Hi there all,
Time to get back on the horse. A piss poor Aintree made up my mind to take May (and the rest of April) off. It's never a particularly profitable time for me, with the end of the jumps and the start of the flat/summer jumps. Good job too as you'd have lost a shitload. I'm still a bit hit and miss, but its Derby Day so I should take on a very open looking renewal at try and find the winner.
1.40 Vincent O'Brien Handicap.
Arlequin (10/1) looks a good type for the opener. Won at York last month and although he's gone up 11lbs for that, there could be more to come. James Bethell has got his 3yo's firing after a tough winter and Phillip Robinson is in excellent form with 12 wins from 47 rides this season, top stuff by anyone's standards. I expect the 10/1 to disappear before the morning is out.
3.15 Investic Dash (Heritage Handicap)
Great race, lots of trouble in running and hopefully a big-priced winner. Moorhouse Lad (16/1, general) won at Musselburgh 5 weeks ago, this is tougher but this is a former Group 3 winner and can run well at a decent price, Brian Smart has an 18% strike-rate this season. I'm also sweet on Judge 'N' Jury (25/1, vcbet, Lad) who has been running under the radar recently after an excellent 2008 and some decent results last year. Phillip Robinson is on board this too.
4.00 Investec Derby
This doesn't look to be the greatest of renewals. It's probably best to stick to the horses at the top of the market as they have provided the winner over the last decade. Jan Vermeer (11/4f, William Hill), Midas Touch (7/1, Ladbrokes) and Bullet Train (15/2, Coral, Bet365, Skybet) look to have the credentials to be the winner but it looks a race to steer clear of to me. Of the bigger priced horses, Azmeel (12/1, general) looks to have improved as a 3yo and could make the frame. Ted Spread (33/1, general) improved LTO but would provide a massive shock if he won this. Rewilding would be a trendbreaker if he won this, but he looked pretty good on his UK debut and I wouldn't rule out. A horrible race this year and best to keep to fun stakes.
That's it I think, can't see much value in the last two races.
World Cup Bets
I've been looking at the Top Scorer markets for each team. The standout bet was Stanislav Sestak of Slovakia. Slovakia are in Group F with Italy, Paraguay and New Zealand. Slovakia are no mugs and definitely have a chance of qualifying. But we don't care if they qualify or not, we just want our man to score the most goals for Slovakia. Sestak has 10 goals from 29 Caps. Not bad, but he scored almost half of their qualifying goals and ended the campaign with 6 goals in 6 games. and he was only on the field for 469 mins in those games. He's 11/4 with sportingbet and Totesport.
The value bet is at Coral, where they are offering 28/1 on there being no scorer for Switzerland. Now Switzerland can easily fail to score in 3 games, they are pretty average. Spain and Chile should cause them all sorts of problems and their game against Honduras is the 3rd of the group where nil points and nil goals could already be on the cards. This is at altitude and Honduras are no mugs.
Mexico (13/8, bet365) should see off South Africa in the opening game and South Korea (21/10, bet365) can beat Greece the next day at a decent price. South Korea are my dark horses to qualify in Group B.
