Having made one of the most unlikely of escapes from relegation last season, Leicester – who earned a 3-1 win at 2014 champions Manchester City last Saturday - are currently five points clear at the top of the Premier League with 13 games left to play.  Another sound result in Sunday’s fixture at Arsenal and even more observers are likely to come in behind the prediction made this week by five of the eight tasked football experts of The Guardian – namely that Leicester are going to win the League.

Of course some people -Leicester people - have already put their money where their mouth is on that question. Which is why, according to bookmakers William Hill, at least 12 supporters now stand to win very large amounts of money for relatively small bets made before season 2015-2016 got underway…

At the start of the season, the odds on Leicester – 14th in 2015 after a miracle recovery from being bottom at Christmas – overhauling the likes of Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester City and United to win the Premier League title were 5,000-1.

Those, as BBC Sport vouchsafed, were the same odds as you could get for Elvis Presley, the Yeti or the Loch Ness Monster being proved to be alive.

Now Leicester are joint 2-1 favourites with Arsenal to lift the title, and fans who loyally backed them, such as 38-year-old carpenter Leigh Herbert, stand to win big.

Herbert, who first watched Leicester aged 10 and ventured £5 on his Foxy intuition, now stands to win £25,000. He has already declined an offer from the bookies to cash in his bet for a guaranteed £3,200, explaining: "If I'd have spent £5 trying to find as much excitement, I couldn't have got it. I'm trying not to think about missing out on the money. To have them finish in the top four would be out of this world.”

William Hill say their biggest pay-out would be to a customer from Guildford who placed £75 each way at 1,500-1 and could collect £140,775.

Meanwhile another Leicester fan, John Pryke, stands to win £100,000 from a £20 bet. He has revealed that his inspiration for the punt came from the shock victory earned by Greece in the 2004 European Championships, where they defeated the host country Portugal - Cristiano Ronaldo included - in the final.

 “The odds were so good, I just thought: ‘Well, that’s not bad – I fancy that’ so I had a bet on them.

“I remember when Greece won the European Championships in 2004, as late entrants. No-one fancied them. They were 500/1 to win it and I remember my son, Christopher, said to me: ‘They’ll win it, dad,’ and I laughed at him.

“Lo and behold, they did. I didn’t want to miss out like that again.”

Maybe dad should have remembered how those other latecomers to the European Championship ball, Denmark, had disposed of the defending champions Netherlands and World Cup holders Germany to win the title in 1992, having taken the place of war-torn Yugoslavia just 10 days before the tournament started.

The odds on Greece back in 2004 were 150-1. Presumably some of their fans came away from the tournament not just happy but wealthy. But that hardly holds up against 5000-1…

What have been the comparable bets to the ones made by the likes of Leicester City’s faithful last year?

Well, in 2010, an “unnamed punter” – actually I bet he did have a name – won £5,000 after putting a £5 wager on Mali to draw with the African Cup of Nations hosts Angola, who were 4-0 up at the time with just 11 minutes remaining. Mali drew 4-4.

Odds 1,000-1. So, close - but no cigar.

When you hear about some winning bets, particularly in the sporting realm, the reaction - as far as any right-minded personage is concerned - has to be one of delight.

I have not forgotten the sense of wonder I experienced while attending a wedding on FA Cup final day in 1988, when it became gradually clear to me – from snatches of radio commentary and post-match anecdotal evidence – that my first serious bet on any sporting event, save for the inevitable office sweep on the Grand National, where the judgmental element resided in which screwed-up piece of paper one should choose from the hat, had come miraculously good.

I swear, when I went into the bookies to put a bet on the forthcoming Wembley tourney between Wimbledon (who!?) and Liverpool, it was with an open mind. But a moment’s reflection led me to the belief that it would be pointless putting money on the side that was bound to win, so I opted for Wimbledon. And after noticing that there was an option to go for a scorer, I set my mind to recent Cup finals which had produced unlikely heroes.

Such as Bobby Stokes, whose goal won the Cup for Southampton against Manchester United in 1976, and Roger Osborne, who scored the only goal of the 1978 final against Arsenal to earn Ipswich Town the honours (the shock of which caused him to require smelling salts and immediate substitution, bless his cotton socks).

Lawrie Sanchez. He was the sort of unheralded midfield toiler who might make the vital difference for Wimbledon on the big day. I wanted to bet on him scoring the only goal, but could only do so for him as the first scorer.

Well we all know what happened. 1-0 to Wimbledon, scorer Sanchez. Having laid down a lordly fiver, at odds I cannot recall, I won well over £100. Betting? Easy!

After similar internal urgings in support of the idea that my team, West Ham, would defeat Norwich City in the semi-final of the following season’s Football League Cup, my sense of having “the knack” disappeared under a 5-0 aggregate defeat. So much for “the knack” – a timely lesson, I now realise.

We digress. Let’s return to those odds.

We can talk about the odds given to Liverpool and Xabi Alonso fan Adrian Hayward when he bet £200 his idol would score a goal from his own half during the 2005-2006 season. When Alonso did so during the FA Cup replay at Luton Town, yer man won £25,000 at 125-1.

We can talk about Rory McIlroy’s dad and his friends putting up £200 on the boy to win the Open before he was 25. Result -– about £100,000 for Dad and co (plus $1 million for the boy) at odds of 500-1.

But to get beyond the Leicester/Elvis/Yeti/Loch Ness Monster odds we have to talk about Swedish bookmakers Betsson giving 175,000-1 odds that Uruguay’s Luis Suarez would bite someone during FIFA World Cup.  Luckily for Betsson, the biggest winner only bet $18, winning $3,300.

And beyond that, we need to mention Mick Gibbs, whose 30p stake on a 15-event accumulator was completed when Bayern Munich won the 2013 Champions League. He had already correctly predicted the champions of top five English leagues and three lower Socttish divisions as well as backing Leicester to win the Rugby Union Premiership and Surrey to win County Cricket Championship. His record-breaking odds were 1,666,666-1…

OK. Those odds are now a world away from those quoted for Leicester City as they close on what would be the most extraordinary, astonishing achievement in their history – a healing balm for those FA Cup final defeats to the two Manchester teams in 1963 and 1969.

Richie – what would you care about the odds?  Figures and stuff and nonsense. You would simply embrace the miraculous…