The three finest #WhatOddsPaddy punts of last week

Deep in the bowels of our trading dungeons here at Power Tower, we hold captive a team of people whose job it is to listen to and act upon our punters’ bet requests.

They are then charged with putting the priced-up bets onsite under the title #WhatOddsPaddy. Often, the members of this secretive sect are made to look very foolish when the markets they’ve added inevitably come in. Lashings and verbal diatribes are then dished out to them by their management team as a result. And rightly so.

Here are some of the better ones that took them down to Bollocking Town this week.

Man Utd to score in both halves & to win over 3.5 corners in each half – 33/1

In retrospect, this looks an easy one. Man United smashed four past Newcastle and seemed to be taking a corner at a higher rate than Chris Smalling misplaces passes – which is a very very high rate indeed.

But in truth, this is a pretty tough bet to hit. Punters who backed it were hoping for an open game in which the Red Devils attacked with more gusto than normal. And that’s exactly what they got, with Romelu Lukaku’s 70th-minute goal bagging them the dough.

Patriots At Raiders: Dion Lewis & Amari Cooper to score the 1st TD for their teams – 50/1

Only one Paddy Power customer was smart enough to back this one, and it paid off very nicely. Looking at the price now, it does seem generous given the quality of the two players involved, but that’s not to take anything away from the person who backed it – this was a superb punt by the individual who put their money down here.

A successful 59+ yard field goal scored in any of the 6pm, 9.05pm & 9.25pm NFL games – 25/1

Ok, so kickers are increasingly able to belt the ball incredibly long distances down the field, but field goals of 60 yards or more are still relatively rare. In this case, however, the punters who backed this market were pretty damn smart.

With games taking place in Denver and Mexico City, the likelihood of an extra-long field goal was always there. At altitude, the pigskin travels further and faster than in normal circumstances.

In the Azteca, this was particularly obvious, with Stephen Gostkowski slotting a 62-yarder as if he were chipping a soccer ball from one end of a tennis court to the other. By the time the ball actually landed past the posts it had probably travelled a good 69 yards.