Last chance for India on this tour

There are many who will tell you that sports gambling is, and perhaps always will be more susceptible to corruption than almost any other form of gambling. In recent years gambling on cricket has certainly had more than its fair share of bad publicity all over the world, but cricket gambling remains extremely popular, particularly amongst Asian cricket fans. The cricket season in Ireland and the UK is now almost over, but for cricket gambling fans there remains one important question to answer, and that is can India rescue some respectability from what has so far been a pretty disastrous tour for a side who arrived in England as the number one test playing nation in the world. Having lost both the test series and the one day series without winning a game, they now face the twenty20 series against England before the tour ends. Twenty20 is of course rapidly becoming the most popular form of cricket in India, and most bookmakers including Ladbrokes still have India as favourites for the 2012 world cup at 4/1 with England at 6/1, but that tournament will not be played in English conditions. Nevertheless, India would have started favourites for the twenty20 series at the beginning of this tour, but their apparent inability to come to terms with English conditions so far has raised the possibility that they could leave England without a single international win. We wonder what the odds of that happening would have been at the beginning of the tour, and indeed cricket gambling fans may still believe that such a possibility is worth a gamble, although India have recently shown better form and may now be ready to beat England in what may be their best form of cricket. Place your bets.