Cheltenham Festival, Friday 15th March

Dispatches from the front line of The Greatest Show On Turf

I cried today.  Not because of a narrow defeat or an overdose of Champagne, both of which would’ve been decent excuses.  Nor for the over-crowding which, as usual, was ridiculous despite an apparent reduction of 5,000 versus last year’s Gold Cup day.  No, these tears were provoked by the unseating of amateur rider Jane Mangan in the Foxhunter Chase.  Her mount Oscar Delta (backed by my sister and brother-in-law after their third child – that’s Oscar rather than Delta) had travelled like a dream and was still full of running as he led over the last.  An exuberant leap appeared to have sealed it but the horse jinked left and Mangan fell out of the side door.  Only when watching the replay did I clock the jockey’s reaction, immediate and utter devastation, and that’s what set the old lachrymal glands off.  Nothing gets me like the theatre of sport.

Our Conor was the most impressive winner of the Triumph Hurdle I’ve ever seen.  Soft ground can have the effect of exaggerating winning distances but it was hard not to be bowled over by the way Dessie Hughes’ charge hacked all over his rivals, not coming off the bridle to score by fifteen lengths.  You could make an exhilarating 2014 Champion Hurdle field from this year’s novices alone: Our Conor, Champagne Fever, My Tent Or Yours, The New One.  Mouth-watering stuff for next season.

In the Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle, At Fishers Cross relished the testing conditions, biding his time before taking the lead over the final flight and accelerating away from his rivals up the hill.  A first victory of the week for champion jockey AP McCoy.

And, as you’ll know by now, Bobs Worth won the Gold Cup.  Nicky Henderson’s doughty stayer added the blue riband event to the Hennessy he won earlier in the season and in the process maintained his unbeaten record at the home of Jump racing.  It was a thrilling encounter.  Long Run, fitted with cheek pieces for the first time, – headgear that had sparked him into new life according to his work rider – attempted to make all.  He gave it a darn good go too.  Sir Des Champs came there to challenge heading for home and the long-time leader was just starting to feel the pinch.  Then Bobs Worth, patiently ridden by Barry Geraghty, appeared on the scene and once he grabbed the lead, there was no stopping him.

So that’s it for another year.  Battered, broken, beleaguered.  It takes a full 365 days to recover.  But only a day or so before you wish all those days away.

Cheltenham Festival, Thursday 14th March

Dispatches from the front line of The Greatest Show On Turf

Thursday at the Festival used to offer significantly poorer fare than the other three days.  Not now.  Today we witnessed the most competitive Ryanair Chase and the most intriguing World Hurdle of recent years.

The select Ryanair field was made up of three groups.  Horses who preferred not to take on the unbeatable Sprinter Sacre in yesterday’s Queen Mother, thank you very much, such as Cue Card (the only horse to get within eight lengths of the ‘Black Aeroplane’ over fences).  Those stepping down from staying trips, such as Irish raider First Lieutenant.  And the middle-distance specialists, like two-time winner Albertas Run and last year’s hero Riverside Theatre.

Colin Tizzard, Cue Card’s trainer, had thrown down the verbal gauntlet to his rivals pre-race, daring any of the competitors to go with his front-running charge.  Champion Court it was who accepted the challenge, pestering Cue Card for much of the first half of the race and forcing a couple of half-errors.  At the three-quarter mark, For Non Stop was travelling ominously well in behind as Champion Court started to feel the pinch.  Then the favourite First Lieutenant worked his way into contention and the race was well and truly on.  But still they couldn’t get to the strong-travelling Cue Card.  Three out and First Lieutenant blundered, knocking the stuffing out of himself; For Non Stop, too, was labouring.  And all the while, Cue Card pressed on in front.  Another bold leap at the last sealed it, Colin’s son Joe urging his mount to stay on up the hill to record a nine-length victory over the favourite.  I’d like to say the whole place went wild but it might just have been me.

In the absence of Big Buck’s, the World Hurdle was wide open.  Would Oscar Whisky be able to prove he stays three miles in top-grade company?  Could Reve De Sivola repeat his performances from earlier this season on better ground?  What else might surprise us?  The answer to the latter question was this: Solwhit, a multiple Grade One winner in Ireland who's quietly crept back to the top table after a frustrating couple of years.  It could have been an even bigger shock if Celestial Halo (40/1) had jumped the last cleanly.  However, Charles Byrnes’s inmate made no mistake and powered up the hill to score.  Personally, I’m pleased for Paul Carberry.  The winning jockey is, in my untutored eyes, the most stylish horseman around; not only that, but he was injured yesterday and must’ve gritted teeth through the pain to pass himself fit today.  Well done, Carbs.

By the way, if anyone had a winning accumulator in the other races today, I should like to hear from you.  20/1, 25/1 and 50/1 would make a lovely Trixie.

Cheltenham Festival, Wednesday 13th March

Dispatches from the front line of The Greatest Show On Turf

Incredible scenes.

A group of mates I like to call ‘London Irish’ were huddled, as they usually are, in a corner of the Mandarin Bar.  I visited them there shortly before the Coral Cup, an impossible-to-predict 24-runner handicap that has the bookies cackling all the way to the bank.  The boys have a group bet each Festival – twenties in and hope for the best – and for reasons unknown this is the race they targeted this year.  Medinas, a 33/1 shot from the Alan King yard, was Sean’s selection.

Rounding the home bend, as the gloves came off, Medinas got a nice run up the inner but still had a handful of lengths to find on the leaders approaching the final flight of hurdles.  “Come on, Medinas,” a few of the lads said.  Over the last and Medinas winged it, eating further into the deficit.  “Come on, Medinas!”  Maybe he could nab a place.  The leaders weren’t stopping but the selection continued to power up the hill.  “Come on, Medinas!!!”  He couldn’t, could he?  Oh yes he could, scooting clear in the final half furlong to land the mother of all touches.  The place went wild.  This is what the Festival’s all about.

Sean’s now inherited the nickname ‘Judge’, without a trace of irony.  Seany, Mart, Dec, Chris, Bern, Walt, Stu, other Sean and Christian: take a bow.

Earlier, the Neptune Investments Novices’ Hurdle, often the best race of the week, saw The New One give Nigel Twiston-Davies a welcome big-race success.  The stable has been under something of a cloud with a bug in the yard and no winner this month.  But the trainer’s son, Sam, galvanised The New One and the pair shot clear to win in convincing fashion, giving shrewd punters who’d taken the 11/2 on offer this morning (ahem) a nice little windfall.

In other news, oh yes, Sprinter Sacre demolished the opposition in the Queen Mother Champion Chase, recording a provisional Timeform rating of 192, the highest in history.  It was nothing short of an honour and a privilege to witness this freak of nature.  The showiest of show ponies, a big bruising brute of an animal with a ‘look at me’ aura who is quite simply the most incredible equine athlete the sport has ever seen.

Dispatches from the front line of The Greatest Show On Turf

Cheltenham Festival, Tuesday 12^th March

Day One of Cheltenham is over.  Such is the anticipation that greets the Festival that my mate said he already felt sad before the first race because it meant the end was that much nearer.  I told him to stop being a pillock.  But he had a point.

There were a few big questions today.  Firstly, would racing go ahead?  Wind chill assisted temperatures had plummeted to -12C overnight, meaning that it was touch and go whether we’d have any action at all.  Shortly before 10.30 a.m., there was a collective roar of relief around the Cotswolds as word came from the course that we were ON.

Now to the other questions.

Would My Tent Or Yours justify favouritism in the opener, the Supreme Novices Hurdle?  He’d cantered all over his rivals in his last race, making a mockery of a hugely competitive handicap.  And when he came there strongly in today’s race, swinging away on the bridle to challenge long-time leader Champagne Fever, he appeared to be running away with the contest.  But Champagne Fever, piloted by the peerless Ruby Walsh, found more up the hill to land a massive gamble for Ireland.

Next, in the Arkle, would Simonsig be as impressive as stablemate Sprinter Sacre had been 12 months ago?  Answer: no.  But he did prevail after surviving a bad blunder and holding off Irish outsider Baily Green.

In the big one, could Hurricane Fly recapture the Champion Hurdle crown he’d taken two years ago?  Having looked beaten down the back straight, ‘The Fly’ came back on the bridle and powered home to best last year’s champ Rock On Ruby.  It was the first time since Comedy Of Errors in 1975 that a horse had regained the Champion.  Historic stuff.  And we hadn’t seen the last of it.

Quevega is known simply as ‘The Mare’.  A nickname that seems to own the whole of her sex.  For good reason too.  As she lined up in today’s Mares’ Hurdle, would Willie Mullins’ inmate win the race for the fifth time on the trot?  Take a moment to consider the magnitude of this.  It requires a monumental effort just to get a horse to the start line five years running.  To win on all of those occasions is a feat seen about as rarely as Halley’s Comet.  And she did it.  Looking beaten as they rounded the home bend, Quevega – with that man Walsh on board – gradually worked her way back into contention and was travelling strongest as they approached the last.  She still had six lengths to make up but, with an increasing sense of inevitability, she wore down her rivals.  The first horse since Golden Miller in the ‘30s to win five on the trot at the Festival.  And the most delirious reaction from the Arkle Bar since Moscow Flyer’s Champion Chase in 2003.

See you tomorrow, Prestbury Park.

The Greatest Show On Turf

With the Cheltenham Festival just days away, it’s time to look back as well as forward

The Olympics of Jump racing.  The Greatest Show On Turf.  The biggest orgy of gambling, drinking and cavorting of the year.  Call it what you will, it’s the Cheltenham Festival next week.  If you’re a sports fan and you’ve never been, you really must.  If, on the other hand, you’re intending to have a punt and you “hate losing more than you enjoy winning” – in the words of my all-time hero Clement Freud – then find another hobby.

Here are a few memories from the last decade that make the losing tolerable.

Voy Por Ustedes – Arkle 2006

Ante-post betting is a mug’s game.  I remember visiting my favourite trainer Alan King’s yard in 2008.  The other guests that morning were all owners and one asked me if I was going to buy a horse for Alan to train.  “Well,” I said, calling to mind an early-season bet that I’d struck, “if Nenuphar Collonges wins this season’s stayers’ hurdle at the Festival, I might think about it.”  Without looking up from his Racing Post, King muttered: “You’ll be lucky, he’s not going for that race.”  As a friend of mine is fond of saying: “Bang goes another dream.”  The rule ‘never bet ante-post’ is a sensible one to adhere to.

But rules have exceptions.  In my case, it was Voy Por Ustedes in the 2006 Arkle.  I’d seen the French-bred with the Spanish name (it means ‘I go for you’) win a novice chase at Warwick the previous November.  Impressive, I thought, and wondered what price he might be for the two-mile championship race at the Festival, named after the legendary three-times Irish winner of the Gold Cup in the 1960s.  I was surprised to see he was trading at just shy of 50/1 on Betfair.  Worth a few pennies.  As the season wore on, the horse’s odds contracted, and I continued to back him, but he was still widely available at 10/1 or better the week before the race.  On the Friday, after a few Guinnesses in a mate’s pub, I was willing to tell anyone who’d listen: “The first word is ‘Voy’, the second is ‘Por’ and the third is ‘Ustedes’.”  I was tolerated at best.

Cut to the following Tuesday and the Arkle itself.  A friend of mine tells me I was “as quiet as a church mouse” as Voy Por traded blows up front with the classy grey Monet’s Garden, neither touching a twig in a beautiful display of jumping at pace.  Apparently, I continued this silence as my fancy pulled out a little more in the closing stages to win by a length and a half.  Then the shouting started.

Katchit – 2008 Champion Hurdle

Some horses love Cheltenham.  It’s an idiosyncratic, undulating track with a brute of an uphill finish.  One such animal was Katchit, not much bigger than a pony, but with a “heart as big as his body”, as his trainer – that man Alan King again – once put it.

He’d won at the course several times, including in the juvenile championship race, the Triumph Hurdle, the previous year.  Historically, though, winners of this race had a very poor record in the Champion.  Undeterred, I backed Katchit at some nice double-figure prices.

In the race itself, Katchit was his usual stylish but nuggety self.  Travelling strongly on the home bend, he appeared to eyeball favourite Sizing Europe out of it (although, to be fair, Sizing was later found to have burst a blood vessel) before blasting up his beloved hill to take the crown.

One idiot in the grandstand made a right spectacle of himself.  “They said it couldn’t be done!” he yelled, as parents hid small children and edged away.  “They said a Triumph hurdler couldn’t do it!  They said a five-year-old couldn’t do it!  They were wrong!!”  To anyone who was there, I can only apologise.

Katchit sadly died of colic in January.  RIP, little fella.

As an aside, jockey Robert ‘Choc’ Thornton – who rode both Voy Por Ustedes and Katchit to the victories described above – is injured and will miss this year’s Festival.  Thoughts are with you, Choc.

Moscow Flyer – 2005 Champion Chase

“My wife drove me to drink,” the old joke goes, “and I never thanked her.”  I owe a similar debt of gratitude to Moscow Flyer.  This wonderful Irish two-mile chaser is the reason I fell in love with racing.  It was 2003, the first time I’d done the Festival properly, and I’d had my biggest ever bet on the Jessica Harrington-trained gelding.  He won, thank God, and in the process cemented a unique place in my heart and made me vow to return to the Festival every year until I die.

2004 didn’t go quite as well for Moscow.  Seeking to retain his crown, he unseated his rider.  When he returned the following year at the age of eleven, many thought his best days were behind him.  Blinded by love (another golden rule that I regularly flout is to bet with the head not the heart), I kept the faith and backed him as if defeat were out of the question.

In a pulsating renewal, Moscow set sail for home three fences out.  His market rival, the 2004 champion Azertyuiop, had placed a back hoof in the water jump, effectively putting paid to his challenge.  But the young pretender Well Chief, five years Moscow’s junior, was still in menacing pursuit.  As Moscow rounded the bend to the home straight with one fence left to jump, a tsunami of sound rose right across Prestbury Park and, seemingly blown up the hill by the crowd’s collective will, he crossed the line with two lengths to spare.  “And Moscow Flyer is magnificent!” said the course commentator.  He certainly was.

My 2013 Cheltenham Festival tips (caution advised).  Tuesday Champion Hurdle: Grandouet.  Wednesday Champion Chase: Sprinter Sacre (I recommend backing him to win by 20 lengths or more at 4/1).  Thursday World Hurdle: Oscar Whisky.  Friday Gold Cup: Captain Chris.

Sporting Spectacles

As Sehwag bats in ‘librarian’ glasses, which other sportsmen have excelled in specs?

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To my mind, there is no more exciting player in world cricket than Virender Sehwag.  Part of a golden generation of Indian batsmen, Sehwag holds some astonishing records.  He has no fewer than six double hundreds in Tests, more than any other Indian, and twice he’s gone past 300 (none of his countrymen has even one triple to his name).  He’s scored more Test hundreds than fifties, a record he shares with just four players in history.  In One-Day Internationals, his 219 against West Indies in 2011 is the highest ever individual score.

But it’s not the bare statistics that make Sehwag special.  It’s the manner in which he scores his runs.  The second of his Test triples, for example, was the fastest the game has seen, coming off just 278 balls.  Steve Davis once said that the key to success on the snooker table was to “play like it means nothing when it means everything.”  It’s a mantra to which Sehwag is 100% committed.  Yes, the way in which he frequently goes after the bowling from ball one in any form of the game makes him vulnerable to early dismissals.  But when it comes off, it comes off big.  And, by God, is it thrilling to watch.  The devastating ferocity of his strokes, particularly that square cut, is a true force of sporting nature.

There was something incongruous, then, about seeing Sehwag bat in glasses this week.  These are not the feats you’d readily associate with a man who now resembles a librarian.  I don’t say this to mock – no myopic-baiter, me, as an occasional specs-wearer myself – but, rightly or wrongly, we tend to see glasses as a sign of studiousness rather than sporting excellence.  Possibly a blight on our societal prejudices but it’s true (although not as dramatic as ex-dictator Pol Pot, who executed people with spectacles for fear they were intellectuals who might overthrow him).

Here are a few others who’ve done their bit to buck that stereotype.

Clive Lloyd

I could’ve picked Daniel Vettori or David Steele but Clive Lloyd is probably the most celebrated cricketing spectacles-sporter.  Whenever I picture him in my mind’s eye, it’s those heavy-rimmed goggles that feature most prominently, as in the opening sequence of The Two Ronnies, where the frames appear on screen before the faces.

As a player, Lloyd was a tall, elegant, left-handed batsman, capable of brutal hitting.  Scoring over 7,500 Test runs, he also whacked 77 sixes, making him the sixth most prolific maximum hitter in Test history.  His century in the inaugural World Cup final in 1975 came off 88 balls, bringing victory to his team and the man of the match award to himself.  He was also an exceptional fielder, patrolling the cover-point region with his distinctive loping gait and swooping in feline style, which brought him his nickname Super Cat (later, abject fielder Phil Tufnell would be christened Cat in more ironic fashion).

But it’s perhaps as a man manager and leader that Lloyd should best be remembered.  There have always been differences and rivalries among the Caribbean islands, so that forming a truly united West Indies cricket team has historically been a huge challenge.  Not only did Lloyd meet this challenge, he also set the blueprint for two decades of domination of the world game.  Having seen his team battered 5-1 in Australia, thanks in no small part to Dennis Lillee and Jeff Thompson, Lloyd set about forming his own fast-bowling production line.  In the years that followed, West Indies became arguably the best team in Test history as the revolutionary all-pace attack swept all before it.

Maybe it was the specs but this was visionary stuff.

Ed Moses

To some extent, the peerless Ed Moses conforms to the view of glasses-wearers as academic or studious.  His background is in physics and engineering and, after retiring from competition, he helped to pioneer the out-of-competition drugs test.

But it’s as a 400m hurdles athlete that we remember him and few have dominated their field so utterly.  After losing to his rival Harald Schmid in August 1977, Moses remained unbeaten for nine years, nine months and nine days.  The streak comprised 122 straight victories.

He won two Olympic golds, in 1976 and 1984, and would surely have made it three had it not been for the USA’s boycott of the 1980 Games in Moscow.  Add to that his two World titles and four world records and it’s not difficult to place Moses alongside the very top sportsmen of the Twentieth Century.  Even today, a quarter of a century after his retirement, he still holds 25 of the quickest 100 times in history.

Dennis Taylor

Not quite the studious academic look, this, more Timmy Mallett on a dress-down day.

Anyone who’s tried playing snooker in specs will understand the problem that Dennis Taylor faced.  You get down on your shot, rest your chin on your cue and look up – and there’s the top rim of your glasses, right in your line of vision.  So you either peer over the top of the rim, which rather defeats the object of wearing the visual aids in the first place, or dispense with them entirely and make do.  Neither could Taylor get on with contact lenses, so he was stumped.

The breakthrough came when snooker guru Jack Karnehm developed a pair of glasses with a far broader field of vision, which allowed the wearer to see through the optical centre of the lens.  What this meant to the casual observer, and there were plenty of them, was that it looked as though Taylor had his glasses on upside-down, like a drunken uncle at a wedding.

But Taylor had the last laugh, winning the World title in 1985 in that final against Steve Davis.  Those who witnessed it (about 18m on BBC2) will never forget Taylor’s joyful, finger-wagging celebration; he was apparently pointing at his manager, to whom he’d said: “I can still win this, you know?” despite being 8-0 down at the time.  No-one else saw that coming.

Oscar Pistorius And Other Fallen Idols

However you view the events at Oscar Pistorius’s Pretoria home yesterday, it’s a tragedy.  For those who’ve been living on Mars, Pistorius’s girlfriend – model Reeva Steenkamp – was shot dead.  Police initially refused to confirm that the suspect they were questioning was Pistorius (standard practice in South Africa, apparently), although they did make the baffling decision to tell us that they’d been called to incidents ‘of a domestic nature’ at the address in the past.

It’ll be months before we know whether or not he’s guilty.  But, whatever happens, it’s hard to see anything other than the ruination of the man who’s arguably been the single-most important sportsperson in the world over the last five years.

As such, his is likely to be the most spectacular plunge from grace by a sporting figure in history.  Here are some other fallen idols, whose descents I’ve attempted to rank.

2. Ben Johnson

From the holder of the most prestigious title in sport to ultimate villain in 72 hours.  In the famous words of Des Lynam, “I've just been handed a piece of paper here that if it's right, it'll be the most dramatic story out of these Olympics or perhaps any others.”

I probably shouldn’t say this but, in my book, that 1988 final remains the greatest race in the history of the 100m.  The look on Carl Lewis’s face!  And four men under 10 seconds for the first time.  It’s been branded ‘the dirtiest race in history’ but at the time it was pure adrenaline-filled theatre.

The saddest part of the whole tawdry business, as I recall it, was that ‘Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson’ became ‘Jamaican-born sprinter Ben Johnson’ in many sections of the media.  Talk about institutional racism.

3. Lance Armstrong

It must be nigh-on impossible for the few journalists who continued to throw awkward questions at Lance Armstrong at the height of his fame, such as the admirable Paul Kimmage, not to be smug now.  Kimmage was once roundly bullied by Armstrong at a press conference for using the phrase ‘the cancer of cycling’.  It’s not certain whether he was referring to drugs in the sport or Armstrong specifically.  Armstrong, who had overcome testicular cancer in the 1990s, chose to interpret it as the latter and lashed out.

Perhaps the most distasteful aspect of the entire affair was Armstrong’s likening of his current situation to the challenge he faced when he found out he had cancer.

It might help the public’s perception of him if he sounded even a little apologetic.

4. Hansie Cronje

A second erstwhile favourite son of South Africa on the list. 

I walked past Cronje at Centurion in Pretoria during the rain-affected fifth Test of England’s 1999-2000 tour.  We’d already lost the series but on the final day, news filtered through that he and England captain Nasser Hussain had agreed to forfeit an innings each to ‘make a game of it.’  For us spectators, it felt like a bit of recompense for what had been a frustrating few days; the sun had shone almost constantly since a deluge on the first day but the wet outfield had prevented any play until day five.

The enterprising agreement by the captains produced a brilliant, one-day-style run chase, England reaching their target of 249 for the loss of eight wickets when Darren Gough pulled Nantie Hayward for four through midwicket with just five balls to spare.  Only in subsequent years did the game look suspicious and, sure enough, it emerged that Cronje had accepted money and a gift from a bookmaker in return for the early declaration.

Cronje’s death at the age of 32 in a plane crash meant South African cricket was able to move on rather more swiftly than would’ve been possible if he’d stayed alive.  One of the reasons that current captain Graeme Smith was ushered into the captaincy at the tender age of 22 – apart from being an admirable character – was that he had no links to Cronje.

5. Tiger Woods

Tiger’s last on this list as his fall from grace has not broken him.  Sure, in the words of The Smiths, ‘at the time it was terrible’, and his carefully-staged apology press conference made for cringe-worthy viewing.  However, he’s emerged from the scandal if not unscathed then at least intact.  He even retained his lucrative association with Nike – unlike Armstrong, who was summarily dumped – although who knows how much money he forfeited from the dozens of other sponsors who walked?

I suppose that in the public consciousness, serial adultery is more forgivable than making a mockery of an entire sport.  Even though the base crime is essentially the same: lying.  People haven’t forgotten Tiger’s exposure as a prolific philanderer but at least he’s back doing what he’s most famous for.  Next question.  Is he good enough these days to add to his 14 majors?

Punting High And Low

United’s foregone title conclusion and more heroic tales of sports betting

Following Manchester United’s routine 2-0 win over Everton at the weekend, Betfred have announced they’re already paying out on bets for the Red Devils to be Premier League champions this season.

The wife of Fred Done, owner of Betfred, must be tearing her curlers out.  A United fan, Done has pulled this stunt a few times over the years and had his fingers burnt not once but twice, in 1998 and again last year when that Sergio Agüero goal handed Manchester City the title and cost Betfred a reported £1m in the process.  Can you imagine anything worse?  Your beloved team has the title snatched away with the last kick of the season; not only that, the winners are your ‘noisy neighbours’ from across the city; oh, and by the way, you’re a million smackers down on the deal.  Ouch!  That apparently prompted Done to promise his good lady never to be such a silly boy again; except he obviously had his charred fingers crossed.

In fact, Betfred is not even the first firm to make the early pay-out this season, rivals Paddy Power doing so before United’s game.  If you’re someone who likes a punt, I can highly recommend Power.  Their innovative money-back offers are second to none and they’re known to give their regular customers – or at least those who lose more than they win – a free bet once in a while.  And, no, I’m not on commission (although I do get the odd free bet).

What are the best bets in sporting history?

Rodney Marsh and Dennis Lillee – 1981

This could never happen today.  Not without the mother of all outcries, an ICC investigation and player bans as hefty as Mark Cosgrove.

It was the Headingley Test of the 1981 Ashes series, and Australia had England in all sorts of bother.  The hosts had followed on and, with seven second-innings wickets down, were still almost a hundred runs behind their opponents.  At about this time, in-play match odds were flashed on the scoreboard: Ladbrokes made England 500/1 to win the Test.

Rod Marsh, the Aussie wicketkeeper, and fast bowler Dennis Lillee clocked the price and raised eyebrows at each other.  500/1?  In a two-horse race?  Even with the match situation as it was, they reasoned, that was ludicrous.  They arranged, via a third party (their team coach driver, apparently), to place £15 on England.

What happened next?  Ian Botham 149 not out and Bob Willis 8-43, that’s what.  Astonishingly, England had won the match and Lillee and Marsh their bet.

Darren Yates – Frankie’s Magnificent Seven

Frankie Dettori made history on 28^th September 1996 by riding the winners of all seven races at Ascot.  For one punter, a joiner from Morecambe, it was a day that changed his life.  Darren Yates had staked £69.76 including betting tax (a concept as out-of-date as smallpox today) on multiples made up of Dettori’s rides, adding in the seven-horse accumulator for good measure.  He pocketed over £550,000.

For every winner, of course, there’s a loser.  One of the biggest on that day was bookmaker Gary Wiltshire.  By the time Dettori rode Fujiyama Crest to victory to complete the seven-timer – the horse had been a general 12/1 in the morning but returned at 2/1 – the larger-than-life bookie was down by at least £800,000, possibly upwards of £1m.  Even worse, Wiltshire was only at Ascot because he’d run into traffic on his way to Worcester.  How’s your luck, Gary?

It was much the same when I backed winners at 33/1 and 14/1 with the same bookie on the rails at Windsor in 2005.  The hapless layer dismantled his board and trudged off before the penultimate race.

These dog days are rare for punters, though, and it’s usually the turf accountants who win.  As my old man is fond of saying, “You never see a bookie on a bike.”

Kerry Packer – heads I win (your estate)

Not strictly a sports wager, this one, but since Kerry Packer brought us World Series Cricket, I’m allowing him in.

Which is more than can be said for one particular individual in the high-stakes room of a casino.  The story goes that Packer walked into the exclusive private area and this chap told him it was “for high rollers only.”  When Packer told him that was fine by him, the man said, “No, you need to go and play out there.  This is out of your league.”  “What’s your league?” Packer asked.  “I’m worth 60 mill,” said the chap.  “Toss you for it,” Packer replied.

The man, we hear, demurred.