DAQMAN’S NECK ON THE LINE: After winners this week at 17-2 and 8-1, Daqman failed by a neck yesterday with Prince Dundee (2nd 10-1 from 13.0 on BETDAQ).
TODAY: Enjoy his piece today: a moan about poor fields and lack of betting opportunities; a story about a ‘thinker’; and, hopefully, more winners at Market Rasen and Wincanton.
TOMORROW: First day of the Coral Hurdle meeting at Ascot.
WHERE ARE THE HORSES?
⚠️ HEADS UP: In 21 races in England today, only eight – less than 40% – have a ‘straight eight or better’ turn-out for each-way and place betting punters: 39 run at Wincanton (only two races with eight or more), 46 at Newcastle (just two again with eight or more), 53 at Market Rasen (four with eight or more); numbers correct at going to press.
With showers due on ‘good (good to firm in places)’ at Newcastle, and good, good to soft elsewhere, there’s hardly grounds for blaming the going.
JESUITIQUE IS JUST VALUE
⭕ 1.22 Market Rasen We were on Jesuitique on the last day. He won at Sandown, which has a right-hand downhill swoop into the straight like Market Rasen, only there’s no hill finish at Rasen.
It is therefore likely that the unexposed six-year-old can last the extra three furlongs of today’s race. He goes up 5lb in future and has Cillin Leonard’s claim to help today; theoretically, then, 10lb well in.
Every winner of this has scored off 10st 12lb or less, one of them sent out by Jesuitique’s trainer, Dr Richard Newland.
The selection gets 23lb from Small Present but that one still makes me nervous as a hat-trick winner in the Spring and trained by the in-form Sue Smith.
Flashing Glance’s last success was here off today’s mark. Then there’s the bridesmaid Tees Components: 18 times in the first three over hurdles but 13 of them without winning.
Giovanni Charge has form figures of 3113 on this course but has to improve 7lb on his last winning mark; recent form shows no indication that he can.
Potters Hedger needs it soft, and Thunderstruck is just being run out of it lately, now 13lb higher than his last winning mark.
The Sweeney, a winner here in the summer of 2019, showed signs of being on the way back the last day but, like Potters Hedge, is nine now, 10 on January 1.
BEWARE OF THE THINKER
⭕ 1.52 Market Rasen I’ll be rooting for, and backing The Edgar Wallace. The pub of that name is an old watering hole of mine and Samuel Johnson’s near the Inns Of Court in London, though I missed his last round of porter by about 200 years.
The old Essex Head Club was renamed after crime-writer Edgar Wallace, the walls festooned with photos from his books and plays.
In 1924 he published a series in Strand Magazine called Do Horses Think? Starting in 1891, the magazine’s pages had so often pulsated with stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, and Wallace fancied himself the natural successor.
He condemned the word ‘rogue’ which was commonly applied to racehorses with their own ideas about the game and instead called them ‘thinkers.’
My own experience is of lining up just such a horse to win on this very course, Market Rasen, so confident of his chances that we paid for our own photographer to be ready to record our leading in the winner!
My jockey was Steve Holland (now a trainer), who rode Ben More and Glanford Brigg to victory at the same Cheltenham Festival.
Steve and my ‘rogue’ horse (sorry ‘thinker’) ran the first circuit in a hack canter, head in chest, reins held hard down on his neck.
Second circuit, and a tap or two with the whip to get him involved along the far side seemed to prompt the horse to stumble and dangle a fore-leg, Steve feeling obliged to pull him up in case he was injured.
Dismounting, he checked the horse and held him on as long a rein as possible to see him walk away.
Walk away he did, in perfectly good order, as if to say ‘fooled ya.’ He had resisted when that tap of the whip had signalled ‘hard work ahead.’
‘Where’s the picture in this,’ asked the photographer. ‘That WAS the picture,’ I said, adding a little unkindly in my frustration: ‘Where were you?’
MATTIE CAN LAND THE NAP
⭕ 2.45 Wincanton Donald McCain sends a rare runner down to the Somerset track, where he has a 33% strike rate.
Soft ground at Musselburgh the last day cut short Armattiekan’s improvement on a sound surface, which had seen him land a sustained gamble at Carlisle.
Likely to have too much speed for Butterwick Brook, who has scored only on heavy (giving him a poor 1-12 strike rate)
Fearless Fracas has yet to win a race under Rules, though did take a Point on a sound surface.
Jarlath last scored over obstacles in the Spring of 2019, showing not a lot since, despite leniency from the handicapper this autumn.
NO TO NEW ZEALAND
⭕ 3.50 Wincanton It’s a leap of faith to back New Zealander at shorts odds – he was heading the BETDAQ BETTING EXCHANGE market in mid-morning trading.
The Fergal O’Brien trained runner was pulled up in a selling handicap at Newton Abbot last time out and finished lame.
He’s yet to win in nine starts over hurdles and it’s a puzzle why he is so prominent in the market.
Noble Savage looks the better percentage call. There was plenty to like about his comeback run at Lingfield when chasing home the well handicapped Naturally High and whilst that was on soft ground, Noble Savage has also shown he handles good ground.
DAQMAN’S BETS
1.22 Market Rasen (win 10)
BET 6.25pts win JESUITIQUE
1.52 Market Rasen (win 10)
BET 2.5pts win THE EDGAR WALLACE
2.45 Wincanton (win 10, nap)
BET 8.3pts win ARMATTIEKAN
3.50 Wincanton (win 10)
BET 3.2pts win NOBLE SAVAGE
What are points? Points facilitate a staking plan, which is the secret to creating profit. One point is whatever you choose: a pound, a euro, or whatever ….
Start with a bank and decide how much you can afford to lose over a period of time, and determine the size of your bets accordingly. Daqman makes this variation every day.
