Swing to Fine Gael and Clare Daly

I'm relying on the bookies for a picture the state of play because, think about it, who else would you trust?

James Reilly has conducted a phenomenal campaign according to the bookies. Daly is also looking increasingly likely. Corr still not strong in bookie terms but for a rookie I'd be happy with his chances as the Greens traditionally do well on transfers and his odds have been narrowing. FF will probably lose a seat but now there is also a small chance of having no-one returned! It's tight down there and despite people assuming that Kennedy has the seat, Labour and FF are scrapping for it. It will all come down to transfers.

I can't imagine Kennedy being a happy camper at the FF decision to run three candidates and labour must be glad now that they didn't run two despite grumblings at the time. Why did FF run three candidates? Maybe they are grooming O Leary as a spoiler candidate in the north of the constituency to take votes from Sargent whose surpluses will have a big say in the tally. And of course both FF and the Greens have their eye on building profiles for the next election when this will be a five seater. Its a tricky business borrowing on the future though.

Tom Morrissey appears to be collapsing and two new independents are added to the slip ballot. The independents could make a difference to whoever has the most sophisticated block voters, as they now fill up more space between your bottom preferences and your top ones. UPDATE These are NOT independents but Christian Solidarity and Immmigration Control candidates. I withdraw my comments that sophisticated voters could put these candidates in the middle of the ballot. Be careful how you vote if you don't want these guys to think they have a mandate of any sort.

Candidate	previous odds	odds now
Trevor Sargent (Green)		1 - 50
James O'Reilly (FG)	8-13 4-9 2-5	1 - 4
Clare Daly (Soc)	4-6 2-7 1-3	4 - 11
Michael Kennedy (FF)	1-2	8 - 13
Brendan Ryan (Lab)	8-15 8-13 8-11	4 - 5
John O'Leary (FF)	2-3 4-6 evens	6 - 4
Darragh O'Brien (FF)	2-1 3-1	9 - 4
David O'Connor (Ind)		11 - 2
Joe Corr (Green)	8-1 7-1	11 - 2
Tom Morrissey (PD)	4-1 8-1	11 - 1
Matt McCormack (SF)	12-1 14-1	16 - 1
John Donnelly (Ind)		66 - 1
Cathal Loftus (CS)		66 - 1