NEWCASTLE NAP IS A STAND-OUT: Daqman checks through the card at Sandown today but finds some closely-matched and needs BETDAQ value to stay on the right side. But at Newcastle later in the day he reckons on two stand-outs, including the nap.
BIG-RACE SATURDAY DOUBLE: Check out Daqman’s Tuesday-Wednesday previews for tomorrow’s Tingle Creek and Becher chases, and look out for his verdict tomorrow.
THE ANSWER, MY FRIEND, IS 16.0 DYLAN
⭕ 12.40 Sandown Valsheda gets a good word from Seven Barrows as a strong sort sure to improve but the stable hasn’t won this since Nico De Boinville was an amateur 10 years ago.
Valsheda’s partner, William Biddick, rode a Paul Nicholls favourite to victory in 2016 but every other pilot in this field can claim 7lb against him.
Rolling Dylan is not normally reliable but he is at Sandown: he was 2-2 on the Esher track in the early Spring this year. Le Breuil scored either side of the summer break.
But three of the last five winners were aged 12 and 13, and gambled-on Step Back is 16lb lower than when winning over the CD at Sandown two years ago.
Step Back and today’s jockey, Lily Bradstock, led until three out in the Sandown Gold Cup in April, a race in which he’d previously finished first and third. I’ll take the two Sandown specialists against the odds-on favourite.
BETDAQ value: 5.9 Step Back, 16 Rolling Dylan
ANOTHER WALK-OVER BY MILAN BRIDGE
⭕ 1.45 Sandown Lazy mare! Fable doesn’t do a tap at home and hasn’t been out since a mares’ chase at this meeting a year back.
Three wins out of four over hurdles, Milan Bridge walked over when put to fences at the recent Ascot meeting when there were so many withdrawals because of the ground.
The one with the experience is Gloire d’Athon, who won back-to-back at Huntingdon and Worcester, one on summer ground the other softened well into autumn.
⭕ 2.20 Sandown These novice hurdlers were all in the frame the last day and all won one of their last two completed starts.
Maximilian has done everything asked of him, winning an Irish Point, two bumpers at Carlisle and hurdles stepped up in trip at Carlisle (2m 4f) and Bangor (2m 7f).
A confident Don McCain sends the six-year-old and his jockey Brian Hughes down from ‘Chommly’ but there’s not much difference in the offers between Maximilian and Henri The Second.
And Man A Work seemed to have plenty in hand at Aintree and makes up a particularly crowded front of the market.
TO HE WHO DARES ROCK THE BOAT..
⭕ 2.55 Sandown Gary Moore has won this twice in seven seasons, including in 2020 with Darebin, who went down narrowly bidding for a repeat last year.
Darebin is rated 10lb lower now for a yard which has had a quite sensational run in the last 14 days, with ‘results’ for stable stars Goshen and Botox Has plus new kid on the block, Black Cherry.
Corrigeen Rock seldom runs two races alike and has fallen once over hurdles and once in his two chases but he is suited to the track and Lucinda Russell has faith enough to bring him down from Kinross before she goes to Aintree on Saturday with Ahoy Senor.
The first, and only other, time Corrigeen Rock traveled South was when runner-up, giving away weight, here at Sandown, trying to make all and very nearly doing so.
Heartbreak Kid needs to improve to carry top-weight here after eight months off, and the grey Rose Sea Has finds it a struggle to cope with a few pounds extra since scoring back to back in the Spring.
Betdaq Betting Exchange 3.25 Corrigeen Rock, 5.3 Darebin
CLASSY RAYMOND TUSK UP TO THE TASK
⭕ 3.30 Sandown Alan King let me down yesterday with Midnight Glance; well, I think it might have been Midnight Glance emerging from the fog in second after the last!
Visibility was desperate at Wincanton and, after tipping another second with Lime Avenue, I felt my horses were following the leader as a marker to find their way home!
But, unless there was something wrong with the clock for the mares’ novice hurdle, you can follow the winner, Annie Magic, and indeed Lime Avenue.
Races were run up to 20 seconds slow, except that one, 19 seconds fast! For sure, Annie was magic, making virtually all and skipping over the hurdles.
Alan King saddles Raymond Tusk in this novice hurdle for the lucky last. Group placed on the Flat, he could be a stone and a half underrated over hurdles.
Hugos New Horse can’t be ignored, as a half-brother to Black Corton (winner of three Graded chases for Paul Nicholls). Paul reckons Hugo has run well while still very green and ‘has a future’.
BETDAQ value 3.7 Hugo’s New Horse, 4.6 Raymond Tusk
TWO LESSONS IN THE ART OF TRAINING
⭕ 4.45 Newcastle A couple of class-2 Tapeta tests over 7f, starting with this handicap and a standout raider from William Haggas’ Newmarket yard, following on his Wednesday double.
He scored cross-Channel between the Polytracks of Deauville and Lingfield Park.
Spirit Of Nguru drops back in trip and returns to a man-made surface, on which he landed 2-2 at this time last year. Still a three-year-old for another 28 days, he gets 13lb from Documenting, who will be 10 then.
Raatea is a once-a-year winner who had his day here in June over 6f, and First Folio’s three wins have all come on grass at York.
⭕ 5.45 Newcastle This is a conditions race, in which the ratings have Logo Hunter on 110 and Art Power 109, if his 5lb Group-3 penalty counts for the exact amount against him.
Art Power made all on this surface when he won here as a novice, his prep run before scoring over 5f again at the royal meeting at Ascot and at Naas, which was the first of his three Group-3 strikes.
Logo Hunter has been beaten, second three times running, on the Dundalk AW surface since breaking his maiden there in March last year, including defeat in a Group 3, so the strong-traveling Art Power may yet have something in hand.
BETDAQ value 4.5 Spirit Of Nguru and 3.45 Art Power
DAQMAN’S BETS
12.40 Sandown (each staked to win 20)
BET 4pts win STEP BACK
BET 1.25pts win ROLLING DYLAN
2.55 Sandown (each staked to win 10)
BET 4pts win CORRIGEEN ROCK
BET 2.5pts win DAREBIN
3.35 Sandown (each staked to win 10)
BET 4pts win HUGO’S NEW HORSE
BET 2.75pts win RAYMOND TUSK
4.45 Newcastle (win 12)
BET 3.5pts win SPIRIT OF NGURU
5.45 Newcastle (win 20, nap)
BET 8pts win ART POWER
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