6-4 NAP WINS ON DAY ONE AT NEWMARKET: Daqman kept his promise yesterday to name at least two winners, and he scored at Newmarket with Intello (nap, WON 6-4) and Garswood (WON 5-2) for 8.50 profit on the day.
TORONADO RATES BANKER BET: He lays into one favourite, and goes all in on another, Toronado, on Craven Stakes day, also following up Henry Cecil’s Nell Gwyn form with a 14.0 outsider from the same stable.
The Guineas and the Derby are on the line today. Toronado (2,000 Guineas) and Ghurair (Derby) are both odds on to win their trials. But their races at Newmarket would be unusual stepping-stones to the Classics.
The link between them is that Ghurair beat Toronado’s stablemate – also a runner today – Havana Gold at the Cambridgeshire meeting last backend.
But the punters job is to decide the safest and most profitable bets available on the day. In this case we know very little about one race and almost everything we need to know about the other.
1.45 Newmarket Previous winners of this have almost all been well backed – only one in the decade in double figures – though just three were outright favourites.
You have very few clues, unless you can read anything into the draw returns from yesterday’s races of double-figure fields: over 6f and 7f, the winners by stall came from 1, 1, 6, 13 and 8; those winning with the pace were the low drawn (that’s where you’d expect the pace to be); those coming from behind did so from the higher stalls. The two most impressive winners – Garswood and Hot Snap – were held up in rear.
Trainers Richard Hannon and Mick Channon usually do well in this, so Our Queenie and Rough Courte. But Dutch Courage from a high stall was favourite this morning, after Richard Fahey said yesterday that she’d been bought by Cheveley Park and he liked her a lot, though will like her more over 6f.
2.20 Newmarket (Wood Ditton Stakes) The market usually has this sorted, with 8 out of 10 winners at 6-1 or shorter SP. Thirteen of the 16 behind last year’s winner went on to take a race of some description, though none was top class.
The Gosden, She’s Late, nudged the Stoute, Mutajally, off the favourite’s perch early doors, with punters expecting a leading yard to win it.
As a Pivotal, She’s Late might not like the drying ground and Mutajally is by Teofilo, who gets first-time winners. Mutajally is Paul Hanagan’s pick of a quartet of Hamdan runners.
As with the first race, I can’t see a reason for having a bet but we have to keep our eyes on the ball, and I shall particularly watch for good runs from Saskatchewan and String Theory, screaming ‘next time’, as both need middle distances.
2.55 Newmarket (Tattersalls Millions) I dissed yesterday’s Tattersalls race as a producer of duds. This one fares no better, its four winners subsequently yielding only two further successes from 28 starts.
Favourites have laid four duck-eggs (0000) in this race; they actually finished 13th, 10th, 5th and 5th yet here we have an odds-on favourite, or at least that’s the way they bet Ghurair this morning as I write.
You have to decide: is John Gosden using this as a rewarding step to the Classics for Ghurair or is this a rung down the ladder, hoping a second-rate but jobsworthy animal can earn a fast buck while other yards are still sleeping?
Either way, Gosden could be the winner. It’s a a funny old start for a Classic career, but Gosden is a trainer who thinks outside the square.
If you asked him what the plan is, he’d say that this is the plan. Every horse of his runs from race to race. But we in the business of winning money from betting don’t have a choice.
Though only 29.0 on BETDAQ for the Derby, Ghurair is a lay this morning. We can afford to watch him run: if he’s a good horse, we’ll get our money back with ease.
From what we know of the race, a field of unknowns, to punter and trainer alike, any one of these can make the big leap forward. There are, in reality, no odds-on shots. We also know that, in the long term, not enough Ghurairs will win today, and we shall come out on top.
3.30 Newmarket (Abernant Stakes) Five of the last six winners had already been placed in the pattern or had run at least twice in a Group 1, so you have to make a fair leap of faith with Tickled Pink, from maiden company straight into Group 3.
But that’s exactly the giant step up the same stable’s Hot Snap made in the Nell Gwyn yesterday, a lesson in how something virtually unfancied, and with little or no hype, can take the big step up at this time of year.
Move in Time has already made giant strides this year, up 16lb in as many racing days, but this is another big step up in class for a handicapper.
The Cheka goes particularly well fresh, while Jimmy Style and Hawkeyethenoo are both CD winners, which counts for a lot on this relentless, open course.
Once again, the bet is written for us: you have a trainer who produces the goods from nowhere like a magician; he does it in the pattern; and he did it yesterday. The 14.0 Tickled Pink is simply far too big.
He’s against experienced sprinters, but they are all, bar Move In Time, first time out and, all bar that one and potentially Angels Will Fall, have little or no scope for improvement, at ages six and seven.
Unless you are a Hawkeyethenoo. He appreciates with age, and so does his trainer, Jim Goldie: he’s been having a fabulous run and his is another bandwagon I am happy to jump on.
4.05 Newmarket (Craven Stakes) The two Hannon winners of this in the last decade produced a flurry in the Guineas betting but neither reached the first three, though both Hurricane Alan (2003) and Trumpet Major (2012) got within four lengths of the winner.
The betting this morning says – at odds on Toronado – that there’s no way Dundonnell (4.7) can reverse their running in the Champagne Stakes last backend.
And, since a third runner, Havana Gold, is also from Team Hannon, and the fourth horse, Tawhid, is from a stable which usually gets going late on the Classic scene, we are left to conclude that Toronado is a banker.
I cannot recall a case where, in such a situation, such a horse of Classic potential was beaten at such a price, since a horse of Dick Hern’s which, if memory serves me right, was called Gorytis and had been got at.
DAQMAN’S BETS
LAY 10pts GHURAIR (2.55 Newmarket)
BET (to win 20pts): 4pts win HAWKEYETHENOO, and 1.5pts win and place TICKLED PINK (3.30 Newmarket)
BANKER: BET 20pts win (nap) TORONADO (4.05 Newmarket)
DAQMAN’S TARGET TODAY: A standard day for stakes. But the market dictates attacking play on Ghurair and Toronado. Difficult to get cover under those circumstances and only 8.5pts to play with from Day One.
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