Gabrial Great At Newton!

There was another nice winner for the stable yesterday afternoon as Gabrial The Great (pictured above) made a winning chase debut at Newton Abbot.  He was given a fine front-running ride from Tom Scudamore and it reminded me of his father back in the early days.  It was his first start over the larger obstacles and he was a bit chancy at one or two of them but he can only improve for the experience.  David will certainly be gloating to me when I see him as he told me he would win!

It is a busy old day today with no fewer than eight meetings taking place with flat cards from York, Musselburgh, Sandown, Chester, Bath, Lingfield and Leicester (who have to pass an early morning inspection) as well as a jumps card from Hexham.  The most important meeting of the day from our perspective is at Musselburgh where we have a runner in the two mile flat handicap at 2.35pm.  Impulsive American won on this track a week ago over 1m6f and it looks as though the additional two furlongs could bring about further improvement and winning jockey Adam McNamara is in the saddle once again and takes a handy 7lbs off his back.  Another good run is expected.

Many happy returns to prominent owner Trevor Hemmings.  You may recall that Trevor owned all of the Pontins holiday camps and I still recall doing an exhibition when he came out and challenged me to a game of ping pong.  I wasn't too hard on him - he was my boss afterall!

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Host nation France kicked off the Euro 2016 tournament with a 2-1 success over Romania.  It was a scrappy game and the winning goal came in the 89th minute.  The best player on the pitch was Dimitri Payet and it was a stunning goal - I wonder who he plays for?!  England start tonight with their match against Russia at 8pm on ITV.  Only a win will do for us and England will do for me at 19/20.  Meanwhile Wales play Slovakia at 5pm on BBC1.

Sadly there was more trouble at the Euros last night.  The trouble makers should just be locked up for the next three weeks so they don't see a single game and then sentenced afterwards.

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I see that Rod Stewart received a knighthood in the honours list so all of the jokes are coming out with song titles such as "Tonights The Knight"!  I remember talking to Rod at the races at Sandown many years ago when Carol came rushing over to tell him that he needed a haircut, completely oblivious to who he was!

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Who was the weakest player in the Greek fish football team?  Achilles Eel - sorry, I thought it was topical!