Bill Esdaile

ACCORDING to the Ribblesdale Stakes (3.45pm) betting, the favourite, Diamond Rain, is going to be hard to beat. Unraced as a juvenile, she kicked off her career with a taking debut win at Ascot back in May and sparkled when stepped up in trip to 10 furlongs at Newbury next time out. Having bypassed the [...]

TODAY marks the middle day of five of this year’s Royal Ascot and for many it is the pinnacle of the meeting as it features the most prestigious race of the week, the Gold Cup (4.25pm). Flat racing often sees champions retired to stud after two or three seasons, which doesn’t give them the chance [...]

HOT off the back of a brilliant Royal Ascot, it’s a Classic weekend in Ireland. Aidan O’Brien swept all before him in Berkshire, landing his 13th Top Trainer title at the meeting, and sends LOS ANGELES to the Curragh in search of a remarkable 16th Irish Derby (4.05pm). O’Brien’s headline runner was last seen when [...]

NEWCASTLE hosts its biggest Flat meeting of the year this weekend featuring the Northumberland Plate (3.10pm), also known as the ‘Pitmen’s Derby’ as it formed the traditional centrepiece of the holiday season for local mine workers. An all-weather surface replaced the turf Flat course at Gosforth Park in 2016 but that has done little to [...]

ALL EYES are sure to be on Aidan O’Brien’s Derby winner City Of Troy on Saturday as he takes on his elders for the first time in the Eclipse (3.35pm). The star colt’s Epsom form received a real rubberstamp last weekend as Ambiente Friendly and Los Angeles, who finished second and third behind him in [...]

WHILE the south basks in sultry conditions this week, Haydock looks set to face regular showers all the way up to Saturday’s Old Newton Cup Day. Therefore, as is often the case at the Lancashire track, we best expect ‘soft’ to be in the going description come race-day. In the feature Old Newton Cup (3.15pm), [...]

THERE’S also a host of competitive action up at York headlined by the John Smith’s Cup (3.10pm). Sheikh Mohammed Obaid’s familiar yellow and black-silked string make up three towards the head of the betting, and the one that catches my eye is LIBERTY LANE. Karl Burke’s gelding started this season as a horse to follow [...]

NEWMARKET’s July Cup (4.35pm) is the centrepiece of this weekend’s action and it should provide us with the rematch between Inisherin and Vandeek we were deprived of in the Commonwealth Cup at Royal Ascot. Inisherin went on to win that race in good style in the absence of his main rival, who missed the Royal [...]

WE’RE also blessed with Jumps action on Saturday in the shape of the Summer Plate and Hurdle at Market Rasen. The Hurdle looks like a devilishly difficult puzzle to solve, so let’s focus on the Plate (3.15pm). Mole Court is a progressive horse for Ben Pauling and currently heads the betting at around 5/1, reopposing [...]

RAIN has been the constant theme recently, with the unseasonably wet weather making ground conditions difficult to predict and things particularly tough from a betting perspective. Newbury was hit with 16mm of rain on Monday evening, turning the going soft, but the rest of the week is expected to be dry, so hopefully we can [...]