Robinson Runner At Kempton

A cold start to the morning with temperatures dipping to freezing. There are four meetings taking place this afternoon with jumps cards from Ayr, Kempton and Ludlow and an all-weather flat fixture from Chelmsford City.  David has one runner today as Major Robinson contests the 3m½f handicap hurdle at Kempton at 2.55pm.  The winner of an Irish bumper, he is yet to get his head in front over hurdles but has some good placed form in the book, notably when runner-up at Wetherby towards the end of last season.  He is 3lbs lower than that now and could improve with the application of blinkers for the first time today.  It is a trappy little race and he can go well under Tom Scudamore, although with seven runners, the bookies only pay two places.

Trusty Scout made a satisfactory start over hurdles at Huntingdon on Saturday, finishing fourth in the maiden hurdle.  His jumping improved the further he went and he will have learned plenty for the experience.  The winner brought some good form to the table having run against the likes of Monmiral and Tritonic, so this was an encouraging effort.

Ramses de Teillee finished a close fourth in the valuable handicap chase at Haydock, where he was beaten only four lengths by the progressive winner.  He was conceding 23lbs to that one, so lost little in defeat.  The ground would have been plenty quick enough for him and he will be seen to better effect when the mud is flying.

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The top three sides in the Premier League all produced impressive performance to maintain the status quo but the biggest news of the weekend came with the sacking of Manchester United boss, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer with Watford putting the final nail in his coffin with a 4-1 win.

Lewis Hamilton was gifted the Qatar Grand Prix yesterday after title rival Max Verstappen was hit with a dubious five place grid penalty when he did not see a rogue yellow flag during qualifying.  I say dubious, as other drivers were also penalised, but to a different degree.  Verstappen did his best to make a race of it, climbing to second and securing an additional point for fastest lap but there are now just 7 points between the main protagonists.  Am I the only one that gets the feeling that this is being orchestrated with only two races remaining?

Judd Trump duly won the only major championship missing from his CV by crushing John Higgins 10-4 in the final of the Champion Of Champions snooker yesterday.  Trump reeled off the last five frames for a comfortable victory.  There is lots of snooker action at this time of year, with the much vaunted UK Championship getting underway tomorrow.

Happy days...the Minnesota Vikings took their second notable scalp in successive weeks as they beat arch-rivals the Green Bay Packers at home.  I had thought that they were away, but a win against them is a big deal, even if the Vikes had home field advantage...and how did they do it?  By going head to head with their rivals, rather than reverting to conservative play calling.  The season may not be over yet...and even if it was, they still beat the Packers! :)

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 Why was the paediatrician always losing his temper? Because he had little patients!