Three At Newton Tonight

This afternoon we have four meetings to look forward to with flat action from Brighton, Leicester and Beverley, while over the sticks Newton Abbot hold an evening meeting.  The stable has three runners at Newton Abbot and my local track would be one of my favourites too - on a lovely sunny evening I can think of few places I would rather be.  Purple 'N Gold and Willem compete in the handicap hurdle at 7.30pm, while Good Value contests the lady's race at 8.35pm.  Purple 'N Gold (pictured above) seldom runs a bad race and should be thereabouts once again, while Willem has been essentially disappointing since arriving from France although he has shown glimpses of decent form.  Good Value has finished runner-up on a couple of occasions this term and Alex Dunn will be hoping he can go one better in the concluding race.

I don't suppose it is the biggest surprise in the world that Barry Geraghty is set to become the new retained jockey to leading owner J P McManus.  He has already ridden quite a few winners for him including a Champion Hurdle aboard Jezki and a World Hurdle on More Of That.  Even so, I wasn't sure he would take another retained jockey - afterall, he managed okay using the best jockeys available before he retained A P McCoy.  Barry Geraghty has an impossible act to follow...

I bet Mikey Ennis doesn't use his I-pad inside the weighing room again after he was fined £200 for using it at Wolverhampton.  I wonder who he was on too?

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What a great result for golfer Jordan Spieth at the weekend as he won the US Open.  Even so, I can't help but keep watching the replay of Dustin Johson three-putting from twelve feet.  The American is now blaming the state of the greens and while I can see his point (they did look terrible), everybody had to play on them.  To me it looked like a simple case of Johnson bottling it...I can't see them playing another major tournament on a course like this again.  Our Open championship is at St Andrews where you will see proper green greens - I can't wait!

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It is England versus New Zealand tonight in an exciting Twenty20 International cricket match from Old Trafford.  It starts at 6.30pm and it looks too close to call with the teams seeming fairly evenly matched.  I think I am going to hang on to my winnings from the remainder of the series.

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I see that former ladies' world number one tennis player Caroline Wozniacki is backing British player Laura Robson to return to her best ahead of Wimbledon.  The trouble unfortunately is that her best is not nearly good enough.  Still, at least Heather Watson managed to win a match yesterday at Eastbourne - she is clearly on a roll!

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