Play Private Ruler on the banjo

People who have been in racing for many years tend to refer to runners like Banjo On My Knee as brasses as they flatter to deceive but I am going to give him one more chance and hopefully he can win Race 7, a Pinnacle Stakes over 1800m at Flamingo Park today.

This Mambo in Seattle gelding looked an unlucky loser when making his course debut and finishing 0.75 lengths behind his rival in this race Two Guns over the course and distance in September.

Banjo On My Knee followed up that by getting caught late last time out by Calls To Heaven over 2200m.

Clearly the 1800m will suit Banjo On My Knee and jockey Marco van Rensburg gets his chance to make amends.

Trainer Paul Matchett has a number of winning chances with his runners at this meeting but the best of them could be Tokolosh in Race 4 and Private Ruler in Race 6.

Jockey Johannes Greyling will be aboard both.

Tokolosh has been at his very best of late having dropped to 1000m and if reproducing his last three runs on the turf here trying the sand, he will be hard to beat.

Private Ruler took a while to get the hang of racing on the sand but has won his last two starts at this track.

In July he beat African Magic by 0.25 lengths over 1300m and that runner was in good form at the time.

Private Ruler followed that up by beating Regent Seven by 0.40 lengths and just last week Regent Seven was a wide-margin winner, Private Ruler was at good Eachway odds of 6-1 at the time of writing.