3 At Worcester

There are five meetings taking place this afternoon with flat cards from Carlisle, Salisbury, Kempton and Bath as well as a jumps fixture from Worcester.  The stable runs Street Entertainer, Brenda de Ronceray and Street Entertainer at Worcester this afternoon.  Street Entertainer, who has already twice been a winner over timber this season is odds-on favourite for the three runner novices' chase as he makes his debut over the larger obstacles.  He was a fluent jumper over hurdles, so let's hope that he can translate that to fences.  Brenda de Ronceray sees the racecourse for the first time today in what looks to be a competitive bumper and I am sure she will learn plenty from the experience.  Our final runner, Weather Babe carries top weight of 11-12 in the 2m7f handicap hurdle and our home-bred mare has been running well this term - she drops back in trip but has already proven her effectiveness and should go well once again.  Tom Scudamore is aboard all three of our runners.

Willem showed improved form to finish second in the handicap hurdle at Newton Abbot last evening with stablemate Purple 'N Gold running another solid race in third although the handicapper does look to have his measure at present.  Even so, they will not always run into a Group 3 winning flat horse (rated 114) during the summer!

I see that the Racing Post would appear to be suggesting that motor-mouthed orange Attheraces presenter Matt Chapman could be the saviour of Channel 4 Racing.  The production team would need someone quite sharp to bleep out some of his comments!  Obviously he would provoke some debate and that has to be a good thing, although if you go into any local bookmakers there are usually half a dozen so called experts that talk just like him!  I like Matt, although he can sometimes be guilty of sensationalism and looking for trouble in races where there isn't any...racing certainly doesn't need negative publicity such as the suggestion of foul play used in an irresponsible manner where it is without substance.  I guess the fact that I am even talking about him shows that he would raise awareness within the sport.  I remember once going for a meal with Matt and one of his girlfriends and he made her pay so he can't be all bad!

Former Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson has a horse running today called Hairdyer - I wonder who that is named after?

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What a great turnaround from England's cricketers to beat New Zealand again in their Twenty20 match at Old Trafford yesterday.  There was a great knock from Joe Root who scored 68 in just 45 balls.  The Aussie's will be a different proposition however and I still don't hold out much hope of being able to compete with them.

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If Tara Moore plays Serena Williams at Wimbledon things could get a little heated.  The British world number 401 blasted Serena earlier in the month for what she perceived as on-court theatric during the French Open at Roland Garros.  I'm not sure what she was hoping to achieve by her comments although I certainly wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of Serena!

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I'm not renowned for my green fingers but have you ever tried to get rid of Japanese knotweed?  Alan Titchmarsh says the answer is to put five lots of weedkiller on it and then move!  He's not a bad judge...I reckon I have put enough weed killer on mine to kill off half of Devon, yet it still keeps coming back!

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A final thought for the day...did you know that only 55% of Americans know that the sun is a star?  I wouldn't have thought there are many that read the Sun!

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