The horse racing broadcaster offers his selections from around the UK and reveals the trainers and jockeys who have most exceeded market expectations this season.
One of the most compelling conclusions to a National Hunt season in recent memory ends at Sandown on Saturday, with Willie Mullins poised to put his head in front on the line to retain his Jump Trainers’ Championship.
You have to feel for Dan Skelton. Fast out of the blocks, he has marshalled his giant army with clinical precision only for a Mullins feat of pure brilliance in the Grand National to undo it all.
At the time of writing on Friday morning, Skelton has sent out 255 different horses this campaign for a total of 985 racecourse starts and 178 victories. It is, however, the superior quality of the Mullins raiders that have tipped the scales, with just 35 winners from 183 starts but 12 of those wins at Grade 1 level, as opposed to Skelton’s three. The £840,000 Mullins amassed in one single race when saddling five of the first seven home in the National tilted the scales in the Irishman’s favour, and the final nail in the Skelton challenge came when Mullins declared Grangeclare West for the bet365 Gold Cup, instantly pushing the majority of those trained away from Closutton well out of the weights. Expect that race to be the final decisive blow in a week that has shone the light on the likes of Plumpton and Perth.
The hard part in punting over jumps at this stage of the season is to identify which horses are still capable of producing their best form late in the campaign, off the back of earlier, higher-profile targets. That will be the case with MINELLA COCOONER 9/2 (16:10 Sandown), who is one of the main beneficiaries of Grangeclare West’s participation and who won the race 12 months ago off a 4lb lower mark. He ran well for a long way in the National, which is obviously the main concern, but is proven in the conditions and has that touch of class.
Skelton’s best chance looks to be with the admirable TAKE NO CHANCES 4/1 (15:00 Sandown), who can beat Kitzbuhel in the Select Hurdle. Kitzbuhel was one of the rare Aintree failures for Mullins, running far too freely in the early stages when favourite for the Grade 1 Liverpool Hurdle, and it was all downhill from there. Take No Chances already has one Mullins scalp notched on her stable door when beating Kargese – who played up beforehand – at Ascot, but subsequent events have shown she is not to be underestimated in her own right and can at least force the trainers’ battle to go as far as the bet365 Gold Cup.
There’s no doubt in my mind as to the most interesting horse running anywhere on Saturday, and that is MYAL 100/30 (14:40 Haydock), who I have been waiting for ever since a really good run in the Spring Mile at Doncaster. He was the only one close to the pace to be remotely involved at the finish, over a trip that may have also just stretched his stamina. 7f round a turn at Haydock suits fine and I will be disappointed if he doesn’t go well here.
ITV cameras also pay a rare visit to Leicester, where the stiff uphill finish can play into the hands of COMPLETELY RANDOM 9/2 (14:05 Leicester). He came from well back to win at Southwell over 5f and looked well ahead of his mark that day, so could be a handicapper to follow in the first half of the season.
Away from the main action, TARLAC 17/2 (17:15 Doncaster) can continue to provide Katie Scott with an upturn in fortunes. The yard have picked up notably in recent weeks after a quiet spell and Tarlac ran better than the bare form suggests at Newcastle, where he kept on up the centre on a day where the stands rail looked a significant advantage.
STATS ALL FOLKS
It is a question often posed in football: who is the better manager – someone who handles the big egos and wins the Premier League, or the one with meagre resources who keeps their side punching well above their weight?
With that in mind, and the focus on Skelton and Mullins, here is a look at a few names who have excellent seasons in outperforming expectations using our favoured Actual Winners/Expected Winners ratio. This factors in the prices horses start at (using Exchange SPs) to generate an expected number of victories to which the actual number is compared (Par = 1.00). I have set a minimum of 25 victories in the season as a qualifying benchmark to ensure a meaningful enough sample.
Top of the list has to be Olly Murphy, who saddled 136 winners from 562 runners for a quite superb A/E of 1.21. As the number of winners increases it is far harder to maintain a high A/E, yet Murphy has consistently done so this campaign. It is largely his brilliant season that has propelled Sean Bowen to a deserved first jockeys’ title, providing him with 99 of his 175 winners and blunting Harry Skelton’s challenge – all bar two of his 141 have been for brother Dan. Murphy has also managed a level stake profit. While that can be skewed by a big-price winner or two, it is not the case here with no winner at a bigger SP than 22/1. A superb season that has slightly gone under the radar.
Of the smaller yards, a shout out to joint license holders Graeme McPherson and David Killahena, whose numbers are 27/140 for an A/E of 1.51, far and away the best of those to have saddled 25 winners or more.
While it is hard in a handicap system to produce such numbers in back-to-back years, these two yards would get my votes for trainers of the season.
Using the same metric for jockeys, the stand-out performer has been Gavin Sheehan, who like Olly Murphy deserves extra credit because of the bigger sample size. With a maiden century of winners, his 104/548 yields an A/E of 1.20, so 20 per cent more winners than market expectations. He is also another to yield an annual level stake profit, though he did have an 80/1 winner to boost those numbers.
Career best totals for Richie McLernon (54/372, A/E 1.33) in his 19th season riding and Bryan Carver (33/237, A/E 1.36) despite a quiet season for Harry Fry also can reflect on excellent campaigns.
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