Gambler looks the one to follow at Beverley
I’M A GAMBLER can defy top weight in the Alan Mcguiness And Robin Lunness Memorial Handicap at Beverley.
The three-year-old had a very busy first season on the track but was ultra consistent and appeared to improve with racing.
It may have taken him five attempts to get off the mark but he bumped into a couple of useful youngsters along the way, like Tolstoy and Ever Given.
When he finally did break his duck at Hamilton, he promptly went on to win next time out at Catterick under a penalty.
He cut no ice in a valuable nursery at the Ebor meeting but swiftly got back to winning ways at Hamilton off a mark of 84 before he shaped well in a #200,000 race at the St Leger meeting.
Given a bit of a break, he then ran in November back at Doncaster, his 10th outing of the season, finishing third.
Gelded over the winter, he reappears off 85 and hailing from Mark and Charlie Johnston’s yard, he is unlikely to need the run.
Love Your Work looks to give the excellent Rebecca Menzies another winner in the Rapid Lad Handicap.
As Paul Mulrennan stated recently after yet another win for the stable, whether it is five-furlong sprinters or three-mile chasers, they all seem to come alike to Menzies.
Love Your Work has been in good form of late, winning or coming second on each of his last five starts.
He gets to run off a lower mark on turf but was second at Doncaster recently, proving it is certainly no barrier.
Paul Midgley has few peers when it comes to training five-furlong sprinters and James Watt looks to be up against plenty of out-of-form rivals in the Watch On Racing TV Handicap.
Fourth on his seasonal reappearance at Newcastle, he has been dropped 2lb for that which is handy and with a run under his belt, he looks the one to beat.
Dubai Hope progressed at a rate of knots last season for Saeed bin Suroor and can return to winning ways in Chelmsford’s One Night Of Queen 2nd June Handicap.
She won a maiden at Wolverhampton, followed up off a mark of 77 before being beaten just half a length off a 10lb higher rating when last seen.
That was her fifth run in fairly quick succession and as her season did not get under way until mid-august, there should be more to come.
The Stuart Williams-trained Puerta De Vega bolted up last time out and can follow up in the Betsi Handicap.
Perth’s good meeting continues where the best bet could be Aubis Walk in the opening William Hill Pick Your Places Mares’ ‘National Hunt’ Novices’ Hurdle.
Honeysuckle’s owner Kenny Alexander paid #120,000 for her after she easily won an Irish point-to-point, she would probably have won the time before, too, but ran out when short of room.
She has been sent to Nicky Richards and looks a smart prospect.
Lucy Wadham’s Trincomalee loves good ground and a return to a sounder surface will suit in the South West Syndicate Handicap Hurdle at Warwick.
MY MANCHESTER UNITED YEARS By Sir Bobby Charlton First published: 2007 Sportsbookofthemonth.com price: £21.00
SIR Bobby was a naturally gifted footballer, although in the first volume of his enthralling tale he wastes no time dealing head-on with an event which, apart from his ability, defined his life, the 1958 Munich air disaster.
Charlton frequently asks himself why he was one of the famed Bubsy Babes to be saved. The answer was to become one of the world’s greatest-ever footballers.
Like almost every boy his age, Charlton grew up besotted by football. Playing the game for as long as parents would allow was the norm in the Northumberland mining village of Ashington, as it was everywhere else across Britain up until the mid-seventies.
Games involving almost every boy in the street were not unusual, but even among these unwieldy matches it soon became apparent that young Bobby, together with his older brother Jack, were endowed with a rare talent.
Charlton arrived at United aged 15, long before Baby Bentleys became a professional footballer’s must-have accessory. Operating within the confines of maximum wages, despite filling stadia with more supporters than ever before, footballers regularly travelled on the same bus as fans going to the match.
The corrosive cult of celebrity was still almost half a century away; players such as Charlton were normal, approachable guys and supporters of every opposition club could identify with this. These were the days when, if a player was chosen to play for England, his name was applauded by everyone in the ground when the teams were read out prior to kick-off.
How things have changed, and not necessarily for the better. Jimmy Hill’s campaign to abolish the maximum wage ensured that footballers were properly rewarded for attracting large crowds to matches, but as those rewards were boosted to unbelievable levels by television’s desire for live action, so home-grown players such as Charlton have become less evident.
During a career in which he played 759 times for Manchester United, Charlton won every honour in the game. Not surprisingly, there’s plenty here for readers to absorb, enough tragedy to mull over, anecdotes to enjoy and great games to relive. However, one wonders how long it will be before another Englishman (Nobby Stiles has already done so) will be able to write about winning the league title, the European Cup and the World Cup within the space of a few years.
For this reason alone, Charlton’s autobiography, like the man himself, is absolutely unique.
For many years, Sir Bobby Charlton has personified everything that is good about Manchester United, a football club that has shaped his life. It helps that a global profile has not eroded his personality; he continues to act with good grace and good manners, a man amply endowed with an ability to differentiate between right and wrong.