Spectator Life

The big race in Paris this weekend, the Qatar Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, is almost certain to be run on much faster ground than usual, possibly the equivalent of ‘good to firm’ in Britain. That will be music to the ears of connections of the two horses at the top of the market: the French-trained Daryz and the Newmarket-trained Maltese Cross. The former won this race last year on soft ground, when put up in this column at 14-1, but his talented trainer Francis-Henri Graffard is convinced his charge is better on quicker ground.  Drawn in stall five in a race in which low numbers are favoured, the four-year-old colt will be hard to beat on Sunday (3:05 p.m.

Tomorrow’s bet365 Cambridgeshire (3.40 p.m.) is a cavalry charge up the straight course at Newmarket and it is almost certain that the field will split into at least two groups. However, as with Ascot’s straight course, it is not always possible to predict whether high or low numbers will be favoured. Pace plays a key role as well and, if one side goes off too fast, the horses leading that group will pay a penalty for their early exertions in the final furlong or two. For the last two years, horses drawn low came out best in the race, whereas in 2023 horses drawn high filled the first three places. I put up one horse for the race four weeks ago: Hard Endeavor, each way at 40-1. He is now less than half those odds and he will come out of stall 8, with David Egan in the saddle.

Perhaps my new-found interest is the result of decades of conditioning by the media When I was a schoolboy, you'd have been unlikely to find the words ‘sporting prowess’ and ‘Philip Womack’ uttered in the same breath. Bar a brief moment aged 13, when, being lankier than my peers, I could win sprints without too much effort, I was always much happier loafing about with my copy of J.K. Huysman’s decadent novel, A Rebours, than I was getting stuck into scrums on the freezing rugby pitches. Always picked last, I would hover by the lines, oblivious to the cries of ‘Catch!’ or whatever else came hurling my way.  My lack of interest in games was certainly not hereditary.

Jockey Saffie Osborne has the world at her feet. She’s talented, young, attractive, personable, ambitious, well-connected and much more. I have no doubt she is on her way to being a global superstar in the sport of racing and beyond. She has certainly done this column plenty of favours in recent weeks. I have tipped three of her rides at fairly tasty prices – Amazing Journey, Hickory and Highwayman – and I am glad to say they have all won. Judging from the Comment section, plenty of others have joined me with these bets and so following her has been profitable for readers, too.

The final classic of the flat season, the Betfred St Leger Stakes, takes places at Doncaster tomorrow (3.35 p.m.) and Irish handler Joseph O’Brien has an excellent chance of landing yet another big prize. The jockey-turned-trainer son of the legend that is Aidan O’Brien has enjoyed a stellar season so far, plundering plenty of big races on both sides of the Irish Sea. Tomorrow his best chance of landing the Group 1 St Leger lies with Enceladus, who is likely to go off as the race favourite. Enceladus is unbeaten in three starts this season including winning the Group 3 Maison Perrier Gordon Stakes at Glorious Goodwood last time out.

Quality staying handicaps are my favourite flat races for betting purposes. Unlike with sprints, the wager is not almost certainly lost if the horse you backed is slowly away or gets hampered in running. In staying races there is plenty of time to make up for some bad luck so the best horse on the day usually wins. Tomorrow’s Betfair Exchange Old Borough Cup Handicap is just the sort of race that I like to tackle as a gambler Tomorrow’s Betfair Exchange Old Borough Cup Handicap (Haydock, 3.05 p.m.) over one mile and six furlongs is therefore just the sort of race that I like to tackle as a gambler.

Newmarket trainer James Fanshawe is a patient man and he has resisted the temptation to run his stable star KIND OF BLUE since he turned in a disappointing run at Royal Ascot on ground much faster than ideal in the Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes. He finished 11th of the 18 runners that day. With the sun shining incessantly for most of the summer, Kind of Blue’s target ever since has been the Grade 1 Betfair Sprint Cup Stakes on 5 September in the hope that the rain would finally arrive. The five-year-old has been second for the past two years. According to my weather forecasts, there is plenty of rain around for the next eight days in the Haydock area and I hope the ground will be properly soft by the off.

Lambourn trainer Ed Walker is one of racing’s good guys but even he found it difficult to stay cheerful after his stable star Almaqam was collared on the line by Item in the big race of the week at York, the Juddmonte International Stakes. So near yet so far to win a Group 1 contest, all the more frustrating since Alamaqam comfortably beat the two short-priced horses in the race, Ombudsman and Constitution River. I am hoping Walker’s disappointment will be short-lived because another of his leading lights, TEN BOB TONY, has a good chance of winning the Sky Bet City of York Stakes tomorrow (3 p.m.), even though stepping back in distance from a mile to seven furlongs may not be ideal.

Bazball's revels are now ended, and this week English cricket enters a brave new world after the retirement of captain Ben Stokes and defenestration of head coach Brendan McCullum. Well, actually, it's not all that brave, nor particularly new - Joe Root returning as skipper; recalls for Dan Lawrence and Ollie Pope for the Test series against Pakistan. And overseeing it all is another New Zealander in Stephen Fleming; though McCullum does assure us that his former international team-mate is 'like me only better'.  Of course, one might argue that isn't necessarily hard. McCullum's tenure started in a blaze of glory in that heady summer of 2022 when all things – enormous run chases at least - seemed possible.

Ripon has a unique sprint course with its undulations, which means that strong course and distance form is always a huge plus when backing a horse there. This is particularly true in a big field such as tomorrow’s William Hill/MND Association Great St Wilfrid Handicap (3.25 p.m.). However, of tomorrow’s 15 runners, no less than five have recorded course and distance wins over tomorrow’s trip of six furlongs. Of these, my preference is for the Nigel Tinkler-trained LORD ROXBY, who won at Ripon as recently as 3 August, beating another of today’s rivals, Dark Cloud Rising, in the process. Dark Cloud Rising has a 5 lb pull at the weights for a one-and-three-quarter length beating and so he will be fancied by many punters to gain revenge, especially given his high draw.

Times have been good for Fifa under president Gianni Infantino. It pulled off the largest-ever World Cup this summer, with the organisation’s revenue growing to $15 billion: three times what it was when Infantino took over a decade ago. Yet, ask most football fans their opinion of this most successful of Fifa chiefs and their verdict is unanimously scathing. He’s everyone’s favourite pantomime villain; the Blofeld of the Beautiful Game.  It’s not hard to see why in recent months. For Infantino, football is a means to an end. He courted Donald Trump by giving him the freshly invented ‘Fifa Peace Prize’ in December and, during the tournament, reportedly suspended American striker Folarin Balogun’s red card after a phone call from the US President.

Scottish trainer Iain Jardine knows what it takes to win the Sky Bet Ebor Handicap at York. He landed the race, the UK’s most valuable flat handicap, in 2017 with his then six-year-old gelding Nakeeta. This year Jardine, who trains in Dumfries and Galloway, plans to head back to York with another six-year-old gelding, PADDY THE SQUIRE, who also has a live chance of landing the spoils. Unlike many trainers, Jardine does not have any worries about his horse making the ‘cut’ for the race, which will have a maximum number of 22 runners. With a career high mark of 104, Paddy The Squire is guaranteed a place in the line-up.

Cricket has laws, rather than rules, which might explain why someone suspected of breaking them can become the subject of an extra-judicial lynch mob. Last month’s North Yorkshire and South Durham Cricket League’s Division Two game between the second elevens of Saltburn and Norton would normally struggle to make headlines in the Northern Echo. But thanks to video footage of Brian Devine, Saltburn’s 38-year-old slip fielder, apparently clicking his fingers as the ball sailed harmlessly past the outside edge – thereby fooling the umpire into giving the batsman out caught behind – the match has become famous across the world.  Newspaper readers from Melbourne to Mumbai have piled in below the line (and, sometimes, below the belt) to demand the fielder’s head.

The Coral Stewards’ Cup has to be one of the toughest handicaps of the year to solve and tomorrow’s running (Goodwood, 3.35 p.m.) is as open as they come, with a maximum field of 28 runners due to line up for this downhill cavalry charge over six furlongs. The most likely winner is arguably Two Tribes, who won this race last year and who ran such a top prep race for this contest just six days ago when second in the Moet & Chandon International Handicap at Ascot. However, the chances of Two Tribes winning are fairly obvious and he is now a single-figure price. Far Above Dream has a big shout too from stall 23 but he is also a single-figure price and the likely favourite.

Sometimes the obvious answer is the right one. And so it is with Lord’s versus the Oval. There’s a certain type of cricket fan who likes to point out that they prefer the south London ground, implying that Lord’s is just too famous, too touristy, not ‘real’ enough. If you’re interested in the actual play, goes the theory, if you’re properly gripped by how much turn the left-arm spinner will get in the second innings, then the Oval’s the place for you. Leave that poncey museum in NW8 to the arrivistes, the sort who can recite Blowers’s one-man show word-for-word but haven’t got a clue how Derbyshire’s seconds did last week.  The Ovaltinies are wrong, but for the opposite reason to the one they think.

Both favourites in the two major races at Ascot tomorrow are going to take a lot of beating if running up to their best form. At the odds on offer, however, neither makes any appeal as a good bet but it is no easy task finding a horse to beat them. The French raider Calandagan will try to win the Group 1 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes (3.35 p.m.) for a second successive year. He needed to be both talented and courageous to wear down the Andrew Balding-trained Kalpana in this race 12 months ago and he will be in his element on the fast ground tomorrow. However, odds of no bigger than 13-8 look skinny enough given the quality of the opposition in this nine-runner Grade 1 contest over a mile and a half.

There is something intimidating about sporting royalty in the stands. At many great clubs, retired legends seem almost gargoyle-like, perched high above the pitch, judging those sent to inherit their legacy. Manchester United have long played beneath the watchful gaze of Sir Alex Ferguson; other clubs have their own ghosts. Spain’s World Cup triumph offered a different spectacle. As the Spanish greats of the past – from David Villa to Iker Casillas – watched Lamine Yamal, Rodri and co defeat reigning champions Argentina, they resembled something more saintly; a reassuring reminder of Spanish supremacy. It was a far cry from the shaking head of Ronaldo watching yet another Brazilian disappointment or protestations of England’s World Cup alumni.

This weekend’s racing makes no appeal betting wise and so I am instead going to put up three ante-post bets in the hope of landing a big-priced winner for the column over the next month or so. The first bet is in Europe’s richest handicap on the flat, the Sky Bet Ebor Handicap at York on 22 August. This is a race in which Irish maestro Willie Mullins, who won the contest last year with Ethical Diamond, has no less than ten entries. Mullins keeps his cards so close to his chest that I wouldn’t want to bet on which of his horses will run let alone which might win the race. Instead, I prefer the chances of an exposed British trained-runner in DAIQUIRI BAY.

It is so-called ‘Super Saturday’ tomorrow with high-class racing at Newmarket, York and Ascot, and that’s good news for some of the lesser-known jockeys as it means they get an opportunity to ride fancied horses in some of the biggest races. That’s because the likes of Ryan Moore, Oisin Murphy, William Buick, Tom Marquand and Billy Loughnane can only be at one meeting at any one time. Rob Hornby is a hugely talented jockey but he often has to play understudy to Oisin Murphy when it comes to riding trainer Andrew Balding’s best horses. I am hoping Hornby can ride a winner tomorrow when he is reunited with MISS ATTITUDE in the John Smith’s City Walls Stakes (York, 3.12 p.m.).