Davydenko fined and Betfair's findings

Further to my previous entry regarding Mr Nikolay Davydenko suffering the indignity of being warned by umpire Jean-Philippe Dercq in his match with Cilic, the footnote to the story is that the ATP fined everyone's favourite Russian £1000 for 'lack of best effort'.

I personally had never heard of this rule until last week and find it rather odd that the ATP would choose to single out Davydenko in this manner, unless it is their way of providing a subtle nudge to the Russian in the manner of "we're on to you, pal" in the hope that they (the ATP) are seen to be doing something to eradicate match-fixing.

Talking of match-fixing - again - and yet another ATP pro has admitted being approached to throw a match. This time it's 2001 Aussie Open runner-up Arnaud Clement, although he wouldn't say when or by whom he was approached.

It appears that the French Tennis Federation (FFT) are making all the right noises about taking match fixing seriously, to the extent that they claim to be working with the police and monitoring the matches at this week's Paris Masters for any signs of corruption.

Had such measures been installed at last week's St Petersburg Open, the powers that be would surely have concluded that Dmitry Tursunov's match with Boris Pashanski was suspicious to say the least.

A number of irate punters complained to Betfair about questionable betting patterns in this match - namely Tursunov being a five to one ON favourite when a set and a break down and later trading at 33 to 1 ON when the scores were level at 3-3 in the same set.

Betfair released a statement to the Associated Press which effectively claimed that the market had become "a little bit skewed" by one specific high volume punter, who is apparently a net loser (no pun intended) on tennis betting and had continued to back Tursunov at the aforementioned odds regardless of the score.

It's little wonder that this mystery gambler is a net loser if he thinks that 33 to 1 on is a good price for an inconsistent and unpredictable player like Tursunov, who was a set down and receiving an injury time out.

It will be interesting to see if the ATP's outcome of the Davydenko v Vassallo Arguello match concludes that the market "became a little bit skewed" by a passionate Vassallo Arguello fan who backed his 87th ranked favourite to victory over the world number four to the tune of around £2.5 million.