Betting.Betfair

[b]Eliot Pollak senses an anti-English agenda at play in recent SPOTY runnings and is banking on the Welsh masses to deliver an upset in the top-three betting.[/b] They say history repeats itself every hundred years or so. 'They' of course are absolutely spot on. In 1913, Emily Wilding Davison hurled herself to her death underneath the King's horse at Epsom, in an attention-seeking stunt aimed at getting women the vote. Nearly 100 years later, who would be surprised if a modern-day Davison didn't suddenly appear, spread-eagled on the floor of MediaCity Salford, inviting Sue Barker's heels to do their worst. Such has been the imbroglio surrounding the male-only names on the 2011 SPOTY shortlist, that the absence of women has dominated all prior publicity (one assumes this was exactly...

[b]Mark Cavendish heads up the BBC Sports Personality of the Year odds at 1.4. But while victory for Cav would mean a second win in four years for cycling, the Contrarian has drawn up the profile of a typical winner and it looks nothing like the sprinting sensation...[/b] [b]Cavendish is from no man's land[/b] Well, actually, the opposite is true given that he hails from the Isle of Man, but that's far from a good omen when it comes to the Sports Personality of the Year, because recent history suggests that you need a large amount of local support to take the trophy. His island, however, has a population of just 84,655. The last four winners - Joe Calzaghe, Sir Chris Hoy, Ryan Giggs and Tony McCoy - have all been propelled to victory by sizeable backing from either Wales, Scotland or...