Heads or tails? It’s a simple choice, with a fair outcome. But it’s only in Australia that it’s become a national pastime and, some might argue, a sport.
The game of two-up, where punters bet on the outcome of two coins thrown into the air, has a reputation for being “fair dinkum”, a reminder of its 19th-century goldfield beginnings. But its uptake by Australian soldiers in both world wars has seen it enshrined in the national mythology. The game is now played play once a year on Anzac Day with near-religious reverence at pubs and RSLs following dawn services nationwide.
Two-up at the Sackville Hotel, Rozelle on Anzac Day, 2022. Credit: Louise Kennerley
Max Presnell, Fairfax racing writer for 67 years until 2024, remembers the unregulated days when “a two-up game could just break out in the backyard, could break out in the street lane”.
“On Anzac Day, you’d come out of the races at Randwick, and there would be a two-up game on the corner.”
But he also recalls the two-faced tricks – pennies with matching sides, ringkeepers who would dress like plainclothes officers, so passing police would think they were breaking up a game, rather than running one.
So as you enter the ring this Anzac Day, what can you use to your advantage? Is a coin toss ever really fair, and is two-up a fiendish game of skill or one of pure chance?
What are the rules?
A kip with two coins held by a spinner at an illegal two-up school on Reservoir Street, Surry Hills in 1930.Credit: Fairfax Media
Two-up rules vary state to state, ring to ring. Typically, an appointed “spinner” tosses two pennies (a three-coin version also exists) from a slotted wooden paddle known as a “kip” (which may have originated in Ireland) with one of three outcomes: “heads”, two heads landing face up; “tails”, when both obverse sides (marked with a white cross) land face up, or “odds” – one of each.
The central bet involves the spinner, who is trying to throw heads (tails means they lose the kip to another spinner, and odds means a re-throw), and someone in the crowd matches their bet.
Side-bets are made by onlookers for heads or tails, which are equally likely outcomes, each occurring 25 per cent of the time (some venues allow bets on odds, and a three-coin version is also played). The person who bets tails holds the cash so it is clear in the crowd who has bet what.
The “boxer” or ringmaster organises the betting, making sure money is exchanged fairly, and takes a 10 per cent cut of the spinner’s winnings. They also initiate the throw – “Come in, spinner!”
So is it really “fair dinkum”?
“Everybody thought they had a technique,” says Presnell, “a long throw, a short throw, a different sort of throw.” He recalls seeing a spinner throw heads as many as 10 times consecutively in Kalgoorlie in WA, one of two places where two-up is legal year round.
Max Presnell, former Fairfax racing writer of 67 years.Credit: Jessica Hromas
Stephen Woodcock, a mathematics professor at UTS, says recent studies have found a coin toss may not be as clear-cut as 50-50. One used 350,000 coin flips to find there was strong support for the idea that a coin lands slightly more often on the side it started – the coins in two-up are placed on the kip tails up, or odds up in casino versions – around 51 per cent of the time.
Another, in which participants were told to try and flip for heads, found that some people may be able to positively influence the toss of a coin. But Woodcock believes the controlled conditions created by the kip, and the height coins must be tossed in two-up (at least three metres, without hitting the roof) means 50-50 is the likely split.
Whether or not there’s skill involved for the spinner, for those betting on the side, Woodcock says the attraction of two-up is precisely those even odds, compared to games such as roulette, which have the illusion of being fair, but favour the house more and more over multiple spins.
“I’m not really a gambler, but I would happily bet on two-up of any day of the week rather than roulette.”
Laurie White prepares for last game of legal two-up at Broken Hill’s Musicians Club in. The game is still legally played year round in the town, but only at The Palace Hotel.Credit: Robin Sellick
Why is it illegal during the rest of the year?
Two-up has been legal without a permit on Anzac Day in most states and territories over the last 30 years, but it once had a reputation as a wild, unregulated game, often played at illegal “schools”.
Gambling reform campaigner and Baptist minister Tim Costello says Anzac Day two-up is harmless compared with the $31.5 billion Australians now lose to the gambling industry each year. But he says its association with the Anzacs’ heroic sacrifice is evidence of the industry’s success in pushing gambling as “quintessentially an Aussie activity, that we’re baptised at birth into eucalyptus oil and a punt”.
The suspected location of the former Thommo’s Two-Up School in Surry Hills, pictured in 1980.Credit: Fairfax Media
“In some ways, [Anzac Day two-up] is a parallel to the offering plate going around after a religious service.”
The game’s darker side was explored in cult Ozploitation film Wake in Fright (1971), where a young schoolteacher loses his money playing two-up and gets stranded in an outback town loosely modelled on Broken Hill, NSW. The town is the only place in the state where games are legally played year round, following a special dispensation lobbied for in 1992.
A still from Wake in Fright (1971). The protoganist, a young schoolteacher played by Gary Bond, loses his money in a two-up game and is stranded in a town loosely based on Broken Hill, NSW.
Presnell says before illegal, then legal, casinos took over in the ’70s and ’80s, fortunes were made and lost in two-up schools, although mostly by the organisers: “I’ve seen thousands gambled”.
He often went to the legendary Thommo’s School, run by ex-boxer and rugby league player Joe Taylor until 1979 at various locations in Surry Hills. “Mastercoach” Jack Gibson spent time running the door at what was one of Australia’s first major illegal gambling operations, but Presnell says Thommo’s was “fair dinkum”, and a great leveller: “a cross-section of Sydney society”.
Two-up helmed by Drag Queen Fairah Nuff at the Kings Cross Hotel on 25th April, 2023Credit: Brook Mitchell
“If you had a bad night, which were pretty constant, they’d give you 10 bob to get home, which was a courtesy of the house.”
Where can I play?
Although this masthead revealed old favourite North Bondi RSL has moved to scrap the game this year, your local RSL or Diggers Club is still a good bet – just follow the crowds after 12pm. And while Surry Hills has changed since the days of Thommo’s, two-up has found new life in an innovation combining the suburb’s old and new characters: drag two-up, hosted by drag queens at several pubs and bars in the area.
