Take That's reunion album tipped as Christmas No 1

Progress, the band's first album since reuniting with Robbie Williams, was pre-ordered by thousands before going on sale to the public, making it the most in-demand Take That album of all time.

Bookies say the group are heading straight for the top after a sensational live performance on the X Factor results show on Sunday evening. Ladbrokes have labelled the band "unstoppable", slashing the odds for the album reaching Christmas Number One to 2/5. Odds for Take That's latest single, The Flood, climbing to the Christmas top spot were also slashed to 14/1.

The single entered the charts on Sunday at number two, following news it had received twice as many online orders as any other album released this year. It was also pre-ordered more times than any other Take That album, including the 2008 release The Circus, which was the seventh biggest-selling album on Amazon.co.uk.

HMV – which opened its 275 stores early yesterday to meet demand – estimated as many as 150,000 copies of the album could be sold across the UK and Ireland in one day, and predicted it could reach the half a million sales mark by the end of the week. A spokesman said: "Progress has all the makings of one of the biggest and fastest selling albums of recent years."