Cheltenham Tips: Top five most-backed 10/1+ shots this week

It’s preview night season which throws up plenty of Cheltenham clues, which is normally reflected in the betting. The likes of Tiger Roll and Paisley Park dominate the ante-post betting as plenty of racing fans build their festival acca’s. However, nobody is interested in us telling you that people are backing Tiger Roll, so we thought we’d flag the five most-backed 10/1+ shot this week.

Gavin Cromwell’s four-year-old has seen plenty of attention in the Boodles this week, he was last seen finishing second to Leagan Gaelige at Leopardstown in December. Cromwell said, “Theatre Of War has improved since Christmas and will go for Boodle Juvenile Handicap Hurdle”. He has also said he’s his long-shot hope of the Festival, which probably explains the support in the market.

The price has slightly gone on Theatre Of War as he was available to back at a massive 40/1 just a few days ago. He’s now 16/1 with one bookmaker which isn’t NRNB.

Plan Of Attack has been the talk of many preview nights and the 20/1 price available at the start of the month has evaporated since. He was last seen finishing third behind Roaring Bull and Fitzhenry at Leopardstown in December.

There’s three in this race which have been mentioned by plenty of media pundits this week, Plan Of Attack is one, the other two are Ravenill and Deise Aba.

Plenty of people thought Darver Star was coming into the Cheltenham Festival slightly under the radar, but after a week of preview nights, that’s certainly not the case. Everybody interested in racing now knows how close Darver Star came to beating Honeysuckle.

Gavin Cromwell said "It’s a massive ask but, at the same time, I think he deserves to be in the race and he has a place chance. It’s not the best renewal and I think the hill at Cheltenham will suit. I’d be disappointed if he didn’t come up it strongly."

Shrewder punters could have got 20/1 on Darver Star just a couple of weeks ago.

Tronador has certainly slipped under the radar until this week, the four-year-old is single figures for the Boodles with the majority of bookmakers now, despite being 20/1 last month.

Gordon Elliott included the horse in his lucky 15 charity bet at the Betfair preview which explains how the horse crept into Oddschecker’s most popular bets last night. Previous Elliott had said “I’m going to put headgear on him and he’s a horse that stays very well. I’m happy with his mark.”

Gavin Cromwell’s dominating this list, and he has another entry in Alfa Mix who has had a terrific season over in Ireland. Alfa Mix has won twice in his last four run's and finished second on another occasion.

JP McManus has recently purchased this horse which could speak volumes itself. However, Gavin Cromwell has always been pretty excited about this horse's chances. In his BetDaq column, he said “He’s one of the horses in the yard we’re very excited about.”

He’s still a 25/1 shot for the Matin Pipe as well. However, the majority of bets we’ve taken have been for Alfa Mix in the Coral Cup Handicap Hurdle.