Huge queues as punters flock to pubs for Anzac Day two-up
Punters flock to pubs offering doubles bets on Anzac Day, while queues snake around inner Sydney pubs hosting a tradition of street gambling.
Images from the Sydney suburb of Paddington posted online on Saturday showed hundreds of people queuing before 10am to enter London, two hours before the game was due to kick off.
Attendance at Sydney bars this Anzac Day has broken records, says Bondi Lines, the venue’s crowd monitoring platform.
“The queue at the Clovelly Hotel stretched almost to the beach at 8.45am, the longest queue ever recorded open at the venue,” said Callum Weatherall, co-founder of Bondi Lines.
“But if there’s one venue that takes the cake today, it’s Paddington’s London, where a huge queue lined the streets of Paddington at 8.42am for the pub’s first year hosting the street duo.
“We’ve never seen anything like The London this morning.
“Clovelly is always crazy but this was something else. Both venues definitely hit it off.”
Images of Bondi Lines also show monster tails at the Clock Hotel in Surry Hills and The Bellevue, just a few blocks from London.
The traditional gambling game of tossing two coins into the air and betting on where they will land, which is illegal throughout the country except on Anzac Day, forms the basis of Australia’s April 25 tradition.
Hours before the traditional game starts, queues form around the block in various parts of Sydney.
There is evidence that the game was played by convicts in the 18th and 19th centuries, but popularized by officers during the First World War, it became an increasingly popular pastime for men in the trenches.
While Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, the ACT, NT and most of WA ban the game 364 days a year, there is greater latitude in Victoria and NSW.
In NSW, people can play and bet with coins in the afternoon on Anzac Day, Victory in the Pacific Day on 15 August, and Remembrance Day on 11 November.
In Victoria the game is legal in the seven days before Anzac Day, but must only be played at an approved RSL sub-branch or RSL Victoria-approved venue.
The mining town of Kalgoorlie in WA is open year-round due to its historic connection to the game, as is the town of Broken Hill in NSW, which has a special licence.
