Blinkers On is a weekly column covering the biggest issues of the spring racing carnival.
Racing has a gambling problem. The country’s rank-and-file punters are being ripped off.
For the umpteenth time across the weekend, punters who laid a winning bet with the TAB tote were sold short.
The culprit? The much-touted World Pool, a Hong Kong-based betting system that is merged with Australia’s tote, the TAB, for big races and on big race days as part of an ongoing agreement. They accounted for seven races at Caulfield and 10 at Rosehill.
The proof is in the dividends: winning sprinter Point Barrow paid $2.60 with the World Pool TAB, while returning $3.20 with the bookies. Another Caulfield winner, Land Legend, was rated a 70-1 chance by the bookies, but returned $44 on the World Pool Tab – that’s a big difference for someone having a $1 bet.
Social media lit up again on Saturday night about the issue and has been an ongoing lament for punters heading towards Melbourne Cup week.
Outspoken professional punter John Walters called it a “literal brutality for all punters” because the World Pool continues to retain a higher percentage of the investment – meaning a smaller return for punters.
He said the World Pool sits at 123 per cent. The fixed odds market (betting with bookies) sits at 115 per cent.
“The market percentage is higher, so, on average, all horses will be poor value in comparison long term,” Walters explained on X. “Doesn’t matter what you back.”
The World Pool concept was introduced as an alternative to fixed-odds betting, and to attract an international audience into the Australian market and create bigger pools of money. But it is hard to see it instilling any confidence.
Melham missing from Caulfield
The Melbourne Racing Club boosted Caulfield Cup prizemoney by $1 million this year – from $5 million to $6 million – to celebrate their 150th anniversary, but maybe that cash would have been better spent somewhere else.
Like on a Jamie Melham appearance fee.
The history-making hoop has left a massive hole in this year’s marketing campaign because she won’t be in Melbourne this Saturday to defend her crown.
For those living under a rock, Melham became the first female jockey to win the Caulfield Cup last year on stayer Half Yours. She is the biggest star in the sport and transcends racing because she followed up little more than two weeks later to do the Cups double – also the first woman to have achieved this feat.
But the 20-time group 1 winning star has opted to head to Sydney this Saturday to ride in the Everest, giving up the title defence on Half Yours to Mark Zahra.
Which makes the MRC’s widespread promotional posters for their 150th Cup somewhat obsolete – they feature Melham in her Half Yours silk, kissing the trophy.
When asked over the weekend about her decision, Melham told Seven she was driven by the desire to win the Everest – a group 1 trophy that is yet to sit in her ever-expanding cabinet.
And who could blame her, considering the riches on offer in the $20 million mega sprint race – the brain child of the now departed NSW racing supremo Peter V’Landys, who has decided to channel all his powers into the NRL?
But maybe a $1 million appearance fee could have persuaded Melham otherwise. Why not? It is a strategy used in plenty of other sports.
For the record, Melham will have her work cut out to win this year’s Everest on Bjorn Baker three-year-old Blue Door. They will have to beat the world’s best horse, Ka Ying Rising.
Why the Cox Plate is becoming an A-reserve event
Speaking of the need for appearance money, the Cox Plate is another event fading further into Sydney’s growing spring shadow.
This year’s $6 million Cox Plate, to be run at Flemington for the first time while Moonee Valley undergoes renovations, will be run and won without at least three of the country’s best horses.
Brilliant mare Autumn Glow and four-time group 1 winner Ceolwulf will instead take part in this Saturday’s group 1 $5 million King Charles III Stakes (1609m) at Randwick, while emerging superstar Sheza Alibi is being lured north by the salivating $10 million purse for the group 1 Golden Eagle (1500m) on Saturday, October 31.
Imagine an Olympic final missing three of its best? It becomes the Commonwealth Games.
A decade ago, all three of these A-graders would have been at the Cox Plate starting barriers. Instead, we are preparing for an A-reserve event, and, for racing purists, it is a hard pill to swallow.
Can you imagine a universe in which Winx did not win four consecutive Cox Plates? Well, you are living in it.
So, back to appearance money. Earlier this year, the Moonee Valley committee weighed up financial incentives to lure international superstar Calandagan down under. Why not offer it to Sheza Alibi’s connections instead?
Who knows, decorated trainer Peter Moody has never won a Cox Plate – it might be the only incentive he needs.
History repeating?
While on the subject of Melbourne Racing Club, which governs Caulfield Racecourse, casual observers could be forgiven for thinking that its recent history is being tweaked, if not rewritten.
The club’s board and leadership – which put on a cracking Caulfield Guineas day, it has to be said – are continually spouting their achievements from across the past 12 months.
A quick flick through the club’s annual report shows their boasting to include: saving Sandown Racecourse from development, introducing cheap food and drinks, which includes $8.50 schooners of beer, scrapping plans to spend a motza on a new grandstand and rescuing the mounting yard.
But The Age annals show the same things were being celebrated in last year’s annual report, under former chairman John Kanga’s watch.
The Age reported in February 2025 that the MRC had written off a new $60 million mounting yard – and reverted to the old one – to keep its members happy.
The Age reported in January 2025 that Carlton Draught-swilling, Four’N’Twenty pie-munching members were thrilled with the club’s “Buck The Cost” initiative that cut food and drink prices.
The club also alludes to inheriting a financial basket case from the previous committee, but conveniently overlooks that their inheritance included 15 poker machine venues that rake in almost $50 million a year. The club now has 17 gaming operations.
Hopefully next year, we are hearing about some fresh innovations.
Catch Maher if you can
Champion horseman Ciaron Maher seems to be borrowing from the Pride Of Jenni playbook, and the spectacle of racing is all the better for it.
Twice now in consecutive weeks, Maher longshots have turned group 1 middle distance events into appealing catch-me-if-you can stamina tests, setting scorching speeds from the front.
Light Infantry Man ($26) beat everyone bar Cosmic Crusader in the Turnbull Stakes at Flemington on October 4 after skipping away to a handy lead, while 70-1 outsider Land Legend caused the upset of the spring in the Might And Power at Caulfield on Saturday.
Winning his first race in two years – no wonder he was missed by punters – Land Legend did the unthinkable by holding off odds-on favourite Sheza Alibi.
It might not be a coincidence that both gallopers were ridden by rising star Ethan Brown.
“He’s half mad,” Brown said of Land Legend’s unexpected feat. “I knew he would keep running. Whether he had the stamina to keep doing it after rolling at a pretty solid gallop, I wasn’t sure … but you can never doubt Ciaron Maher.”
You can never doubt Ciaron Maher, indeed. Nor Pride Of Jenni, who is also running in Sydney next week.
Until the spring of 2023, we had not seen a leader regularly break a field apart since the legendary Vo Rogue. But maybe Pride Of Jenni has taught Maher a thing or two.
Remember the name
By the way, Brown can no longer be classed as an emerging star. He has well and truly arrived.
He has ridden two group 1 winners across the past three weeks – Jimmysstar and Land Legend – and crashed through double figures earlier this year to notch up a total of 13.
While the 27-year-old still sits a rung below champions James McDonald and Zahra, he deserves to be named in the country’s best.
Not bad for a kid from Alice Springs who did not sit on a horse until he turned 14.
Among the keys to Brown’s success, alongside hard work and skill, has been pairing up with trainer Maher and mega-owner Ozzie Kheir, who races horses in blue silks with pale yellow dots.
The trio is a massive chance to take out this Saturday’s Caulfield Cup with Irish import Zahrann, which will carry 53kg.
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