Saturday 15th August 2020

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“Welcome to this Saturday’s Preview which comes from Newbury, and their feature race the Group 2 Hungerford Stakes. Over the last couple of days the focus on the site has been in predominantly in Ireland which is often the case. Three winners out of four were had on Friday at the Curragh, with Frenetic, Delphi and Armory all doing the business….

….this preview is going to be short and sweet, so as ever, enjoy!” – Jordan

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The Hungerford Stakes is a Group 2 race that’s contested over a distance of seven furlongs. This year’s race hasn’t thrown up the best of renewals, however, it seems to be about one horse for me and that’s DREAM OF DEAMS for Sir Michael Stoute and Oisin Murphy. He’s miles above the rest of the field on all known form and was last seen finishing a very close-up second in the Diamond Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot, behind Hello Youmzain. He’s arguably a Group 1 horse, which is a level that none of these can really match. His only negative for me would be potentially soft ground, but he still has form on ground with give in it and if turning up anywhere near his best I think he’ll be very tough to beat.

Who are the dangers? The main danger for me here looks to be John Gosden’s Glorious Journey, who’s the mount of James Doyle. He won this race last year on soft ground and is a generally consistent performer at this sort of level, I think he’ll be there or thereabouts again. As for the rest of them, Threat was a very smart horse as a two-year-old but hasn’t been quite right so far this season and the has “he trained on?” question very much looms over him. Surf Dancer still looks pretty unexposed for William Haggas, SDS is on board him, but he’ll need to take a step up on the level of form he’s shown so far.

My Punt: Dream Of Dreams (7/4) (Finishing Position: 1st)