Irish Horseracing Betting: Tuesday at Punchestown

005 Irish Racing / Darren Skelton / 09 December 2008 / Leave a Comment

Sunday's loss is Tuesday's gain as we all get to enjoy a high class jumping card on a day that's famous for being the worst day for racing in any week. Punchestown's rescheduled card offers up some top class action and Darren Skelton has the stand-out bets on the card...

The opening race on the card, as is the norm, is a maiden race with about five to six horses with a decent chance of visiting the winner's enclosure. As you all know I think that Noel Meade is a training God at this time of the year but I'd be inclined to dismiss Steve Capall here because he's had a lot of racing on punishing ground recently. and may not be at his sharpest.

Shirley Casper probably has the most obvious piece of form in the race with his fifth behind Academy Sir Harry - a horse that I think will win at Cheltenham. That form alone entitles him to be favourite here, but let's not forget, it is a maiden and every horse has something to prove.
We're better off looking for a bit of value and hopefully we can find it with Chicago Grey. Now try and keep up with what I'm about to say because when I get into form mode things can go a bit Dan Brownesque.....

Chicago Grey was only just touched off on his first run over hurdles by a decent horse called Head of the Posse. Before that race Head of the Posse beat Kennel Bridge by eight lengths....That horse won a good maiden at Fairyhouse last week, and head of the posse himself has come out again and advertised the form with a decent second at the weekend.
Everything seems to be in place for a horse that may trade at about [8.0] today.

The second race on the card is a valuable (especially for a Tuesday! Woohoo) novice hurdle that could be won by any of these eight exceptionally talented horses. Mr Meade is once again represented here so again, it will be the first horse we'll look at. Go Native was described by his trainer as "one of his best bumper horses and good enough to win good races on the flat". He then went on to win his maiden race over hurdles at Kilbeggan. However, it is his next race that poses us some questions.

Heading into the Galway festival "Meade's best bumper horse" was a well fancied 5-4 favourite and came there swinging with Slippers madden on board (Paul Carberry was sidelined)...however when it came to the crunch the horse seemed to back out of the challenge and threw his head to one side. On all reading of the form it would seem that Go Native is a horse of Graded potential but this character trait is a very worrying one.

Jaffonnian is entitled to step up on his seasonal debut behind Academy Sir Harry (28 lengths behind mind you) but he would really have to if he was going to figure here. He's not for me but a big run from Shirley Casper in the first race would force me to rethink things. Table Talk is undoubtedly a horse with some potential being a full brother to gold cup winning Kicking King, but like his brother I don't think Table Talk would appreciate ground as heavy as this. I won't be on him tomorrow but I wouldn't rule out him winning a big race on better ground in the future.
I'm going to throw a speculative horse into the mix...If there was a gun to my head I'd probably pick one of the three horses above to win this race but because I've never seen a gun in my life I'm going to select a horse that has never even run before. Pierrot Du Moulin is supposed to be very well regarded by connections and he really should be because he cost 100,000gns at the sales. Charles Byrnes is bullish about this one so let's have a bet early and hope that the money then comes for it.

The third race is very tricky but I think Dorset Square will go very close and could be the value in the win and place markets. JJ Murphy's gelding ran a good second to Mystical breeze last time and his able jockey takes off a handy 7lbs. This could be one for the Turkey and ham lads...well not so much ham....

The main event on today's card is undoubtedly the John Durkan Memorial Punchestown Chase. John Durkan, for those who don't know, is the man that discovered Istabraq. He was convinced that this horse could be a Cheltenham winner, despite others arguing with him to the contrary. He set out to train to do just that but was tragically diagnosed with Leukemia. He suggested that Aidan O' Brien train him until such a time as he was well enough to take over himself. Unfortunately he never recovered and died before Istabraq won the 1998 Champion Hurdle. It's great that we have such a good race to remember this class act of a man.

War of Attrition has excited many with his two come back runs this season and there are many that think he may be back to his best. Unfortunately, I'm not one of those people. I think that he was out for such a long time and a test like this may just be coming a bit quick for him. He's also meeting some very classy rivals today and it's definitely a leap from what he has had to beat so far this year.

Paul Nicholls has a simply awesome strike rate when he brings horses over to Ireland and he can never be overlooked. Noland is a classy horse but he has some demons in his head and I'm also not convinced that we'll see him at his best on heavy ground. Although he has won on deep ground before, he didn't beat very much. I think there could be value to be had in backing Watson Lake. A bare look at his form will probably put people off when they see him a distance behind War of Attrition back in October but that form can be ignored because he lost all chance after an early blunder. His next effort in beating Slim Pickings (who ran very well in the Hennessy until making a race ending error) was a fine one, and puts him slap bang in contention here. He's not the most obvious choice but with question marks about the front two in the market I think there could be value in looking to Noel Meade's horse.

I don't have any strong fancies in the next race so I'm going to skip to the final two races where I have two strong fancies.

The last two races, a beginner's chase and a bumper should be won by the same trainer - John Kiely. Indian Pace has the best form by far in the 3:05 and normal improvement (which I'm told is expected) should see him take this. I don't usually touch bumpers but I've been told that Kiely's horse here Miss Abrahnovic is a cut above and there are big hopes for him. Hopefully we'll get a nice price and we can all have expensive Marks & Spencers Crackers for Christmas.