Rooney fires United into first

Soccer Betting Lines

03/14/2010 - Manchester, England (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Wayne Rooney scored two more goals to increase his Premier League-leading total to 25 and Manchester United defeated Fulham 3-0 on Sunday at Old Trafford to reclaim first place.

Arsenal and Chelsea passed United with wins on Saturday, but Rooney scored one minute after halftime and added his 32 in all competitions in the 84th.

Dimitar Berbatov, who assisted on Rooney's second goal, added his 10th Premier League goal in the 89th to seal United's 21st win of the season.

"The start to the second half was crucial and we got a good one to put us in a good position. After that our confidence grew," United coach Sir Alex Ferguson told MUTV.

Rooney handed United the lead less than one minute into the second half after a great give-and-go with Nani. Rooney had the ball in the middle and passed to the left to Nani, who threaded a pass through four Fulham players to get the ball back to Rooney for an easy finish to the bottom right.

Berbatov set up the second goal after he drove into the area from the right to slip a pass through three Fulham players to Rooney, who slotted to the left to beat Mark Schwarzer for the second time.

"The second was the star goal really," Ferguson said. "The work by Berbatov was fantastic football and he just laid it on a plate for Wayne, who took it well."

Substitute Ji-Sung Park delivered a cross to Berbatov in the 89th, and he dove to head the ball inside the right post from five yards for the third goal.

Fulham lost for just the second time in its last seven matches, but still sits in the top half of the standings in 10th. American Clint Dempsey, who returned in Thursday's Europa League match, made his first start since suffering a knee injury earlier this year.

Adam Johnson scored in the 91st minute as Manchester City escaped the Stadium of Light with a 1-1 draw against Sunderland.

Johnson latched onto a corner kick on the far side of the area in injury time, and lofted a perfect shot into the upper-left corner.

Kenwyne Jones scored in the ninth minute for Sunderland, and Craig Gordon made seven saves before Johnson left him no chance in the final seconds.

City is in fifth place, two points behind Tottenham for fourth and a berth in the Champions League. Sunderland is seven points clear of relegation in 14th.

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SPORTS BETTING - Tennis is an underrated and under-utilized bettors' sport.

Ten years ago, at just about this time, I called Alan Boston in Vegas and left him a voicemail that went something like this (abridged version): "Hey Alan, Chad Millman from ESPN The Magazine calling. I want to do a book about wise guys, you in?"

A couple weeks later I got a message back (abridged version): "I don't know, maybe," Boston said. "Call me and we'll talk about it. But not later today. I got $1,000 on Andre Agassi to win the French Open at 40-1, and he's in the finals."

Here's what happened next (abridged version): Agassi won his tourney. Boston won his $40,000. I wrote sportsbook.

In the ten years since, how much has been wagered on the big-time tennis events? Put it this way: The Nevada Gaming Commission doesn't even track the number year by year because it's so small.

"Tennis makes up about one-tenth of one percent of our take," says Lucky's bookmaking boss Jimmy Vaccaro. "The last big golf major we probably had $100,000 worth of bets. In tennis, we might have written two big tickets."

Tennis' lack of popularity amongst the American bettoratti is no surprise, really. For starters, the biggest sports betting holidays -- the Super Bowl, the NCAA tourney -- are must see TV. People, at least the degenerates I know, plan vacations around watching those events in Vegas sports books.

But Wimbledon? Doesn't exactly reel in the whales. "Seriously, it's the nuts as an event," says Boston. "But who even knows when it's on?"

Here's another reason that helps explain why golf gets traction, something I call "The Bubbe Theory." My Bubbe is pushing 95 and has cataracts so bad that, to her, even the most crystalline Chicago day is mostly cloudy. But she still listens to the Cubs games, and she still calls me in a fit if she disagrees with something Rick Telander writes in the Chicago Sun Times. She's a sports fan. If she doesn't know you, you're just filling a niche. And niche players, even historically good ones like Roger and Raf, don't drive betting volume. Only the highest profile names attract square money, which inflates wagering totals like a shot of saline to the lips. Bubbe, and the public, loved Agassi, tennis' last cross-the-rubicon, mainstream draw. She also has a crush on Tiger. She's given me standing orders to put a sawbuck on the big cat whenever I walk through a sports book (or mistakenly tap into one via my Internet machine.) That explains why the Masters is getting $100K in action at some books while the four tennis majors might not get that combined this year.

This isn't a case of tennis being a difficult sport to bet. In fact, in Europe, it's probably the second most popular sport for gambling after soccer. Granted, as the WSJ football betting last week and The Mag's Shaun Assael examined in even greater depth last year, that might be because gamblers across the pond see it as an easy game to fix. But it could also be because, over there it holds the kind of sway the big two do over here.

Street corners in Spain are peppered with public courts and kids doing their best Raffy impressions. In some war torn parts of Eastern Europe poverty-stricken kids view tennis as an escape route, like football or basketball here. A couple years ago The Mag's Lindsay Berra wrote a great piece about Belgrade's Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic. They learned the game as kids while bombs were raining down on their homeland. They practiced in drained swimming pools. Not exactly Nick Bolletierri conditions.

In the United States, casual fans think tennis is played four times a year. But on the tightly packed European continent, national interest in homegrown talent runs deep every weekend. Of the ATP's current top 20 players, only two, tennis betting and James Blake, are American. Fourteen are from Europe, representing six different countries.

No wonder fans from Lisbon to Bhudapest get jacked up for the net game, whether it's Wimbledon or a low-level tourney like the Estoril Open in Portugal (congrats to Spain's Albert Montanes for winning that one, btw). Chances are good that someone representing their flag will not only be playing, but have a shot at winning.

And that's all any bettor can ask for.

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