On the first day of Crufts 2008 a story broke in the National Press that the bookmakers William Hill had suspended betting on Crufts due to “abnormal betting patterns” on a dog from the utility group winning Best in Show.

I must say that I was taken completely by surprise as I had no idea that you could bet on the outcome of a dog show, and being what might be described as an “insider” i.e. having shown and bred dogs for 30 years, and working for the Kennel Club, I have very rarely heard of anything more difficult than trying to second guess which dog is going to win.

The specific bet that Hills suspended was on predicting which group the Crufts BIS winner would come from. This seems a fairly straightforward bet and it seems obvious to me that all groups have a fairly equal chance of producing a BIS winner.  The Press’s line however seemed to be that “abnormal betting patterns” suggested that a “super dog” was competing within that group, the implication being that someone close to the dog was placing large amounts of money on it.  Perhaps the bookies don’t realise that trying to read 3 peoples minds i.e. that of the Breed, group and BIS judges, is virtually impossible. Then there is of course the very small point that the “super dog” would have to be at his very best each time he was in the ring.

Personally I found the whole story a little tough to swallow and I can’t believe that anyone who owned such a “super dog” would tempt fate by betting on it.

It seems to me that there was a one in seven chance of predicting which group the winner would come from so if a bookie was offering odds of greater than 7 to 1 on which group the eventual BIS winner would come from then perhaps it was worth a bet after all!

Author:

Bill Lambert

Publisher:

The Kennel Club

Date:

07-Mar-08

Last updated on:

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