Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss: Steve Jones strikes again

2023-12-31

Eleven years have passed since Probets joined the Besttipping Challenge and, for much of that time, it’s been a case of playing support to fellow Steve Jones service, Daily Bargain. But, at last, Probets has stepped out of the shadows to claim the 2023 title.

Last year Probets had the title in the bag, only for that bag to explode in disastrous fashion during the autumn. This year, happily, there was no repeat as Probets outscored Daily Bargain in August, September, October, and November.  This meant that entering December, Probets had an 82-point advantage over Daily Bargain, which allowed a considerable margin of error.

This was just as well as Daily Bargain hit back strongly in, posting five winners to reduce the deficit to a more palatable sixty-one points as Probets struggled to maintain the fine form that had been with them for most of the year.

Fittingly, the year ended on a winning note for Probets with Tyrrhenian Sea obliging at Lingfield (7/2, 31 December).

Overall, Probets were worthy champions. Ten profitable months, just one shy of the Besttipping record, and eight monthly top spots took the overall profit for the year to 74.6 points, a personal best, bettering 2018’s 61.9-point return. Probets strike-rate was a commanding 30%. There were a few significant losing sequences, but when the winners came prices averaged 7/2 which cleared any losses.

No single month yielded a huge return (June’s 18.2 points was the best), but the steady accumulation of profits proved decisive.

Given Daily Bargain’s fine record, it wasn’t until October that the penny began to drop. This wasn’t going to be a seventh title-winning year. Perhaps the most telling feature of Daily Bargain’s year was an appalling strike-rate of just 11%. In the past, Daily Bargain had regularly found one winner in five, a remarkable achievement given the that prices were frequently 10/1 and upwards.

But 2023 was painful. It wasn’t until May that Daily Bargain hit form with a 10-point yield; two months later a return of 27.5 points – the single biggest yield of the year – briefly brought the contest alive, but from that point on, Daily Bargain had no answer to Probets steady progress.

At least the year ended with a profit for Daily Bargain – the thirteenth year of profit out of sixteen, which represents a huge triumph.

For the two Personal Info services, Mainline and Saturday-Only, 2023 promised much; Both PI services were within striking distance in the spring, but for the second half of the year tips became irregular, and the results less impressive. By November, PI was no more.

So. Congratulations for Steve Jones who claimed Besttipping honours for the fifth year in a row and best wishes for the New Year to all followers of Besttipping.