Sports betting is great for women athletes
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Sports betting could prove to be a way to increase attention, interest and funding for women's sports.
PHOTO: TNP FILE
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NEW YORK – The 2023 Women’s World Cup is on track to be the most-viewed women’s sporting event in history, having already become the best-attended edition on Sunday, with the round of 16 not yet even completed.
More likely than not, it will also be the most-wagered-upon women’s sporting event we have seen yet. That is a good thing.
Betting boosts audiences, media coverage and sponsorship. For women’s sports, which still struggle with gender equality, the money and attention are critical to growth, especially if it can be done while maintaining the integrity of the industry.
In important, measurable ways, that growth is already happening. According to a new study on betting in women’s sports, bets on football have grown at a roughly 20 per cent annualised compounded growth rate since 2020.
Tennis, basketball and cricket saw over 10 per cent annualised compounded growth from 2017 to 2022. Betting data for the ongoing Women’s World Cup is not publicly available yet, but a spokesman for Flutter Entertainment, the world’s largest online betting firm and owner of FanDuel, recently said the company expects the international competition to boost trading activity further.
That is a safe bet. Viewership for women’s sports is growing rapidly, with expectations that the Women’s World Cup could have double the 1.12 billion viewers who watched the tournament in 2019. Likewise, the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) reports that national TV audiences for its 2023 season are up 67 per cent over 2022.
Audience growth parallels an increase in betting. In July, German researchers, using data provided by Flutter and other gambling industry organisations, operators and suppliers, traced the expansion.
In 2019, just over 300,000 legal bets were made on women’s football; in 2022, the number had reached 700,000 – worth around €30 million (S$44 million) in betting volume. In the world of basketball, the WNBA reports that the number of bets made grew 270 per cent in 2022 over the 2021 season.
Women’s sports made up a small fraction of the US$93.2 billion (S$124.8 billion) in bets that legal bookmakers in the United States handled in 2022. But the steady growth in those wagers is critical to understanding one important factor: audience engagement.
Research shows that gamblers pay closer attention to a sports broadcast if they have money riding on it. The competitiveness of a match does not always matter, either. In 2015, economists found that ratings will spike during blowouts if one of the teams have a chance to cover the point spread.
If viewers stay with a broadcast longer, they are more likely to pay attention to advertisements and become fans of new teams – both of which enable leagues and their broadcast and streaming partners to charge higher rates.
Women’s sports are right to seize the opportunity. Last September, the WNBA extended a multi-year deal with FanDuel, cementing the company’s role as the league’s top bookmaker and fantasy partner. And in June, TAB New Zealand became the first gambling firm to be named an official betting partner of the Women’s World Cup.
These deals and others will bring added attention, engagement and – critically – money to women’s sports. Though the equality gap with men’s sports will not be bridged overnight, those revenues can contribute to better salaries, prize money and treatment, including safer travel arrangements.
Of course, any expansion of gambling risks undermining the integrity of a given sport, and women’s sports are not immune. Sportradar, a leading monitor of suspicious betting activity, detected 1,212 suspicious matches in 12 different sports worldwide in 2022.
While only 24 of those came from women’s sporting events, mostly from lower-level competitions, that is no reason to sleep on a potential problem. The low incidence numbers are likely due to the lesser profile of women’s sports.
As the industry’s popularity grows, match-fixing is likely to increase. While this is a problem long associated with men’s sports, it poses a unique threat to women’s sports, which have expanded partly because of their close association with social movements like #MeToo and purpose-driven advertising. Match-fixing will dent the brand.
Historically, athletes are most vulnerable to corruption when they are paid poorly. As gambling expands in women’s sports, that vulnerability will increase unless leagues and teams take steps to raise pay to such a level that bribes are no longer attractive to their athletes.
Not every women’s sports association may have the opportunity to do that. But Fifa does. It has US$4 billion in reserves, yet prize money at the current Women’s World Cup stands at US$110 million,
If Fifa, the WNBA and other leagues will not bridge the sports gender gap out of pocket, they should consider recruiting legal bookmakers that might sponsor better pay. In time, these betting partners might even see it in their self-interest to serve as key proponents of pay equality.
For gamblers, fans and athletes, that is a future worth wagering on. BLOOMBERG
