!

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