But is there still value in a Harriet Harman bet?

If punters have got this right then the Education secretary, Alan Johnson, looks pretty certain to pick up the Labour deputy leader crown when the results are announced this weekend. Our chart, showing prices reflected as implied probabilities, indicates the big swing that there’s been in the past few days.

But surprisingly betting has been very light. Only £74,000 has been matched on the Betfair market reflecting the lack of interest in the election amongst punters and the lack of media coverage. The next Labour leader market, by comparison, has seen more than £1.8m in matched trades on the betting exchange alone.

The complex electoral system might still spring a surprise especially if this gets down to third and fourth preferences. I’ve got a feeling that the value bet is Gordon’s choice, Harriet Harman, who is now at 6.8/1

All the polls showed she was getting good support from women party members and trade unionists and she’ll surely pick up a large part of the Hazel Blears support. My guess is that a large proportion of voters in each of the electoral colleges will have her in their top three in order to show gender balance.

Turnout is likely to have been very low and we might get indications of that during the day. If it is then that might help Cruddas whose supporters were much more motivated to vote than those of the other candidates. What polling there has been took place before the Newsnight debate when he came out well.

Whatever all the attention over the weekend is going to be on Gordon. The deputy race will just be a footnote.

Mike Smithson