Newbury, Kelso Runners

There are five meetings taking place this afternoon with jumps cards from Doncaster, Kelso and Newbury as well as all-weather flat fixtures from Lingfield and Southwell.  David has three runners today with two at Newbury and one at Kelso.  Umbrigado contests the 2m4f Greatwood Gold Cup at 1.50pm.  A high class horse over hurdles, he has taken well to chasing this season, winning two of his three starts and he certainly appears to be improving.  Whilst most of his wins have come with cut in the ground, he has won on the prevailing good going and looks to have solid claims in a valuable and very competitive Grade 3 contest.  David Noonan rides.

Iron Heart is our other runner at Newbury and he won't mind the drying ground at all.  A decent dual-winner on the flat last season, he has shown promise to finish in the frame three of his four starts under NH rules.  He was only narrowly beaten in a three-way photo in a jumpers' bumper at Kempton last time out and looks reasonably treated with only 10-0 to carry after Fergus Gillard's claim.  Only a four year old, he is open to plenty of improvement and is a nice prospect for owners, Decimus Racing.  They operate a number of racing syndicates and there are still a couple of 10% shares available in this chap.  Please do get in touch with our office if you are interested in dipping you toe into the ownership experience.

Night Edition is our third and final runner and he contests the valuable Morebattle Hurdle at Kelso at 3.15pm.  He was a good juvenile hurdler last season and produced an excellent performance when runner-up at the Cheltenham Festival from a 4lbs higher mark than today.  He has obvious claims on that form and conditions should suit but he does need to improve on his efforts this term to get involved.  Tom Scudamore is in the saddle.

*****

England's cricketers are staring down the barrel of an innings' defeat in the final test match of the series against India following another batting collapse.  England are currently 74 for 6 and trailing by 86 runs in their second innings.  Another loss will mean that India win the series 3-1 after England made a promising start to the campaign by winning the opening match.

There were a number of shocks in the Gibraltar Open snooker yesterday with Kyren Wilson, Mark Williams, Mark Selby and Stuart Bingham all losing.  Meanwhile, veteran Jimmy White rolled back the years by beating Bingham 4-2 and Mark Allen survived an almighty scare, winning 4-3 after an outrageous fluke on the final black.

*****