On Our Travels!

There are two jumps meetings taking place this afternoon and the stable has runners at both Carlisle and Huntingdon.  Big Occasion and African Broadway (pictured above after winning at Wetherby) head up to Carlisle where they will be partnered by Tom Scudamore (who is developing a northern accent!) - they both look to be nice chasing prospects, although they will know they have been in a race.  Carlisle is a very stiff track and when the going comes up soft, things can get very testing.  Meanwhile Conor O'Farrell will be on duty at Huntingdon to partner My Brother Sylvest in the novices' chase.

Irish trainer Gordon Elliott runs Oscar Hill at Huntingdon and I see that the first prize is worth only £2144 - I would imagine that he will need to win just to cover the expenses!  With all the good prize money on offer in Ireland, it does make me wonder why some of these trainers come over to England quite so often.

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I had to laugh when I read in Richard Hughes column that he came in for criticism on Twitter for the ride on Strong Suit at Newbury.  The champion jockey elect says that you can't please all of the people all of the time, but there are certainly some people that will never be happy with him - he went on to point out that while Strong Suit was getting beaten, he was away in Portugal catching some sun with his family!

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John Gosden is on the verge of claiming his first trainers' championship and this is a wonderful achievement.  However, when you consider that Richard Hannon has trained 100 winners more than him (and JG would only be fourth in the table) you have to wonder if the title is being decided correctly...they don't decide the jockeys' championship in this manner.  Fortunately ours seems to be the only sport where they work out their champions like this.

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Liverpool take on Newcastle this afternoon at 4pm and the Reds need to start scoring some goals, especially at home.  Also, QPR play Reading - it is the third from bottom taking on the bottom club in the league so there is plenty at stake.  It is only November but these are already crucial games...especially for the managers!