Andy Holding's Sunday Racing Tips

GREEN VAULT (best price 2-1) has shown a fair degree of promise in two above-average novice hurdles up North and with plenty of heavy ground form tucked away up his sleeve courtesy of his days over in the Irish point circuit, Lucinda Russell’s gelding may just have enough to hold sway over his main market rival, Fever Roque.

A winner of a 2m4f Punchestown bumper under testing conditions when with Liam Kenny, the son of Shirocco took a notable scalp that day in the shape of Famous Bridge and given the way he stayed on strongly in the closing stages, clearly a test of stamina is very much his game. Having reportedly made a noise when only seventh in a hot novice event at Carlisle back in October, a trip to the operating theatre beckoned and following wind surgery, he came back to action over today’s C&D two months later. Dropped out towards the rear, the six-year-old still had his back to the wall as the field turned for home, but it was notable that he made some nice late headway from the second last and although beaten nine lengths at the line, he still managed to finish ahead of the well-regarded Bill Baxter. Time-wise, the race at the Scottish venue wasn’t at all bad on the figures and with him bound to have gleaned more confidence knowing that he can breathe more freely during his races, hopefully he should be ready to really rock and roll on his return visit.

GOVERNMENT (NAP) (best price 13-8) only managed fifth here on his debut, but he shaped like one of the nicest horses going forward and he can back up that view on his return to the Midland track.

Not massively fancied according to the market beforehand, Hugo Palmer’s colt was in the kind of position early that made even the most optimistic among his supporters fear the worst and although that feeling partly came to fruition as the race developed, his last two-furlong work was much more encouraging. Hitting the line quite nicely without being subject to a hard ride, the son of Caravaggio left the strong impression he would be a much more switched on customer next time and with his main market rival, Sen Ding, running out of excuses at a rapid rate of knots, the more unexposed one of the pair is fancied to break his duck.