18.5 ‘BALLY’ BIG BETDAQ ODDS FOR DAQMAN IN THE BECHER: Daqman rates the very bottomweight Ballyvesey at 18.5 for the Becher Chase this morning on Betdaq and reckons West End Rocker equally good value at 14.5.
HE FOUND FINGAL BAY: Who else knew? Daqman named Fingal Bay as a horse for the season way before the Racing Post Ten To Follow failed to put it in the list! Daqman has gone banker or nap on Fingal Bay (WON 4-5) every time the horse has run.
1.55 Sandown (Henry V111 Novices Chase) The race’s best find in recent years was Fondmort (2001), though Marodima won eight more races, Fair Along five and Impek four, and the 2009 winner, Somersby, has gone on to place eight times out of nine in good company.
Backed up by his Champion Bumper second and Supreme Novices success, Al Ferof can step up into this company of stars by taking this after an impressive chase launch at Cheltenham.
2.10 Aintree (Becher Chase) The winner of this race has gone on to win (two) or be second in the Grand National three times in the last decade.
Four out of six Becher Chase winners had already won at 3m 4f plus, and two of the last four had experience of the Grand National fences.
Hello Bud, winner last year when fresh, has had a run back this time. He’ll be 14 years old in less than a month but still loves the jumping game if short on finish.
So it was that victory cost Sam Twiston-Davies a five-day ban in 2010 and we don’t want to see another Ballabriggs affair now the whip row has settled down. Swing Bill is another whose only success at 3m-plus cost his rider a whips ban.
Former Irish National winner Niche Market was fifth in the Ballabriggs National. It’s 31 months since he won a race and he’s never scored on ground worse than good to soft. However, he will have been prepped for this by a yard which has won it three years in the last six.
Always Waining loves Aintree, too, but prefers the 22f of the Topham in April (form figures 411). Blinkers first time won Rare Bob the Leopardstown Chase; he’s placed in a John Smith’s at Aintree but is high in the handicap.
The ground could come right for West End Rocker, the 3m 5f Warwick winner; you have to make excuses for him since that success, though he was travelling strongly in the Grand National when brought down and goes best when fresh, so is massive at 14.5 on Betdaq.
Ballyvesey (18.0 as I write) was well wrong in the weights in this last year but was leading three out and another year on the back of this young horse could bring enough improvement. He’s won only on good ground but it was soft for this last season. Rain or not, he won’t mind, then.
2.30 Sandown Just when we thought it was safe to say ‘nothing wins this with 11st or more’, Nicky Henderson took the last running with Tasheba (11st 12lb).
But that was a special event: it was run in a bog and Tasheba has never won another race. Incidentally, Tasheba was four, as have been four of the last seven winners.
Henderson is claiming off both Rajdhani Express and Gibb River, which brings them closer to Edgardo Sol, the stylish Cheltenham handicap winner (it cost him 12lb though).
Mister No (18.0 this morning on Betdaq) ‘could be anything’; Enfant De Lune impressed at Sandown over further but needs plenty of aids (cheekpieces, tongue-tie).
The handicapping question of the race is whether, after a lack-lustre first run back, Tenor Nivernais (offered at 11.0) can run up to the form of his length-and-a-bit third when Via Galillei was second at Taunton in the Spring: he is in here 12lb better with that one.
‘Tenor’ was a running on late in the Fred Winter at Cheltenham and I shall take two outsiders against the favourite, whose odds are big enough for a small stakes saver on my gambles.
3.05 Sandown (Tingle Creek Chase) Household names like Twist Magic, Master Minded, Kauto Star and Moscow Flyer have won this recently, three of those scoring twice. But there must be a new hero this time around.
Only the likes of Desert Orchid and Moscow Flyer have taken this at a late age; winners since its inception in 1979 have been: 10 eight year olds, 9 aged seven; three 6; but three 5-year-olds in the last six years, following the trend to younger and younger chasing stars.
So, if anything is to beat Queen Mother winner, Sizing Europe, then you’d expect it to be Wishfull Thinking – he is 8 – or Kauto Stone (5).
We simply don’t know how good the ‘new Kauto’ is but taking less than 3-1 to find out is not my idea of a bet.
Wishfull Thinking fluffed his lines first time back but I can see him being made a lot of use of here by Richard Johnson and he might just take the sting out of Sizing Europe, whose stamina is suspect.
Philip Hobbs is on record as saying that this beast needed ‘a blow out’ last time – he gets ‘thick in the wind’ – so they could find him a big handful today.
3.20 Aintree (Grand Sefton) No winner has carried more than 11st 5lb in its recent history; the last four have been a double-figure SP. They tend to go pell mell and treat this race like a hurdles event.
Frankie Figg did it last year, racing away from the second fence and not seeing another horse. There’s no reason we know of why runner-up Nikola should get any closer and Buffalo Bob looks short for what he’s done.
Nikola is unlikely to beat Grand National pacesetter Santa’s Son on recent form. Linnel off a featherweight has never won under Rules but is a big beast who bowls over his fences.
Fine Parchment has jumped well here in the past. Stewarts House has the form to win it but not at Aintree; this is his first visit to the course. Linnel each way at 8.4 seems to be the bet, if the stats are to be upheld.
DAQMAN’S BETS
BANKER: BET 20pts win AL FEROF (1.55 Sandown)
WIN-40 JACKPOT: BET 2.9pts win WEST END ROCKER and 2.3pts win BALLYVESEY (2.10 Aintree)
BET (to win 20pts): 2pts win TENOR NIVERNAIS and 1.1pts win and place MISTER NO, plus 1.2pts win (stakes saver) EDGARDO SOL (2.30 Sandown)
BET 6.7pts win WISHFULL THINKING (3.05 Sandown)
BET 2.7pts win and place LINNEL (3.20 Aintree)
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