Waterhouse was doubly miffed. He had just tried to lay a bet to win $500,000 on the German outsider Ibicenco at the wonderfully generous price of 101-1. He had been told he would be limited to $100,000 on that, too, and, anyway, he ought to remember the matter had been agreed during discussions the day before. Ibicenco was the surprise of the day, with the odds tumbling to 61-1 after being backed for a total of $500,000 to win. ''It's very upsetting,'' Waterhouse said later. He had thought he could get 8-1 on his mother's horse and $1 million here, $500,000 there, he felt, was perfectly reasonable. He was not so upset, mind, that he wouldn't flash those famously perfect teeth of his for the cameras of a stream of ladies of a certain age who kept interrupting to tell him they loved and adored him. Waterhouse was one of 1335 punters, chancers, captains of industry and lovers of horseflesh who attended Monday's Melbourne Cup Call of the Card at Crown casino's Palladium - a sort of Brownlow for the racing crowd with less glamour and muscle.

Waterhouse has, in previous years, been one of the bookies up on stage and he has been known to happily accept wagers of $1 million or so. Now he's registered only in the Northern Territory and thus was reduced to a seat in the crowd. Was he trying to lay off bets he had taken elsewhere and was he just sore because he couldn't compete for all those dollars punters were tossing around? ''No, I just wanted to have a punt myself,'' he said. ''I thought they'd bet big here today but they just wouldn't. It's very upsetting.'' Eskander wouldn't be drawn on whether he thought Waterhouse was trying it on because he wasn't up on stage any more. ''Betstar tries to service the punter and I wanted to preserve the price for the punters,'' he said. ''I didn't want to rob the punters.'' Fiorente attracted the biggest money and the lowest odds, with another punter backing him for $50,000 at $7.50 and yet another wanting the opportunity to win $400,000 but finding himself limited, like Waterhouse, to $100,000.

French mare Verema, owned by the Aga Khan, found herself well-fancied when bookies WinBet and Sure Bet set her at 15-1 and BetStar had her at 14-1. She attracted straight out wagers of up to $1000, an each-way bet of $7500 and one ''to win'' chance of $100,000. An earlier favourite of punters and commentators, Mount Athos, found limited interest among the crowd at the Palladium. While the bookies set him at 11-1, the only significant wager was written on behalf of big-time bookmaker Sean Bartholomew ''to win'' $200,000. There were, of course, about 1300 different opinions in the room about who might win the Melbourne Cup. Among the more esoteric was the view of jockey Corey Brown, who will ride Super Cool. He was, he said, so confident he wouldn't swap the horse for any other ride. Super Cool, he pointed out, was horse No. 13, it had drawn barrier 13 and, of course, it was competing in the Cup of 2013.

Loading In a sport and industry notorious for superstition and special signs and a race historically difficult to pick, it seemed as reliable a guide as any. ''Yes,'' said a punter down the back. ''It'll probably come in 13th.''