Saturday 25th May 2019

Image: Jordan Yates

Author: Jordan Yates

Graphics: Logopit Plus

Curragh

The race that seemingly takes centre stage this Saturday takes place at the Curragh as the Irish 2000 Guineas is the feature event. A Grade 1 that’s contested over a mile and this year’s renewal has thrown up a cracker as it see’s the winner of the English equivalent Magna Grecia go head to head against the champion two year old in Too Darn Hot. It was only last week we saw John Gosden’s classy colt when he was tried over a longer trip in the Dante, he finished a gallant second that day to the impressive Telecaster and he certainly gave the impression that he’s retained all of his ability from last term. He also gave the impression that he is very much about speed as he made up a lot of ground very quickly to get to the leaders the last day at York, however flattened out slightly in the final furlong or so but back down in trip he’s every chance of being a leading light within the mile division this term. However today’s rival Magna Grecia will most certainly have something to say about that, I’m a massive fan of this horse and have been following his career since the get go. I was at Doncaster at the end of last season when he won the Group 1 Vertem Futurity and he showed that day what a tough but quality animal he is. Since then of course he’s gone on to win the English 2,000 Guineas in what was an even more impressive performance and it’s very unlikely he’ll go down without a fight against John Gosden’s raider here.

This is a pretty stellar renewal of this race with a whole host of classy performers making up the rest of the field, Mohawk, Van Beethoven, Old Glory and Globe Theatre conclude the Ballydoyle contenders and there’s also three more raiders from the UK. The first of these comes in the form of Craven Stakes winner and English Guineas third Skardu who represents the in form William Haggas stable and he’s closely followed in the market by Charlie Hills’ Phoenix Of Spain who closely followed Magna Grecia home in the Vertem back in October, concluding this UK trio is Kevin Ryan’s Emaraaty Ana who’s the mount of Andrea Atzeni. Two notable contenders for the home challenge look to be Decrypt and Shelir.  The former arrives here on the back of a fine reappearance victory the last day whereas Dermot Weld’s three year old by Dark Angel Shelir has won both of his starts this term and looks an exciting prospect moving forward. This duo are 20/1 and 33/1 respectively.

Race Verdict:

As clashes go they don’t get much better than this if truth be told, as a flat fan this is pretty much as good as it gets. Well I’m excited anyway. I love Magna Grecia, I think he’s an absolutely brilliant horse but back down to a mile I think TOO DARN HOT will be just that and prove too hot to handle. As stated in the build up he’s all about speed and I think he’ll be the champion miler this season, Frankie didn’t give him too hard of a time the last day in the Dante and I think he’ll come into this race much the better for that experiment. I’ve also had a very small punt on one at an absolute monster price and it’s one of the O’Brien contingent and that’s the Frankel colt OLD GLORY. He cost a rather staggering 1.6 million euros as a yearling and after winning on debut has always gave the impression that the further he goes up in trip the better he could be. It’s likely he could be used in somewhat of a tactical affair here but he certainly remains with potential and sporting those famous American Pharaoh silks there’s going to be a lot worse 100/1 shots out there. Decrypt made my shortlist too, he’s one that has been in my tracker for a while now and has been progressing with each start and despite being massively up in grade here he could be up for the challenge.

WIN: TOO DARN HOT (6/4) (Betfair SB)

EACH WAY: OLD GLORY (100/1) (Betfair SB)