After picking up a 4/1 winner yesterday, Andy Holding has two tips for today's racing including a NAP at Plumpton.
15:35 Plumpton
MINELLA HUB (NAP) (best price 7-4) ran out a pretty decisive winner over today’s C&D on handicap debut and with conditions almost identical to what they were 39 days ago, Pat Murphy’s gelding is fancied to keep up the good recent work of his small yard (Galtee Mountain, Nessfield Blue and Neverbeen To Paris three notable winners).
Not totally disgraced in two above-average novice hurdles for Adam West, the son of Shirocco was picked up by new connections with a view to going chasing and having been handed a mark of 105 for his first attempt in his new vocation, he made an instant impact. Well-supported from 10-1 into 10-3, the seven-year-old was always in the hunt to land the gamble and then when it came a question of going and sealing the deal in the home straight, he answered every call. Staying on strongly all the way to the line, he scored with more in hand than the official winning margin suggested and with the numbers for the race coming out pretty good for the grade, even a slight adjustment in his rating shouldn’t be enough to prevent him from following up.
20:30 Wolverhampton
David Evans is a very dangerous man when one of his gets on a roll and with MILLION REASONS (best price 13-8) falling into that category in recent weeks, the in-form sprinter can complete the hat trick.
0-20 heading in to his penultimate outing at Lingfield, the son of Mehmas finally laid the ghost to rest with a cosy success and it was much the same story at Newcastle a month later. Tracking the pace set by Won Love at the Gosforth Park venue, the four-year-old always looked like he was going to the deliver the goods and once quickening to the front inside the final furlong, it was just a question of game management by his pilot in the dying strides. Having run plenty of times over tonight’s trip and even a mile, the drop back to seven furlongs shouldn’t pose too many issues and with a good break from stall two likely to see him handy from an early stage, hopefully he can utilise his turn of foot to good effect late on.
