Racing tips: The quirky Whataboutyeh is still well treated over fences

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It's becoming extremely painful watching how badly the horses are running each day. No excuses on my part, clearly some bad picking, but I've not changed anything up in my selection process. We go again…

Sedgefield 2:20 – Western Soldier 5/2 (1pt Bet365)

I was expecting Western Soldier to be a shade of odds on for this hurdles debut, as based on his flat form he should be head and shoulders above this weak field if his jumping is anything above average.

Milton Harris acquired this horse from Germany for 62,000 Euros, which is a decent sum, but I have full faith in Milton as he is a trainer I rate extremely highly. He doesn't waste his bullets when sending his horses to the northern tracks, especially Sedgefield. He has a 21% SR at this track, and has a very nice profit of +24.48 to £1 level stakes. He has tended to use this course as an introductory to the jumps game for some of his nice horses like Knight's Salute, so I think you should be pay attention to the fact he is sending this horse to this track for his hurdles debut as he was on the border of being a Group horse in Germany and did produce consistent RPRs in the 90s and even hit the 100s on a couple of occasions.

His pedigree is very good, every horse bred from the mare has managed to obtain black type and the pedigree for jumps looks there as the Sire has produced some smart jumpers in his time with the likes of Saldier and Arctic Fire to name a couple. He should be fit enough for this first start as his last race only came 66 days ago, which isn't a huge gap in between races and the horses who have hurdles form to date aren't exactly pumping out fantastic numbers, so I think the price he currently is at is definitely classed as value.

Sedgefield 4:05 – Whataboutyeh 2/1 (2pt Bet365)

It's hard to get too optimistic about Whataboutyeh as he is a bit of a monkey and I don't think he knows whats going on in his head, but there is one for thing for certain and that he has plenty of ability and if he wants to win then he has all the tools to do so, especially off his handicap mark which is surely still miles off what he can reach.

This horse has his own way of doing things, the way he travels through his races would suggest that as he travels like a dream, but as soon as he hits the front it can go from one extreme to the other and before you know it he virtually pulls himself up. Johnathan England will have a task of delivering him as late as possible for this race, so ideally you'd like a horse to carry him into the race as deep as possible. I think he'll travel like a dream again, he stays the trip, but what will be in his favour today is the good ground that Sedgefield has as I do believe the heavy ground he encountered at Cartmel last time out was not for his liking, so in the grand scheme of things he ran very well.

I know he has been expensive to follow, with him losing at short odds on a few occasions, but he isn't too short today and 2/1 is more than fair for him who I do believe has the capability of moving up the ratings by at least 20lbs.

Ludlow 2:10 – Minella Plus 11/1 (0.5pt EW)

Bad yard form is normally a big put-off for me, but when the odds are decent enough I think you can take a chance of the horse.

Donal McCain normally fires in winners left right and centre, as he is one of the northern powerhouses but over the last few weeks his yard has struggled for wins. However, Minella Plus is on a far too dangerous handicap mark to ignore and odds of 10/1 or around that are more than fair enough despite the yard suffering with their form.

Donald likes to have a runner in this race, he won it 12 months ago with See The Sea and he has had another runner-up in the years this race has been running. Minella Plus is his only runner at the track and is the only ride for Peter Kavanagh, who was on board the winner of this race last year. This horse was once a decent hurdler and chaser, and was rated 126 over hurdles at his best, that mark has come down to 102, which is effectively 99 with Peter's 3lb claim, which makes him hard to ignore despite the form dip and form of the yard. He has previously won at this course, which is a big tick in my book and I think his run before last time out was a signal that he was returning to form. He was well-fancied to back that decent effort up at Hexham when backed into favouritism but he bombed out, and I think you can relate that to the form of the yard. He's had a few weeks off the track, which will have hopefully got him back to form and as long as the ground doesn't get too soft with the forecast rain likely to turn it to good to soft at the very worst (I hope), he should be fine.

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