Five starts without a win. That is the line on MANAGING DIRECTOR (8:00 Southwell, 13/8) that will put most people off, and it is the wrong thing to read. The races he lost are where the case sits. At York on 6 September he was beaten half a length, and the horse that did it has since gone and won a Class 4. Another rival out of his recent starts has won since as well, so the company he has been keeping is not the company his form figures suggest. Only one of the seven here is higher on the official marks, he has raced over this trip, and Southwell brings more out of Geoff Oldroyd’s runners than tracks in general do. He has been running to a level that wins ordinary races without getting his head in front. Four furlongs and a bit on a standard surface with P. J. McDonald up is a fair place to put that right.
Beverley
Six days is not long to wait after a winning run, and STAR SUEPREME (1:30 Beverley, 4/1) gets it anyway. Lemos De Souza has not let her cool off. The forgiving part of that is the track, because she has gone well over course and distance before, and Beverley over a mile and two asks questions that a horse either has already answered or has not. Stall five is the right end of the draw over the trip. Her speed figures have been drifting the wrong way rather than the right one, so nobody should be calling her progressive. We are on the course form and the winning run, and that is the whole of it.
A handicapper only has so long to catch a horse that is climbing. BATTENBURG BELLE (3:50 Beverley, 13/8) is climbing. Two wins on the bounce off a modest starting point, the second of them a fortnight ago, and the figures behind those wins have jumped rather than crept. Good ground is what her record asks for and that is what Jason Hart will find under her over the five furlongs.
Four weeks between runs is the opposite of the Star Suepreme situation and it suits AMBER HAMUR (5:35 Beverley, 5/2) just as well. She has won two of her last three and added a third last time, so nothing has gone wrong and nothing has been asked of her recently. The Ripon run on 3 August is the piece of evidence that stands up best, where she finished two lengths in front of a rival that has won since. Her own figures have come on sharply from a low base too, which is the pattern that beats a handicapper. Good ground is fine by her record, she has had a go at this trip, and Connor Beasley takes it on from stall nine.
Yesterday our five headline picks produced a winner in Naoi at 13/2 and two others placed.
Southwell
Which leaves the biggest price on the list. MOVING SHADOW (5:30 Southwell, 13/2) went to Leicester on 29 July and was beaten a head. The horse that beat him has since won a Class 4, and he is not the only one out of Moving Shadow’s recent races to have won since, so that form has been tested in public and it has held up. The bare figures read seven and three in his last two and they undersell what he has been doing. He now drops in class from the grade he was winning in, which is the move that turns a placed horse into a winning one often enough to matter. Stall six is a good spot over a mile round here and Sam James has the straightforward ride from it. Fifty five days off the track is the thing you are betting against, and it is a real query rather than a token one, because a horse back from that long needs to have been left alone by choice.
Two at Southwell, then, and the same idea underneath both of them. The horses that have been beating these two keep going on to win. At 13/8 and 13/2 you are being asked very different prices for it.