Thursday Racing Tips from Andy Holding

BURNISH (NAP) (best price 5/4) overcame significant market weakness to land a competitive handicap on his first outing since being gelded and with the strong possibility of further improvement to come, especially over an extra furlong, William Haggas’ inmate can add his second course win to his name.

Having just shown a modicum of ability in three starts as a two-year-old, he was always going to be quite difficult to assess and, as it turned out, we got no clues based on the betting patterns prior to him making his handicap debut off a mark of 69.

Despite his drift in the betting, however, he was always shaping as though he was going to blow his starting price of 13/2 out of the water and once he hit the front just over a furlong out, he was in no mood to relinquish the advantage he’d established.

By no means the finished article based on that effort, the valuable experience of being involved in a tight finish 16 days ago can’t be underestimated and with his winning time figure another notable aspect of his victory, the son of Kingman can carry forward those positives into today’s similar event back to the same venue.

MELWOOD BOY (best price 10/3) couldn’t quite get the job done and justify heavy support in his direction over today’s C&D last time, but he did manage to run a decent speed figure in defeat and that small crumb of comfort is enough to make him a tempting betting proposition back at the scene of that defeat.

A promising third on his debut at Newcastle back in January, Hugo Palmer’s gelding was warm order to go two places better at the Midland venue a month later but despite breaking well and racing in a handy position throughout, he didn’t quite have the speed of the front pair close home.

That said, the numbers of the winner in particular, suggested he’d bumped into an above-average performer and with that experience over today’s track likely not to be lost on the son of Massaat, there’s a decent chance he will put his valuable knowledge to good use.

BENTLEY’S RETURN (best price 9/2) did about as well as could be expected given he was asked to race around the slowest part of the track here last time and providing connections have learnt from that misjudgement, Chris Gordon’ gelding has a decent chance of making amends on his return to the West Country venue.

Ridden a good deal more prominently than when never involved on his debut, the son of Mahler led the field on the long pull for home, but as his three main rivals searched for the better ground out on the widest part of the track, for some reason his pilot decided to stay over on the far side where conditions were at there most testing (got badly churned up during the day).

To add to the impossible task he faced that day, the subsequent exploits of the three who finished ahead of him have all gone on to prove themselves well above average and with the likelihood of there being not too many of a similar standard in today’s contest, it would come as a major surprise if the five-year-old didn’t run well enough to finish in the frame at the very least.