Three Runners At Plumpton

Today we have three meetings - 2 over the sticks at Kempton and Plumpton as well as a flat card at Wolverhampton.  The stable has three runners at Plumpton - bumper winner Lady Of Longstone (pictured above), ex-Irish import Rathealy and Saint John Henry.  Rathealy makes his debut for the stable today and he showed some fair form on the level, finishing third on yielding ground at Sligo over 10f and has a flat rating of 73.  Any rain at the course will help and a big run is expected.

On Saturday Taj Badalandabad finished fourth on his hurdles debut at Wetherby - it looked a good race on paper and he looks as though he will be suited to softer ground and is certainly capable of winning further races.  Meanwhile on Sunday Obistar finished runner-up at Carlisle on his first start in a handicap and this was his best piece of form so far.  He can improve again, possibly over a longer trip and he too looks as though he can win a similar race.

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Another Grand Prix, another Mercedes victory.  The US Grand Prix was anything but a cliff hanger as Lewis Hamilton prevailed from his team-mate yet again.  He has now overtaken Nigel Mansell in total number of career wins (32).  He looks all set to win his second World Championship with only three races left as he leads Nico Rosberg by 24 points.

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I watched Manchester City versus Manchester United yesterday afternoon - it was exciting match but was far from a classic with City prevailing 1-0.  Smalling was sent off for United in the first half for two yellow cards - I'm afraid he was stupid and deserved it.  City had three good claims for penalties turned down.

Chelsea won 2-1 but were not at their best to beat QPR, but the team to beat at the moment are Southampton would you believe?!  Southampton beat Hull 1-0 and are second in the table and deserve to be there.  Ronald Koelmans must be a good manager - remember they sold Alaanao, Lambert, Shaw, Lovren and Chambers and the replacements they have found look good.

Crystal Palace play Sunderland on SKy at 8pm and 23/20 looks like a decent bet about Palace...you heard it here first!

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Golfer Marcel Siem was put off by a dog running onto the 18th fairway and he bogeyed the hole in China at the weekend.  It wasn't a dog-leg but he won the playoff and won £1.3 million in prize money so he was not dog tired!