Party members	YouGov 1st round	Actual 1st round	YG Mili pref	Final votes
ABBOTT, Diane	11	7.3	0	0
BALLS, Ed	9	10.1	0	0
BURNHAM, Andy	10	8.6	0	0
MILIBAND, David	38	44.1	48	54.4
MILIBAND, Ed	31	29.9	52	45.6

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Trade unionists	YouGov 1st round	Actual 1st round	YG Mili pref	Final votes
ABBOTT, Diane	12	12.3	0	0
BALLS, Ed	9	10.2	0	0
BURNHAM, Andy	14	8.5	0	0
MILIBAND, David	29	27.5	43	40.2
MILIBAND, Ed	36	41.5	57	59.8

Did punters nearly get caught with party members?

As one who risked a large amount of cash on the YouGov Labour poll published two weeks ago it comes as something as a shock to compare what actually happened with the polling numbers.

I don’t think I would have been as definite in my call for Ed Miliband on Friday morning if I’d had any hint that the variance from the members polling numbers was as it was. Fortunately for my betting a better EdM performance in the other two segments saw me home.

For the online pollster’s survey seriously undershot on the party members but this was just about balanced by EdM’s performance in the trade union section being better than predicted and his deficit in the MP section not being as large as was being suggested.

The extraordinary performance was by David Miliband amongst members coming out with 44.1% of first preferences. Even though EdM did well picking up lower preferences the final split in this section saw DaveM 6.8 points ahead. YouGov had this as a 4 point deficit.

The MP/MEP section was based on public preferences compiled by the LeftFootForward website. This had DaveM with a 12 point lead in the final run-off. As it turned it the margin was just over half that at 6.8%. This was completely in line with the predictions coming out of the EdM campaign in the final week.

So a lot of lessons for leadership punters and poll watchers.

Mike Smithson