NAP! DAQMAN IN ON ANOTHER GAMBLE: Daqman, who has already landed FIVE Classic winners this season, was in top form for the weekend’s Derby and Oaks with yet more BETDAQ value from his nap yesterday, the gambled-on Team Meeting (WON 13-8 from 4.2 on BETDAQ), which he doubled with Westerland (WON 8-15).
IT’S CLOSE IN THE FILLIES’ CLASSIC: Today Daqman concentrates on Friday’s Oaks, with a stats-and-form guide which turns up three fillies that tick all of his five main boxes, but an X factor on breeding brings more into play, suggesting a close contest.
DAQMAN’S OAKS ABC GUIDE
4.30 Epsom (Friday): The Oaks Stakes
A Officially rated 102 to 122
B Won or placed Group/Graded race or key trial
C Stallion progeny average distance 8.4f to 12.5f
D One to three races as 2yo
E Trainer O’Brien, Gosden, Beckett
X Sired by Galileo, Sea The Stars, New Approach
ABCDE Alluringly
Related to Galileo and Sea The Stars on the dam’s side, ‘she will improve an awful lot’ was the word from Ballydoyle after her Cheshire Oaks second to Enable.
ABCDE Coronet
Like John Gosden stablemate Enable, ticks all the boxes, despite the pair of them having had only three races each, which leaves them both open to any amount of improvement.
Half-sister to a Leger runner-up, beat the colts in the Zetland Stakes (1m 2f) in October – among them Derby hope Permian, third – and in the frame when Sobetsu won the Prix Saint-Alary (soft) at Deauville a fortnight back.
ABCDE Enable
By Nathaniel, who came from nowhere in his second season to win the King George, and has passed on rapid second-season improvement to this filly.
Beaten on her seasonal debut but won the Cheshire Oaks, eased down, from Alluringly, who had been impressive in her maiden.
ABCD Sobetsu
Well behind Rhododendron on firm in the Fillies Mile in the autumn, reveled in the soft ground when beating Coronet and Co in the Saint-Alary last month.
ABCEX Rhododendron
Looked unlucky in the Newmarket 1,000 Guineas when, hampered and switched, she got to within two lengths of the winner, Winter, who confirmed her status as a top miler by adding the Irish 1,000 Guineas to her trophy cabinet.
Rhododendron won the Fillies Mile last season (Sobetsu fifth). As a granddaughter of Pivotal, she enjoys a bit of cut in the ground.
AC Natavia
Like Enable, a daughter of Nathaniel but her dam’s side suggests that 1m 2f would be her best trip. Only started out this year, winner of a Listed on her second start.
B Daddys Lil Darling
Dirt winner twice in six-race two-year-old career. Rear run when fourth in the Breeders Cup fillies’ mile. Grade-1 runner-up twice this year, including Kentucky Oaks, again staying on well from the back.
CD Horseplay
Stamina-packed pedigree, and stayed on gamely to beat Isabel De Urbina in Newmarket’s Pretty Polly (Listed) at the Craven meeting.
DE Isabel De Urbina
Ralph Beckett usually has a useful filly for the Classics. This one looks a nearly horse but the trainer is ‘tempted to roll the dice’ after she kept on well behind Horseplay at Newmarket.
D Pocketfulofdreams
No slouch on breeding but reckoned only a 1m 2f animal and likely pacemaker for the O’Brien team
KASPER CAN DEFY THE WEIGHT
3.30 Beverley This is very hard for extremes of the draw. Stalls 4 to 9 win it. A double figure draw has been duff. The low three gates get squeezed out.
Another long-term loser is the favourite (no wins in the decade) but keep your bets within the 9-2 and 6-1 parameter.
Stats don’t often work this easily but recent form suggests that they could in this one because the only one to tick all the boxes is Hijran, overpriced at 16.0.
She seemed back to form on the last day for her claimer, whose allowance takes the filly well below her last winning mark and almost to the foot of the handicap.
3.50 Nottingham Third in the Newbury Spring Cup, fourth in the Hambleton at York, but Another Touch has won only once in 10 starts since being gelded.
Algaith has twice run well in Listed company, including runner-up to subsequent Winter Derby winner, Convey, and Jim Crowley is booked. But he is clearly a glass horse,
With just three runs on the CV since 2015, and is was drifting like a looney dog on a raft this morning.
I can’t have the nearly horse Dragon Mall, and fancy Kaspersky (8.2 on BETDAQ, called ‘Kasper’ in the yard) might be good enough, despite the weight. He’s won 10 times, four at group level, three at Listed, albeit those black-type races were in Germany and Italy.
SOUND’S LIKE STOUTE OAKS
4.20 Nottingham (Nottinghamshire Oaks) Just like Grand Nationals, every course wants its Oaks. They’re all over the world. And they don’t always restrict them two the Classic season animals.
But, despite the lack of three-year-olds, Colwick Park has acquired Listed status for this one, so there was a fair turn-out of fillies looking for black type for the breeding catalogues, until ground conditions reduced the field this morning. It’s still an interesting contest, if not classic.
In these races, I always look first at which yard has the dominant fillies at Classic level in the year and John Gosden (Alf Guineas) has Coronet and Enable in the Oaks proper at Epsom as we’ve seen in the ABC guide.
Ralph Beckett (Very Dashing) usually has a strong hand with fillies. Not so much this year but his stable is absolutely flying. It’s had eight winners since May 19 and is currently on four out of six. He won this race when it was run at Warwick.
James Fanshawe also won this at Warwick and he is very hopeful of Permission, is a tempting 8.8 for win-and-place betting among the eight that are left.
But the morning market was dominated by Sir Michael Stoute’s Playful Sound and Frankie Dettori’s Al Shaqab mount, Entsar.
Entsar’s best form is with cut in the ground and it may be significant that Playful Sound won on firm at Newmarket when she battled well in the wide open spaces of the Rowley Mile course.
DAQMAN’S BETS
BET 1.25pts win and place HIJRAN (3.30 Beverley)
BET 2.75pts win and place KASPERSKY (3.50 Nottingham)
BET 12pts win (nap) PLAYFUL SOUND (4.20 Nottingham)
BET 8pts win GYMNASTE (7.50 Kempton)
BET 1pt win and place FORESEE (8.50 Kempton)
BET 5pts win TORIANO (9.20 Kempton)
DAQ MULTIPLES: 3 x 3pt win doubles and 1pt win treble PLAYFUL SOUND (4.20 Nottingham), GYMNASTE (7.50 Kempton) and TORIANO (9.20 Kempton)
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