GOING FORECAST: WATCH THE BETDAQ MARKET: Heavy ground which spoiled form chances at Goodwood yesterday will make Perth ‘attritional’ today. Gowran Park and Pontefract will also be ‘soft’ but Newmarket hopes to get away with ‘showers’ and the forecast was ‘good’ this morning. Says Daqman: ‘Punters beware, and watch the market: four horses for the money yesterday won as favourites at Goodwood, where times were up to 17 seconds slow.’
TWO-YEAR-OLDS’ CLASSIC LOOKS SENSATIONAL: The good news is to expect a sensational two-year-olds’ ‘classic’ on Saturday, the Middle Park Stakes, as Daqman forecast earlier in the week. He concentrates on place bets today under the headlines:
🔹 MONARCH JOINS MIDDLE PARK KINGS
🔹 IT MUST BE MASCAT AFTER PIER SHOW
🔹 MILLTOWN FITS THE NURSERY STATS
🔹 33.0 SHOT HAS BIG CHANCE ON FORM
🔹 MANIGORDO LOOKS WELL PLACED..
🔹 HASANABAD ONE FOR THE NOTEBOOK
MONARCH JOINS MIDDLE PARK KINGS
It’s the two-year-old international. As I warned earlier in the week, Pinatubo has parked the bus in the Dewhurst and his future Classic rivals have rushed to judgment between themselves in Saturday’s Middle Park.
✔️ UNBEATEN (France) 1111 Earthlight (A Fabre)
✔️ UNBEATEN (England) 11 Mums Tipple (R. Hannon)
✔️ UNBEATEN (Ireland) 1111 Siskin (Ger Lyons)
Now Aidan O’Brien has thrown into the ring Monarch Of Egypt as well as Lope Y Fernandez. Richard Hannon plays the same game by adding Threat to Mums Tipple.
It’s taken all eyes off the Cambridgeshire, and the Newmarket meeting, which opens quietly today, is lucky to have such a sensational test of two-year-olds.
Eight races there this afternoon but six of them do not have the eight runners that inspire punters to bet. Too many extended meetings could be cut down by a day and not lose anything.
IT MUST BE MASCAT AFTER PIER SHOW
1.50 Newmarket This colts and geldings maiden has been won in the last three years by winners of seven subsequent Group races.
Much of that is thanks to Charlie Appleby’s 2017 winner, Ghaiyyath, and his already-gelded Discovery Island – same sire, Dubawi – is a strong contender here for Godolphin.
His defeat by Palace Pier at Sandown on the last day doesn’t look so bad now that the winner has established a 98 rating with a storming success on the same course.
The meat in the sandwich was Mascat, who finished second that day, showing good speed but with a stamina-packed pedigree. The 2020 Derby hope Thai Power is also well bred but the early-mouse market favoured Mascat.
MILLTOWN FITS THE NURSERY STATS
2.25 Newmarket Another two-year-old race, this time a nursery. Winning weights range from 8st to 9st 7lb, which means that, as you’d expect, the handicapper generally fails to get a handle on them (and only one favourite has won in the decade).
The front of the market is all about winning form in only three starts but the stats also say that such a lightly-raced youngster has scored only three times in 10 years: seven winners had raced between four and eight times.
My fancy is Milltown Star (BETDAQ 8.8 taken). After back-to-back success, he was aimed high at Group 2 and Listed before an excellent, staying-on fifth in a big sales race at the Curragh over shorter.
33.0 SHOT HAS CHANCE ON OLD FORM
3.00 Newmarket It’s a sprint. It’s for fillies. And it’s a handicap. Those three ingredients make up a sticky-toffee pudding of the form, but I note that, of Tim Easterby’s 20 probables in three days, 19 of them run in the North but Lady Calcaria is sent down South solo.
Tim loves to play trick or treat with the Newmarket stables and I see that Lady Calcaria is a stone better off on Spring form with dual winner since, Gale Force Maya, who was 7.0 to Lady Calcaria’s 33.0 in the BETDAQ orange this morning (8.2 the place).
MANIGORDO LOOKS WELL PLACED..
3.35 Newmarket (Somerville Tattersall Stakes) Manigordo (by Kitten’s Joy out of a Silver Deputy mare) is a white cat of ocelot proportions so well done on the name but this is a dark bay colt.
Well done to the colt, too, for only a length defeat (not much room a furlong out) by the royal runner Kings Lynn in the big-field Weatherbys sales race at the Leger meeting.
Lord Of The Lodge’s Gimcrack second to Threat has lofted his rating to 109. He was nearly three lengths in front of Repartee, who comes out more than a length better than Manigordo on the sales-race form, not allowing for Manigordo’s difficult passage at the business end of the race.
The favourite, Wichita, has crossed the Irish Sea before this month, narrowly beaten at Doncaster by the highly-regarded Molatham, and this is clearly the best race of the day for me.
Only seven runners but the place offers of 3.6 Manigordo (two chances of a return) were tempting alongside 2.6 Wichita to win (one chance of a return), and they might both be vulnerable to Lord Of The Lodge.
HASANABAD ONE FOR THE NOTEBOOK
4.10 Newmarket (Rose Bowl) Will they catch the odds-on Withhold? Will any one of them catch him? He made all in Cesarewitch, Northumberland Plate and at Newbury in July, and he’s a stone in front of all bar Austrian School.
Strangely, some shrewdies say that the Cesarewitch winner is in the field but he’s not Withhold or Austrian School.
Hasanabad, who impressed as a stout stayer at the Galway festival, was then sold by Dermot Weld to Ian Williams’ mixed yard. Talk of top staying races and of the big hurdles could both be right. So 14.5 BETDAQ offers seem good for a dabble.
DAQMAN’S BETS
1.50 Newmarket (win 10)
BET 7pts win (nap) MASCAT
2.25 Newmarket (win 20, win 10 place)
BET 2.5pts win and 5pts place MILLTOWN STAR
3.00 Newmarket (bull’s-eye bet win 50, win 20 place)
BET 1.5pts win and 2.75pts place LADY CALCARIA
3.35 Newmarket (win 10 both win and place)
BET 1.6pts win and 3.75pts place MANIGORDO
4.10 Newmarket (win 20, place win 10)
BET 1.5pts win and 4pts place HASANABAD
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