The British Darts Organisation (BDO) Championship kicks off at the famous Lakeside resort in just over 4 days and this year promises to be the biggest yet. A grand total of £325,000 is up for grabs with the eventual winner 2010 BDO Darts Champion being rewarded £100,000.

Current BDO Champion, England’s Ted Hankey, faces a tough opening draw in the form of good friend Gary Robson. Another first for the BDO Championship is the introduction of two brothers, Steve and Tony West.
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Boxing Day is a great day for sport, this year. And for all you betting punters wanting to escape down the pub for a few hours to escape the in-laws then here is a quick rundown on what sports are taking place for your Boxing Day betting fixtures.

Cricket Betting
England resume their second Test against South Africa, on Boxing Day, in Durban. After escaping with a draw from the first Test, England will be looking to go one better and beat South Africa in their own backyard, as long as they don’t dramatically collapse like they did on the first Test.
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You want to win the PDC Darts World Championship 2009 then you need to stop one man, Phil Taylor. Simple! Taylor or ‘The Power’ is a phenonomen in the World of PDC Darts. Since turning professional back in 1988, Phil Taylor has won a remarkable 14 world championships (an even more incredible feat when you consider that PDC Darts wasn’t conceived until 1994). And the current World Number 1 got his defence of the title underway by whitewashing, Colin Monk, 3-0 at Alexandra Palace.

Taylor has got competition in the form of Barneveld, Wade, Anderson and King but competitive competition, I’m none too convinced. There is just something about Taylor that renders his opponents ‘powerless’ when they meet on that ‘oche’. He’s not unbeatable, but he is hard to beat.
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At last, after about 5 years of dominance, we have a real Christmas Number One betting war on our hands and it sounds surreal to say this, but the X Factor winner might not be number one at Christmas time. Thanks to online social media sites, Facebook and Twitter, an online backlash campaign against Simon Cowell’s stranglehold of the British music charts at the moment, has grown in strength and made, Rage Against the Machine, a real contender against Joe McElderry for the Christmas number one spot.

Betting has got so heated that Ladbrokes and William Hill suspended bets as over 90,000 downloads were registered in just 1 day for Rage Against the Machine. However, with McElderry’s single being released as a CD from today it is expected that he will narrow the gap pretty quickly. Rage Against the Machine is only available to buy as a download.
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It’s that time of the year again, when we hope the fluffy, white stuff will fall from the sky on that very special day of the year. Yep, it’s White Christmas weather betting. And it is a very welcome distraction for most punters prior to the festive Premiership betting furore, with 3 games played in 5 days.

The chances of snow landing this year on Christmas Day seem pretty good for a change. Currently, the UK is in a cold snap with eastern winds blowing over the country. There seems to be a possibility that East Anglia and Central Southern England will expect snow showers this week. But will it still be around for Christmas Day? According to the Met Office most of the country will experience rain, sleet or snow next week. So, it does look promising.
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I’m writing this article, not as a bitter Scotsman, but as a football fan. Can England really expect to win the World Cup in South Africa 2010? The bookies have installed England as third favourites, behind Spain and Brazil after receiving a less-than-tough group consisting of the USA, Algeria and Slovenia.

How England qualify from the group stages will determine the path they take and the quality of teams they’ll meet in the knock-out sections. Winning Group C will see them play against the runners-up from Group D (Germany, Australia, Serbia & Ghana). With Germany much fancied to win Group D, England don’t want a potential banana skin in Round 2 if they finish in the runners-up spot.

Yet, when you start talking about who England would like to avoid, that’s when you begin to wonder are they really good enough? Being classed as third favourites out of 32 teams should really mean England should fear no-one. But that’s not the case, is it?
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And here we are, finally, at the end game for the X-Factor 2009. The three remaining contestants, Olly Murs, Joe McElderry and Stacey Solomon will be singing for a million pound recording contract this Saturday night. Who do you think is going to win? Obviously, the bookies have their favourite, little geordie, Joe McElderry, has this one in the bag, according to them.

But is it really so black and white for Joe to become this years X-Factor winner? What about snake-hips Olly Murs, he has a decent voice, not as good as Joe’s mind, and has the stage presence of Robbie Williams and the hips of a young Tom Jones. Surely, that combination can win him the hearts and minds of the public when it comes to voting this weekend. Remember, as much as Danyl (who got voted off last week) was slated in the press, he had a big following. Will they now switch their allegiance to Olly?
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On Saturday night, the 5th of December, 2009, Amir Khan (22 Fights, 21 Wins, 15 KO’s, 1 Loss) makes his first defence of his WBA World light-welterweight championship against the unbeaten Ukranian-born American, Dmitry Salita (31 Fights, 30 Wins, 16 KO’s, 1 Draw).

No doubt, an enthusiastic crowd will pack into Newcastle’s, Metro Radio Arena, in anticipation of Khan racking up a successful defence of his title. The bookies see this one as a foregone conclusion with boxing betting punters looking to Paddy Power to offer the best odds of 1/7 for a Khan victory.

Will it be just a ‘walk-in-the-park’ for Khan against Salita, or has the 27 year old, Jewish boxer from Brooklyn got anything in his armoury that could worry Khan and pull off one of the biggest boxing betting upsets in a long time?

According to an old trainer of Salita, Jimmy O’Pharrow, the best way to describe Salita is, “looking Russian, praying Jewish and fighting black’. Despite having an impressive, unbeaten in 31 fights record on paper, Salita has not fought anyone worthy in the division. Until now! Hence, the expectancy level on Khan to quickly wipe Salita from the scene.
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What an incredible year it has been for UK sport. British sport has had a rather successful 2009 and when you look over your shoulder at the year almost gone, you can see why the betting for Sports Personality of the Year 2009 is going to be a tough ask.

Understandbly, the bookies have opened the books and made Jenson Button the hot favourite to lify this years Sports Personality trophy. However, look down the 10 nominations and you’ll see names that also gained success this year and who have a story to tell just as remarkable as that of Button’s.

For example, Ryan Giggs, who broke into the Manchester United first team way back in 1991 and has made an astonishing 574 appearances for his club – even more remarkable when you consider a professional footballers shell life with a club is around the 2 – 3 year mark.
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