My good betting form continued this past weekend with my best bet of Lions to score 36 points or more against Griquas arriving with room to spare. I also collected on Sharks to score over 35 points against the Pumas and was in a powerful position heading into the Bulls v Stormers game.

I was quite strong on the Bulls and liked them to win by 4 points or more, but in the end was influenced by the approaching thunderstorm and took the decision to go under 53.5 points in the match. Shortly after kickoff the storm hit my house, some 60 kilometres away and I realized it would be some time before Loftus felt the brunt of it.

In the meantime points were flowing, 38 in the first half and all I could afford was 2 converted tries in the second. The Bulls were running away with the game so there was every chance it was going to be a high scoring second-half, but on the other hand the chances of teams going for penalties were greatly diminished. There was one try in the first quarter of the second-half and with 8 points to play with I started to get some hope. Then with around 17 minutes to play a loud bang of thunder could be heard in the background and this ref was clearly taking no chances and whipped the players off the field.

The game was abandoned and in terms of the log the result stood. When these things happen things get a bit complicated from a betting point of view as punters wonder which bets will be paid out. The rule is that if the market has not been settled it would be void and given I was still likely to lose my bet I was more than happy with this outcome. In fact the bookmaker credited it as a winner initially but I knew this would change and by Sunday morning it reflected as a “no bet”.

As happy as I was to be saved by a Johannesburg thunderstorm, I had sympathy for those punters who were sitting on what looked likely to be winning bets only to find their stake returned.

There have to be rules in place for these instances though and at the end of the day voiding non-settled bets is the fairest outcome.

Twitter: @BrentGraham.

This article was written for the CitiGaming supplement of the Citizen Newspaper and was published on the 5 November 2020.

Brent Graham is a blogger on www.goodforthegame.co.za and sends a free weekly e-mail list just CLICK HERE to register