Novice Punter Stakes £1 on 10-fold acca and Wins £170k at Odds of 169,923/1

Cambridge Punter Wins 270k on 10 fold acca at William Hill

William Hill were no doubt scratching their heads as they tried to figure out how a 33 year old from Cambridge, someone who had only signed up to their sportsbook a week before.

The unnamed punter was new to betting, and planned to use accas in a similar way to playing the lottery, by spending a few pounds each week and crossing his fingers, but he defied all the odds and actually won.

He almost didn’t though; it took a 101st minute goal from Leyton Orient winger Dean Cox to save the acca from destruction, not that the punter would have known as he wasn’t even following what was going on in the games he had bet on. He spent his afternoon at the park with his family.

The 10-fold acca was placed for just £1, and included the following fixtures, with those in bold backed to win:

  • Bristol City 1-3 Sheffield United (23/10)
  • Chesterfield 2-3 Leyton Orient – (5/2)
  • Crawley 5-1 Barnsley – (21/10)
  • Crewe 2-0 Fleetwood – (21/10)
  • Doncaster 3-0 Yeovil – (Evens)
  • Gillingham 4-2 MK Dons – (7/2)
  • Oldham 0-1 Colchester – (7/2)
  • Peterborough 2-1 Rochdale – (7/5)
  • Scunthorpe 3-1 Swindon – (11/4)
  • Walsall 0-1 Port Vale – (16/5)

You can see the odds for the winning team in brackets.

It was only the 8th bet the man had ever made, and a representative of William Hill confirmed that the odds of 169,923/1 were the second highest they have ever paid out.

Cambridge is full of academic types what with it being one of the most famous university towns in the world, so obviously, a local mathematics professor had his say on the matter:

“If you placed such a bet every day, you would expect to win once in almost 500 years. This is an event of a half-millennium.”

The lucky winner – and let’s face it, this one was totally a case of luck over judgement – said he and his wife planned to put a large chunk of the money away for their 5 month old son’s future, and would use the rest to buy a house.

Let’s hope he stopped betting and that none of that money went back into the bookmaker’s pockets.