Martin Dixon of The Horse Watchers gives his verdict on the team's upcoming runners, including a course regular at Goodwood today.
Upcoming runners
Rhoscolyn - 15:00 Goodwood, Wednesday
His draw in stall 12 isn't ideal, but he has won around Goodwood from wide out before. I think you've just got to try and make the best of it. He's going to need to jump and break well and try to get into a positive position. But his Goodwood record on soft ground speaks for itself and he's won this race for the last two years, so it made sense to go back there. We thought he ran pretty well at Ascot last time. It's not a track where he has anything like as good a record as he does at Goodwood, so this should be much more suitable. He's slightly higher in the weights than he's ever won off, so he's going to need to produce his very best to win, particularly from his draw, but he seems in good order and conditions are his optimum.
Further ahead
Royal Zabeel - 17:20 Newmarket, Saturday
He has an entry at Newmarket where it looks like there might be some nice ground over the weekend. The race he's in on Saturday is under serious consideration. He won on the July Course and, with that in mind, we'd expect the Rowley Mile to suit him. He ran well on the Rowley Mile in the Abernant earlier in the season. It's important that the ground isn't too soft for him, so, given opportunities will be quite limited over the next month, the percentage call will be to run him at Newmarket. He seems in good form. We tried him in a listed race over six furlongs at York last time but things happened a bit quickly for him and it was the race in which two horses unfortunately came down and he got hampered. He was on the retreat a bit but wasn't completely done with at the time he got hampered. That's a run you can put a line through, and I'd say stepping back up to seven furlongs in handicap company is more suitable for him on the turf.
Looking Back
Daring Legend
It was good to see him get his head in front at Newmarket - now 16 of the 20 horses we've run more than once this year have won. It was a deserved win given he was unlucky a couple of times in the summer and was banging his head against the crossbar and running well. It seems that seven furlongs on a straight track is what he needs.
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Hornsea Bay
I think it's fair to say he hasn't scaled the heights we hoped he would at the start of the year, but he's largely been running well without everything going his way. They went too steady for him at York where he ran very well from right out the back in a slowly-run race and then at Ayr last week he was travelling strongly but got squeezed for room when looking to challenge. I'm not saying it was the difference between winning and not, but it stopped him from getting into a challenging position in a key part of the race. He still ran very well and was only edged out for second place. He's a talented horse who, when things drop right, has it in him to win a big race.
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