Will the wide curse strike Harmison again?

By Phil Hay, PA Sport

Steve Harmison's pre-Ashes nightmare may have delighted the unsympathetic Australian public - but his inclusion in England's squad for the 2003 World Cup will give spread betting firms across the globe a sharp reminder of past mistakes.

Harmison began the winter tour down under in humiliating fashion, enduring the type of sporting moment which has the potential to ruin the most promising of careers.

Thrown into Nasser Hussain's attack for the opening warm-up match against the ACB Chairman's XI, the Durham fast bowler responded erratically with 16 wides from seven overs - including eight in one over.

As starts go, it was far from ideal for Harmison. But for certain bookmakers the episode brought back memories of the blackest month in their professional existence.

The 1999 World Cup was nothing short of disastrous for Sporting Index, Britain's largest spread betting company, after a massive misjudgement over the issue of wides led to a loss of almost £400,000 from a market originally designed as nothing more than a novelty for punters.

The experience, though, will ensure that even if the world's top bowlers are as inaccurate as Harmison in South Africa the bookies will not suffer for a second time.

"There were over 40 matches during the last World Cup, and we ran a market on how many wides there would be in the entire competition,", said Sporting Index's PR director Wally Pyrah.

"We predicted a figure of 247 - at an average of around five wides a match - and it has to be remembered that this was really a novelty bet.

"It was probably the first time we'd offered a market on wides. The figure proved to be wrong, and massively so. The person who made the figure of 247 had based his judgment on individual days of Test matches rather than one-day internationals, where wides are far more common.

"Where we had reckoned there would be four or five wides a game, it was proving to be nearer 25 - and by the end of the tournament there had been 980 in total. We lost just under £400,000.

"We have a list of top 10 worst scenarios in our history, and the 1999 World Cup went straight to the top of it. All our boys were expecting Ferraris, but they quickly forgot about their bonuses.

"The incredible thing was that the market started at 247 and before a ball had been bowled it was up to around 450 because of the amount of money being gambled," added Pyrah.

"That meant punters who had bought at 247 could call in a win of over 180 times their stake before the World Cup had even begun.

"It's possible for us to lose more than £400,000 in 90 minutes of a football match. But for novelty bets it is surely a figure that will never be challenged."

The 1999 World Cup stands ahead of Brian Lara's world record knock of 375 and Manchester United's famous treble in the list of betting misjudgements.

Sporting Index predicted that Lara would hit just over 80 runs against England in 1994 - by the end of his marathon innings the West Indian was costing the company £1,200 every time he hit a boundary.

However, Pyrah insists wides will again be on the menu for punters next year, admitting: "We love the cricket World Cup because it's a wonderful betting opportunity.

"You're always going to worry about the impact of the (Hansie) Cronje case. It's a bit like the recent Panorama programme on racing which can make people say they'll never bet again. But betting levels during the Ashes have shown that's not really been the case."