Racing tips: Smart German flat horse Western Soldier can win on his second outing over hurdles

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A breakdown of the disaster which was Sunday. Cairo was given a very weak ride in my opinion, Seamie was like a statue on him. Sprewell was ridiculously bad, something must've been amiss for him to finish that far back. Navy Seal got the lead which I thought Ryan would do, but the horse was nowhere near good enough. American Flag has gone backwards since having a nice start to the season, no excuses.

Plumpton 2:15 – Western Soldier 13/8 (2pt)

Western Soldier finished 3rd on hurdles debut nearly two weeks ago at Sedgefield when I stuck him up that day. He was well-supported that day, backed into 5/4F but couldn't manage to get the job done.

With that experience over hurdles now in his back pocket I think he should be much better off now, as we know any experience in life is greatly appreciated and is definitely a bonus to have. This horse was a Group-level performer in Germany on the flat so clearly has plenty of ability in his locker and we saw glimpses of that last time out at Sedgefield. His jumping wasn't immaculate, but it was good enough and would've given Milton Harris plenty to work with for this season.

Plumpton is a speedster track so I believe it will suit this smart flat horse, and the ground will be soft which is what his best runs on the flat came on, so I'm expecting him to get his head in front today.

Plumpton 2:45 – Kadex 9/2 (1pt)

Some of you might have noticed that John Paul Ryan has sent a couple of horses to Plumpton from his Ireland base, stuff like that has to be taken very seriously, especially when he has brought over Danny Mullins to do the riding. However, his horse in this race, he might be well-handicapped on the look of his 84 handicap rating, but he has shown very little and John's record in the UK is hardly inspiring with just 2 wins coming at Hexham since he started training and no other wins at any other track, with his record looking like 2/23 and 0 wins in the last five years on British soil.

In this small-runner field I thought the top weight could be worth chancing. Kadex was making his chase debut last time out at Warwick over 2m 4f, he weakened very quickly after making most of the running and it looked like a bit of a fitness session from Lucy Wadham, and getting him over fences in public. I think they did something similar last year over hurdles, they sent him out at the start of Jan on the back of a small absence and he weakened in a similar way that he did at Warwick. However, on his next run they put him up to 3m, like they are today, and he finished 2nd and put him a career-best since being trained by Lucy. That run was a very good effort as the winner went on to win again.

The soft ground should be up his street given that he won two hurdles in France on heavy and very soft ground. From his chase debut I can take that he can jump a fence nicely, he made a mistake but that's not a surprise from such an inexperienced horse and Warwick can be a bit of a jumping test, so his jumping was good enough for me to give him a chance in this very weak race.

Plumpton 4:45 – Idealko 5/2 (1pt)

Evan Williams is very good at getting horses to land multiple races in a row, and he manages to do that by getting his horses in races off very low handicap marks to begin with. Idealko won last time out on his second chase start off a mark of 69, and he won with a fair bit to spare, now he runs off a mark of 74 and I don't think that will be enough to stop him.

He'll have to prove he is as good on soft ground as he is on good to soft, but I don't think the ground should be an issue and neither should the extra 3f he'll have to run over as he was doing his best work in the final furlong over 2m at Ffos Las. running off a very light weight again against some decent horses for grade, but I think there is still plenty more to come from this horse who is still running off a basement handicap mark and is Evan Williams' and Adam Wedge's only horse at Plumpton.

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