Super Saturday!

There are four meetings taking place this afternoon, two over the sticks at Newbury and Warwick as well as all-weather fixtures at Lingfield and Wolverhampton.  We have runners at both National Hunt meetings; Swing Bowler and Dell' Arca in the Betfair Hurdle and Seven Nation Army in the bumper at Newbury as well as Tullyesker Hill at Warwick.  Tom Scudamore rides both Dell' Arca (pictured above) and Seven Nation Army, while Conor O'Farrell takes the ride aboard Swing Bowler.  Meanwhile, over at Warwick conditional jockey Tom Bellamy comes in for the ride aboard Tullyesker Hill.  I thought he looked interesting with Tom's claim a big help under such gruelling conditions - Tullyesker Hill will handle the ground and should run a big race.

Yesterday both of our runners ran creditably enough without getting their heads in front, with Baltimore Rock and Smiles For Miles both finishing second.  In my opinion if Baltimore Rock had jumped the last two hurdles cleanly he would have won - he still needs to learn to settle better and still gives the impression that he will be suited by a quicker surface.  Smiles For Miles produced a better performance to finish runner-up to Harry's Farewell, trying to concede 3lbs to the winner - he looks capable of winning something similar from a mark of 109.

The horse that caught my eye yesterday was Third Act who won the bumper.  I am not sure what he beat, but he did it very easily and now heads for the Cheltenham Festival.  He will probably be a decent price next month and there will certainly be worse outsiders than this one.

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I know I am always banging on about prize money and there are certainly no grounds for complaint today at Newbury with the Berkshire course putting up over £315,000.  However, I see that one of trainer Brendan Juke's owners has just won £25,000 from a pigeon race in South Africa...I suppose the training fees will go on his bill!

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Sri Lanka's star batsman Kumar Sangakkara made 319 runs in the first innings of their match against Bangladesh.  He followed that up with 105 in the second innings and is only the second player to score a triple century and fourth player to make 400 runs in a test match.  He scored more than England did on the entire Ashes tour recently.

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If you were head of the Environment Agency would you have visited the south west of England?  I guess it just shows how daft these people are...he received plenty of stick as you would expect.  But true to form, much like any politician - he never answered a question with a yes or a no.

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For those of you fancying a little wager on the football this weekend, I will be backing Manchester United at 2/9, Chelsea at 2/7, Burnley at 4/6 and Manchester City at 4/11 - all short odds but I fancy them to win and they should make a nice little acca.