EACH DAY OF the Cheltenham Festival, Heed Your Hunch will be bringing you tips for the first, the last and the feature race at Prestbury Park thanks to Betway.
Irish bankers generally arrive earlier in the week. This year though, the Triumph Hurdle will carry so many hopes for the Green Army at Prestbury Park. Sir Erec (Evs) is favourite and will officially be Joseph O’Brien’s first Triumph winner.
Although his dad Aidan has his name on the scoreboard beside Ivanovich Gorbatov, really his son did the work from his Pilltown base, not Ballydoyle.
Sir Erec is a top class flat horse — his closest rivals from Ireland are in the same ownership so won’t oppose him — and the best English challenge won’t run. The son of Camelot will have the Irish punters dining at the round table for the rest of the day.
The festival’s blue riband looks a vintage renewal this year. Native River is aiming to become the first dual winner since Kauto Star and first back-to-back winner since Best Mate.
Those stats show just how difficult it is to back up, it has become rare for the holder to even get a chance to reclaim their crown. It’s a stronger field with more classy horses in attendance than last year, but the best horse often gets beaten in the Gold Cup — it’s a relentless grind over three and a quarter miles.
The Colin Tizzard-owned nine-year-old has never been out of the first three over fences, including his last three visits to Cheltenham. Native River (4/1) will bring the field to a world of pain and won’t stop. Winning will be an outstanding achievement, but he will not be out of the frame.
The closing race of the festival is the Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys’ Handicap Hurdle. Gordon Elliot has won the last two renewals of this race. He was an assistant to Martin Pipe in his youth and clearly has an affinity for the race. Dallas des Pictons (5/1) looks to be his main hope and is the type of horse who excels in this one.
Get your money back as a free bet if your horse loses in the first or the last race over each day of the Cheltenham Festival with Betway’s Money Back Special. You can also win a prize of £25k each day of Cheltenham on Betway’s Insider Blog with 4 To Win, a free-to-play prediction game. Offer as above. 18+, always gamble responsibly. For more, see BeGambleAware.org
If he does live Dortmund. Think Liverpool would suit him. He seems to be able to achieve alot with limited resources and young players. Could be what the pool needs. Don’t want to see Rodgers go but Klopp would be a good replacement. YNWA
If he was to go to Liverpool and do what he has done at Dortmund, Liverpool would have a few good seasons before becoming a feeder club to teams with more money. They would end up in the relegation zone before he moved on to do the same in Spain or Italy.
Klopp could do a lot better than us, and that’s coming from a liverpool fan.
I still think arsenal would be mad to let wenger go. Much harder to win the English league than the German one. I think if arsenal do let wenger go they’ll only realise what they’ve lost afterwards.
I don’t think Klopp is the right choice for Arsenal and maybe not Liverpool. The reason they’re doing well in the CL and horrifically in the league is because they have one gameplan and domestic opposition and copped onto it. They sit back and hit on the counter to negate Dortmund’s high energy attacks. They’re afforded more time on the ball in the CL and that means they’re doing well but Klopp hasn’t adapted at all with Dortmund, Guardiola has worked out how to adjust his plan for different opponents and completely deserves the continued domination in Germany whereas Dortmund have fallen away.
I am not at all saying that Klopp is a bad manager, but seeing fans beg for their manager to be sacked and to have him placed as a saviour for any team in need simply isn’t correct.