By Brian McGeachan

SYMPATHY for bookmakers? A suggestion so risible it stretches credibility. Surely no racket is less deserving of support? But on walks I peer wistfully in the windows of my local bookies.

Ghostly figures jump excitedly like badly-dressed jive dancers. They’re all there. Down at heel but high in expectation: Peter Rabbit, Dom the Indomitable. And Asterix de Gaulle – so named because he marks favourites with asterisks and resembles General de Gaulle. Apparitions, of course. Their phantom faces reflecting anticipation, angst and – less commonly – joy. In the flesh they exude a personal warmth that replaces the coal fire.

I long to be back among that fraternity of hopeful no-hopers. Where a faux celebrity awaits, as I’m often mistaken for Pat Kane and asked to autograph betting slips.

Covid-19 will shutter many betting shops for good. Technological “progress” began the trend toward phone and online punting. But home gambling is dangerous for the already marginalised. Online slots were legalised by the Blair Government and still causes harm for the poorest sections of our country. I’ve known blokes who punted with easy credit on multiple cards. Very often alcohol is involved.

Why do we do it? A fiver on a horse called Flo-Jo hooked me. I trousered £50 from that first flutter. And walked home with a swagger straight out of Sinatra’s gang in Ocean’s Eleven.

A pal paid off her student loan with a succession of big wins. It provoked an outbreak of euphoria. Grown men wept like a convention of Johnnie Ray imitators. An improvised conga-line formed, snaking up Argyle Street. The festivities continued in shebeens and house parties, until we emerged, days later, blinking into daylight.

I bumped into my first wife outside a bookies. I suspect even then she surmised the odds were against us.

It takes a special kind of village to produce an idiot who punts in the hope of bankrupting the bookies. But us punters are the bedrock of betting, poorly served by corporates who’d take the fillings from our teeth.

These big-time operators want to rip apart the social ties that bind us.

Let them try. You’re taking on minds not machines. Folk who grapple with mathematical conundrums that’d leave Carol Vorderman puzzled.

Since betting involves a faith that’s more dumb than blind, what makes rational folk act so irrationally? The appliance of science? Superstition?

I once interviewed Goon Michael Bentine inside Rosslyn Chapel. A lovely man who dabbled in parapsychology as well as funny voices. “The stones in Rosslyn speak to me,” he said. “Can they tell you the winner at the Scottish National?” I asked.

An impertinence, of course. But think of it? Doris Stokes should have cleaned up in the sweepstakes. Instead she passed a plate round in bingo halls.

Meanwhile, I’m down at heel, shut out of an industry with plenty. With punting I might not win. But right now, I’m guaranteed to lose.

There’s a shambolic figure playing harmonica blues in Kelvingrove Street. If you’re passing you will drop a few quid in my cap, won’t you?

Brian McGeachan is an author and playwright.