YouTube views favour Sam to be X Factor threat
Published:Sharon Osborne has never previously mentored the winner of the X Factor, but the page views on YouTube from the first week of performances of the current season suggest she has perhaps her best ever chance with Sam Bailey.
Looking at the views from the YouTube channel of The X Factor UK, Sam’s rendition of The Power Of Love by Jennifer Rush has been watched over 400,000 times.
Not only is this the most views of the 12 acts to perform on the first live show, but it is more than double the number of the next most-viewed contestant, with Rough Copy just creeping beyond the 150,000 mark.
A lot can change in terms of popularity between week one and the end of the series, as Janet Devlin and Ella Henderson have discovered in recent years, but the X Factor odds of a Sam victory at 9/2 are certainly fair.
If nothing else, this price could offer a slight profit from an each-way perspective, with Ladbrokes paying 1/4 of the odds on the final three on the X Factor.
Sharon was a judge previously on the first four series of the X Factor and in the initial three of these, at least one of her acts remained in the competition in the final three, with Andy Abraham her best result in 2005 when a close runner-up to Shayne Ward.
The fact that Andy was also representing the over-25 category could prove good news for Sam.
The one exception where Sharon failed to have a top-three finalist was in series four, but Emily Nakanda was expected to reach the latter stages of the competition, until being reportedly ask to leave the show after a ‘happy slapping’ incident.
For those preferring to play it safe from a betting angle, it is 1/20 that Sam is Sharon’s last remaining act in the over-25 category.
All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.
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