Cheltenham Novices' Hurdle Antepost Tips: Kevin Blake's trio of bets up to 11/2

• Mullins pair worth taking on in Supreme Novices'

• Final Demand to take all the beating in the Turners

• Elliott can strike with The Yellow Clay in Albert Bartlett

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Surprised the novice hurdle programme remained unchanged

The novice hurdles at the Cheltenham Festival always tend to rank highly on the table of excitement in the build-up to the meeting. So many young, often untested potential stars of the future being examined on the biggest stage of the sport, it is a tantalising prospect.

As well as that, they often pit the best of the Irish versus the best of the British for the first time, which only serves to add further layers of excitement as unknown depths are plunged into.

Mind, there was surprise in some quarters, including my one, when the novice hurdles at the meeting escaped modification in the series of sweeping changes made to the race programme in advance of this season's Festival.

If three Grade 1s and a Grade 2 were deemed worthy of slashing back to just two Grade 1s in the novice chase division, it is surely difficult to justify leaving the three Grade 1s and Grade 2 mares' race of the novice hurdle division unchanged? Maybe next year.

In love with Romeo for the Supreme

The Supreme Novices' Hurdle can always be relied upon to produce an exciting spectacle to kick the meeting off.

When one looks back over the last decade of this race, it has often been a case of Willie Mullins' number one versus Nicky Henderson's number one and both have landed big blows on another in that time. Mind, we won't be seeing a repeat this year as Henderson doesn't have an entry in the race. In fact, Henderson only has three entries across all three Grade 1 novice hurdles at the meeting and none are shorter than 40/141.00. That certainly took me by surprise.

In the absence of Henderson, Mullins is dominating the market with Kopeck Des Bordes and Salvator Mundi heading it up, but I'm inclined to take them on.

Kopeck Des Bordes obviously looked brilliantly impressive at the Dublin Racing Festival and his jumping improved there from what had been a very unsatisfactory hurdling debut in that respect, but he still did plenty wrong. He got fired up in the preliminaries and while his jumping was better, it was still more akin to that of an embryonic chaser than a slick two-mile hurdler.

Similarly, Salvator Mundi did his share of things wrong on his belated return to action in the Moscow Flyer Novice Hurdle at Punchestown, racing quite freely and not being all that impressive with his jumping. Now, raw ability can trump plenty of other factors in restricted company such as novice hurdles, but there is just enough to poke at with the two of them to make them opposable at their coupled price.

I feel there is a solid alternative to the frontend of the market in the shape of the Gordon Elliott-trained Romeo Coolio. The six-year-old was one of the best bumper horses in training last season, finishing a close second in the Champion Bumper at the Cheltenham Festival.

His transition into novice hurdles has been a smooth one that has yielded two wins from three starts, with the only blip coming when he had his pocket picked in a messy renewal of the Royal Bond Novice Hurdle at Fairyhouse. Given a more positive ride on his latest start in the Future Champions Novice Hurdle at Leopardstown's Christmas meeting, he blew the field apart in winning by nine lengths. He will be suited by the type of race that the Supreme Novices' Hurdle is and he appeals as being overpriced at the time of writing.

Final likely to be in Demand for the Turners

To me, the Turners Novices' Hurdle has a more straightforward look to it. I suspect this could well be the novice hurdle that is the odd one out in terms of those at the front end of the market being likely to take up other options leaving it light on depth.

One that we can be quite sure will take his place in the line-up all being well with him is the Willie Mullins-trained Final Demand. While it was Kopeck Des Bordes that seemed to get most of the race reviews at the Dublin Racing Festival, I thought Final Demand put up the more complete performance there.

For a big chaser in the making, he shows really impressive athleticism to snap up his front legs so nimbly when jumping and his finishing effort was very impressive indeed. A stayer with speed, he looks ideally equipped for the Turners' Novices' Hurdle and I would see him as being very tough to beat.

Stamina test means it's all Yellow in Albert Bartlett

The other Grade 1 novice hurdle at the meeting is the Albert Bartlett Novices' Hurdle and I'm going to return to Gordon Elliott in search of the answer with The Yellow Clay.

The six-year-old was another of Elliott's that was in amongst the best bumper horses last season, finishing second in the Grade 1 bumper at the Punchestown Festival. However, he always shaped like a stayer in the making and has duly confirmed that in his novice hurdle campaign thus far.

He has won all four of his starts over hurdles and has given the impression every step of the way that a strong test of stamina will suit him best. Indeed, his least impressive win came in the Navan Novice Hurdle where a very steady pace didn't at all suit him and made it hard work for him. His most recent start in the Lawlor's Of Naas Novice Hurdle offered a much stronger test of stamina and that duly translated into a much impressive performance.

The stamina test that the Albert Bartlett Novices' Hurdle represents will be right up the street of The Yellow Clay. As good as he already has been in novice hurdles, I wouldn't be surprised if he was even better at the Cheltenham Festival.

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