Bally In The La Barka!

There are six meetings taking place this afternoon with flat cards at Newbury, Doncaster, Newmarket and Thirsk supported by jumping fixtures from Uttoxeter and Bangor. David left early this morning to catch the plane to Paris as the stable runs Ballynagour in the Prix la Barka (French Champion Hurdle Trial) at 2.08pm (UK time). It is a Grade 2 contest worth over £60,000 to the winner and as you would expect for that sort of prize money, it is extremely competitive. Silsol representing Paul Nicholls and Val de Ferbet and Gitane du Berlais (Willie Mullins) complete the overseas raiding party. Unfortunately I don’t think there is a British channel that will be showing the race, although Martin has the French racing channel, so no prizes for guessing where I will be!

Brown Panther finished a creditable runner-up in the Yorkshire Cup yesterday, trying to concede 5lbs to winner Snow Sky. It was probably a decent performance and he would appear to have sound claims in the Ascot Gold Cup next month.

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The big football match of the day is between Liverpool and Crystal Palace. The match doesn’t mean an awful lot except that it marks the last game for Steven Gerrard with Liverpool. Apparently tickets are going on the black market for £1200. He has been a superb player for his only team Liverpool and I am surprised they could not persuade him to take another position with the club, perhaps as a coach or something similar.

The best match of the weekend looks to be between Manchester United and Arsenal tomorrow afternoon at 4pm. It looks fairly tight with United available to back at 6/4 and Arsenal at 21/10.

I see that Leicester are going to give their players a £300,000 bonus if the team stays in the Premiership. That is just a week’s wages to the likes of Wayne Rooney!

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I keep looking through the England cricket team and they have a Test match coming up against New Zealand before the Ashes series against the Aussies. Remember, we could not beat a poor West Indian side so I dread to think how we are going to get on against Australia. I can see a few hidings coming up this summer as our batting line-up looks distinctly moderate…and no, I won’t mention the fact that our best batsman is missing!

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Did you know that in one day, your heart will beat an average of 100,000 times…what about if you are involved in a photo finish?!