Untitled

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume IV, Issue 202, 7 June 1894, Page 4

A weiter in the New Review recently devoted himself to the subject of racing prophets, and endeavoured to expose the folly 'of placing any reliance upon the forecasts of those newspaper writers whose calling forces them to select winners for their readers. But he did not make out a very good case for his argu-

ment. The writer is a reverend gentleman, the Rev. 8.. W. Horsley, and he takes a week of English racing and tries to show that because certain writers were only correct in their tips from 11 to 13 times out of 33 attempts anyone who followed the advice tendered would have lost money. But that does not necessarily follow. A man may make a regular investment of a sovereign on each of a sporting writer’s tips, and although he makes five losses to one win he may not lose. In England 10 to lis a common price about a winner, so even 10 winning tips out of 33 attempts is no handle to use against the racing prophet. We do not say that certain money can be made by backing newspaper tips, but it is certain that a good judge of form, who has to constantly attend race meetings, can give his readers much useful information and many good hints It is a help to find that your own opinion about a certain, race is backed up by the expression of a man who has to continually visit racecourses and whose living is gained by constant study of racehorses. A sporting tipster cannot argue infallibility for himself, but he can argue that the horse or horses he names will be handy at' the finish. Of course it is a very difficult thing to place the horses 1,2, 3, as is the custom with sporting writers, and readers must be left to gather that in trying to place the order of the finish the writer merely names the three horses that he considers to have the greatest chance of scoring. Taking them as a class, and considering their successes during the year, we think there is justification for the existence of the sporting tipsters, and the backer would, we think, be sorry to see them, disappear from sporting journals.