Betfred’s Owen McMahon shares a couple of tips for the action at Haydock on Thursday.
Haydock Park Tips
It can be difficult to get a handle on two-year-old maidens at the best of times, let alone when they feature predominantly unraced, eye-catchingly bred horses with big price tags, so when you find one with form in the book – and good form at that – it often pays to side with them.
That’s part of the thinking behind me selecting THE CAMDEN COLT in the maiden stakes over 6f at 3.00.
He was third in a small but select field at Chester exactly two weeks ago, finishing four lengths behind the winner Hackman, who’s in Listed action at Sandown later on Wednesday.
I believe that’s strong form and that Richard Hannon’s son of Footstepsinthestand will improve significantly for the experience, as I saw plenty of promise in his performance – and he’ll have to improve to win this, as even if you ignore the ‘could be anything’ newbies he has just over two lengths to make up on the favourite Invincible Friend for Tom Dascombe.
The latter had already ran prior to Chester, however, and didn’t shape like he’d be suited to this step up to 6f quite as much as the selection, who should absolutely relish the extra distance.
Richard Hannon’s string are in decent nick and Dane O’Neill is riding pretty well too – another couple of positives for The Camden Colt.
Half an hour later there’s a 6f handicap for three-year-olds rated 0-80 and frankly I’m surprised CHASSERAL isn’t significantly shorter in the current market.
Andrew Balding’s daughter of Exceed and Excel was a fairly average two-year-old but reappeared this term with a very promising fourth in an eight-runner 0-100 handicap at Newmarket earlier this month.
The winner of that contest was Julie Camacho’s Shaquille, now rated 111 and a Listed winner after comfortably taking the Carnarvon Stakes at Newbury last weekend. The runner-up, Washington Heights, has also done the form no harm, finishing second again in a strong 0-105 handicap off a mark of 89 at HQ the other day.
There’s reason to think Chasseral can improve a fair bit for that run, which itself is good enough form to be competitive here, for not only was she having her first run of the season but she was hanging right throughout.
Conditions suit and the Balding/Murphy combination are in good form, so I’m very hopeful for a big run from this improving filly.
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