Bella blue - Gill’s Everest captain’s call sets the scene for new Tabcorp

When the contract for Bella Nipotina to represent TAB in this year’s The Everest came across Gillon McLachlan’s desk, the deal was all but signed, sealed and delivered.

*Gillon McLachlan celebrating Bella Nipotina's win in The Everest.* *(Photo by Jeremy Ng/Getty Images)*

But some terms and conditions in the agreement between the owners of the Group 1-winning mare and Tabcorp caused the new managing director and chief executive to raise an eyebrow.

“We require change” McLachlan stated very early in his tenure and The Everest, and the way TAB’s slot was managed for the $20 million race, was a way for the new chief to stamp his authority.

With a $1.36 billion annual loss last financial year, there was no room for complacency or unnecessary risk and every dollar was being counted, even more so when $700,000, the cost of TAB’s Everest slot, was at stake.

McLachlan, who had been in the chair only a matter of weeks as the permanent replacement for the ousted Adam Rytenskild, ordered his executive team back to the negotiating table with the owners of the Ciaron Maher-trained mare.

McLachlan wanted to offset as much of Tabcorp’s $700,000 investment in the slot as possible.

There would be no splitting of the $700,000 prize money between Tabcorp and the owners, the amount they would win if Bella Nipotina finished seventh to 12th (excluding the 10 per cent and 5 per cent the trainer and jockey are entitled to respectively).

A prudent McLachlan wanted greater importance placed on performance, so if it all went awry for Bella Nipotina, and she didn’t run up to expectations, the TAB would not be significantly disadvantaged.

To compensate for the owners’ giving up their share of the seventh to 12th prize money, believed to be about $200,000, they were entitled to a bigger percentage of the prize money if she ran in the placings under the performance-based deal.

Of course, Bella Nipotina - in career-best form as a seven-year-old mare - would go on to win this year’s Everest and connections, including Tabcorp, pocketing $7 million.

There’s also The Everest trophy that’s worth $549,000 that will rest on someone’s mantlepiece (that’s a story in itself).

How exactly the huge sum of money was divided up isn’t clear, but The Straight has been told by multiple sources that the contract between the owners of Bella Nipotina and Tabcorp was renegotiated just prior to the public announcement on September 17.

The Straight understands that the new terms proved much more favourable to Bella Nipotina’s owners than to Tabcorp.

While the victory was still a significant one for McLachlan early in his tenure at Tabcorp, and he celebrated accordingly, as it turned out, the deal would have been better, in cash terms, had he left it as it was.

It’s the first time Tabcorp has won The Everest - its best placing being in 2019 when Santa Ana Lane finished runner-up as its slot representative - and McLachlan had a spring in his step just days before addressing shareholders at the company’s annual general meeting.

The new CEO’s demand for the contract to be altered at the last minute to protect the company’s bottom line was understandable. Arguably, it was surprising that such a performance clause wasn’t there in the first place.

Those clauses are a major consideration for the majority of the 12 slot holders when opening negotiations with the owners of prospective sprinters.

And it’s not just the strategy around The Everest which signals a change in approach by Tabcorp with McLachlan at the helm.

The former AFL chief executive, who was appointed in June to the role vacated by Rytenskild in March, has swung the axe, stripping internal and external costs from the business and either ending or altering legacy media partnerships.

One of McLachlan’s early moves was axing TAB’s sponsorship of newspaper form guides, such as News Limited’s Herald Sun in Victoria (Entain’s Ladbrokes has since taken it on).

A deal for Tabcorp to be Victoria’s racing radio station RSN’s exclusive wagering partner was also not renewed while redundancies have taken place at Tabcorp’s media arm, Sky Racing and Sky Sports Radio.

Paul Carew, Tabcorp’s chief operating officer since 2022, is also set to leave the company, having secured a job elsewhere.

McLachlan also publicly stated that the TAB25 strategy that was being implemented under Rytenskild wasn’t fit for purpose, declaring that the company needed a reset as it attempted to reclaim market share it had lost to corporate bookmakers such as Sportsbet.

Bella Nipotina, meanwhile, took her earnings beyond a staggering $20 million by adding last week’s $3 million Russell Balding at Rosehill to her record and she is an acceptor for this Saturday’s Group 1 Champions Sprint at Flemington.

With Craig Williams maintaining his association with the mare, Bella Nipotina is $4.40 favourite to win the $3 million Flemington straight six race. .