Later today, when A Moment Like This by Leona Lewis is officially sworn in as the UK’s Christmas No 1, it will confirm pop’s greatest open secret since you saw Mummy kissing Santa Claus.

It’s not the poor girl’s fault, of course. But these days, the victor in the unstoppable marketing juggernaut that is The X Factor is party to a conspiracy that has stifled one of the most enjoyable traditions in the music calendar. Anybody who does not know that the glutinous ballad is about to become this year’s festive chart-topper by a gigantic margin must surely be out of their Christmas tree.

Even by the middle of the sales week that ended last night, and even as a rush-release that didn’t physically arrive in stores until Wednesday, A Moment Like This was so far ahead of the outgoing bestseller that it was as attractive as watching an old boxer having his brains pummelled to blancmange by a teenage fighter on steroids. Not only was the song outselling Take That’s Patience, No 1 for the past five weeks, by a margin of about 10 to one, its sales exceeded those of every other song in the Top 20 combined.

Fair play, you might think, the television audience has voted with its wallet. On the other hand, if any other release in the yuletide market was bequeathed the recurring publicity of 10m viewers per week and every other attendant media outlet, we might see something that we haven’t had for a while: a level playing field.

Talent shows are car-crash television in the audition stages and pure soap by the finals, with music listed somewhere among the bit parts. We shouldn’t be quite so snobbish as to pretend that no good can come of them, or that talent can never be discovered. With attentive A&Ring, the former Pop Idol Will Young is sustaining a credible career five years later, and the Fame Academy loser Lemar has developed into a good soul singer.

Retailers will tell you that they’re delighted for any pop phenomenon that generates footfall, and that when the infrequent record-buyer pops in to pick up the X Factor single, there’s every chance they will stay long enough to add a few CDs and DVDs to their shopping basket. But to argue that Simon Cowell and co’s ruthless co-opting of the Christmas market is just part of the competitive fun is like pretending that the chairman of Sheffield United or Charlton Athletic has the same financial muscle as Roman Abramovich, just because they’re technically in the same league.

Gone, perhaps for ever, are the days when a flutter on the Christmas No 1 was as much a part of our betting habits as the Grand National or the Derby. It’s not in the least bit surprising that the bookmakers who encouraged the practice are now less than enamoured at how their fun is being spoilt. But a custom that, until quite recently, took more than £1m in wagers has been crushed by the wheels of this relentless industry.

According to William Hill’s Graham Sharpe, who as good as invented the festive No 1 wager in the 1970s, all bets are off. “In those days, there was great anticipation and excitement about the record that would hit the all-important top spot at Christmas,” he says. “I’ve been saddened to see how first charity records, then The X Factor, have ruined all that. It’s to the detriment not only of bookmakers — although I wouldn’t expect any sympathy for us — but, I should imagine, of the music business.

“Surely The X Factor would create greater sales if it took place at a different time of year, rather than attaching itself to Christmas when there’s no problem selling records to people who don’t buy at other times?

“From a betting peak of well into seven figures, the market has now been decimated, because everyone knows that the X Factor single will be No 1, and few people are as interested in what will be No 2.” By the time the book closed last Sunday, A Moment Like This was 100-1 on to reach the top, and a piffling £20,000 had been taken in bets.

It’s a long way, and an unrecognisably different market, from the heyday of the single in the 1970s. Everybody made Christmas records, some of them genuinely good fun, and in those days, before records were marketed to death, plenty of now staple yuletide songs never got to No 1. Wizzard’s I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day never even made the Top 3.

It was a year ago to the very week that last year’s X Factor victor, Shayne Ward, was selling an astonishing 742,000 copies in four days of his winning song, and he hasn’t exactly bossed the charts since. I ask if you will still recall his name this time next year.

In the meantime, in the spirit of pop’s more innocent past, a Wombling Merry Christmas.

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