Leading quartet look to have Spoty wrapped up for Christmas

BBC1, Sunday December 16, 7pm

It’s the betting heat where six odds-on favourites have been turned over in the last 12 years, where record 40-1 shot Mo Farah won from seemingly nowhere last year, and in which Princess Anne once pipped George Best and Barry John to the post. Welcome to BBC Sports Personality of the Year.

The event is a long-standing tradition but this year it’s different.

There’s no shortlist published in advance, and there’s no odds-on shot miles clear at the top of the market. But four names are dominating and it’s 20-1 bar the quartet of Harry Kane, Geraint Thomas, Lewis Hamilton and Tyson Fury.

The 2017 result stunned even winner Farah himself, who was not in the audience in Liverpool to receive his trophy. The places were no less eyebrow-raising as World Superbike champion Jonathan Rea took second and Paralympic sprinter Johnnie Peacock came third.

Critics have said the change to the format this year is to ensure there’s no repeat, amid suggestions of block voting by motorcycle enthusiasts for example. The Beeb insist it’s being done to allow more time for the review part of the show. So what are the factors at play, and was 2017 an orchestrated coup or just a freak year?

The numbers game
Farah’s 40-1 quote on the night is the biggest upset since Spoty betting entered the mainstream 15 years ago, twice the price of next best Joe Calzaghe in 2007.

But another number that’s of more interest is the number of votes the runner polled - just over 83,000, by far the lowest tally of any winner. Second-placed Rea was 3,000 votes behind whereas Andy Murray’s winning margin the year before was more than 120,000.

In 2016, 80,000 votes would have got you fourth place, in 2012 you’d have finished seventh.

Votes were shared around pretty evenly - the top six each took between ten and 15 per cent - reflecting perhaps the lack of any real standout names. Even 1-6 jolly Anthony Joshua, for all he had achieved, was not a household name in the mould of former boxing winners from Henry Cooper to Lennox Lewis due to the rise in pay per view events.

This year’s top four should all be optimistic of garnering big numbers on the phone vote.

Narrow favourite Kane has the whole summer World Cup adventure on his side and the precedent of 1990 and 1998 winners Paul Gascoigne and Michael Owen.

Thomas can look to the success of three cyclists in a five-year spell from 2008 to 2012, 2014 winner Hamilton has course-and-distance form while outsider of the four Fury has been in the headlines most recently.

Block votes
If motorcycle sports supporters did all unite to get behind Rea last year, it’s hardly new. Rugby league fans made it clear they were getting behind Kevin Sinfield in 2015 as much for the sport as for the man, but even that was old news.

And horse racing followers know that only too well after the sport successfully got behind Tony McCoy in 2010

In 1991, angler Bob Nudd is reported to have received most votes but was ruled out by the BBC, who said his success was sparked by a campaign in Angling Times.

Even without a shortlist it’s hard to identify a candidate who could benefit in that way and the revamp of the format might well negate any effects.

The outsiders
A clear but distant fifth in the betting is sprinter Dina Asher Smith, who had a golden summer in Berlin in the 100m, 200m and relays. But it was the European Championship, not the Worlds or Olympics.

England's retired Test cricketer Alastair Cook reached an emotional milestone, Rea and Joshua are again lurking, but we’re already pushing past the 50-1 mark and surely Farah’s record odds last year won’t be burst at the very next go.

Recency
Kane’s headline act, when he hit odds-on for Spoty, came in June and July, while Thomas won the Tour de France at the end of July.

Hamilton celebrated his fifth Formula One drivers championship in November while Fury’s turn in the spotlight was at the start of December, and the boxer’s hopes of landing this award may even have been enhanced by the fact that his bout with Wilder ended in a controversial draw rather than a victory as it gives him the aura of a victim of injustice.

Although the World Cup is the oldest memory, England have defied many doubters by not reverting to type but adding success in the new Nations League. Kane and the Three Lions are still on the up.

The World Cup
The summer may seem a distant memory on a damp, cold December morning, but it won’t take much footage of Gareth and the boys basking in the Russian sun to bring back memories - not just reaching the semi-finals and Kane’s Golden Boot, but the beer-throwing, the waistcoat and daring to believe that it might be coming home.

Of course narrow favourite Kane has only the English vote - minus thousands of Arsenal fans - behind him but it’s still a pretty sizeable block, and don’t forget that when England’s rugby team won their World Cup in 2003 they scooped the top two individual places - Jonny Wilkinson and Martin Johnson - plus Coach of the Year and Team of the Year.

Who would bet against another hat-trick in 2018?

The time of our lives

There’s an extra award to be handed out this time in the shape of the Moment of the Year, and England’s World Cup penalty shootout win over Columbia is even-money favourite with Hills, ahead of Tyson Fury’s comeback to draw with Deontay Wilder having suffered two knockdowns.

The Overseas Personality category has been renamed World Sport Star of the Year with American gymnast Simone Biles odds-on with Hills, although the 3-1 about golfer Francesco Molinari could be interesting given his success this year included starring in the Ryder Cup and an Open Championship victory on British soil.

Hills - greatest sporting moment of 2018 Evs England penalty shootout win, 3 Tyson Fury comeback v Wilder, 7-2 Alastair Cook farewell century, 7 England’s netball gold medal, 14 Tiger Woods's first win in five years. World Sport Star Of The Year: 4-6 Simone Biles, 3 Francesco Molinari, 5 Oleksandr Usyk, 6 Ester Ledecka.

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