KICKING FOR CASH
Unless your name is Stuart Tinner and you can win £250,000 by hitting the cross bar at Wembley from near enough the half-way line, it’s pretty hard to think of many other ways to make money kicking a rugby ball. That is, of course, unless someone else is kicking the ball and you are betting on how far they are going to kick it.
Well, much has been written about tomorrow’s England v New Zealand game, but one of the most intriguing battles will be the battle of the boot. In Dan Carter and Jonny Wilkinson, you have arguably the two best kickers in the world and with rain forecast, even more responsibility than usual may land on their shoulders.
Sporting Index offer a spread bet on each team’s successful total kicking metres which includes conversions, penalties and drop goals. At the time of writing, England are pitched at between 90-100 metres, while the visitors are 150-160 metres. England accrued 134 metres last week against Argentina, but fell 18 metres short of a century against Australia. It therefore seems likely that they should fall below 90 metres tomorrow, but that can hardly be a confident call as they will take every point from the boot on offer.
However, as already highlighted, there seems little downside in buying the All Blacks at 160 metres. They mustered up 157 metres against Wales recently, yet, it’s their record against England that catches the eye. They have managed totals of 200, 175 and 222 metres in the last three meetings between the two nations and there is very little to suggest that they are a worse side than in 2008 or England are any better – in fact, surely the opposite is true.