Friday’s Meydan selections:
14:35 – Rawy
15:10 – Home City
15:45 – Asawer
16:55 – Get Shirty
17:30 – Zainhom
*All prices are bang up to date with our snazzy widgets, while odds in copy are accurate at time of publishing but subject to change.
14:35 – Rawy
This isn’t a vintage quality dirt handicap for the Meydan Carnival but I do like Rawy. Saeed Bin Ghadayers’ horses typically come on a great deal for their first runs of the season and jockey Mickael Barzalona rides the Meydan dirt better than anyone else. Rawy does have some backclass having won a UAE 200 Guineas trial last year. In opposition here is a strong trio of Alkaraama, Colour Up and Behavioral Bias – and Colour Up has the potential to be the strongest to put it up to Rawy. However, the way that the golden rail plays and Barzalona’s style of riding, I also like Rawy to Win by 3 Lengths or More in the lengthen your odds market.
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15:10 – Home City
We have seen some early market support for Boomshalaa but I can get past backing Home City for Saeed Bin Suroor. The Bin Suroor stable has kicked off the season very strongly scoring a hat trick last week. Home City ran some good races in defeat as a three year old at last year’s carnival but I expect him to be a better and stronger type this year.
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15:45 – Asawer
Pat Dobbs is the number one jockey to Doug Watson and one of his strengths is not being on the wrong horse when he has a choice. He rides Asawer over stablemate Awasef and I find that compelling. Asawer hasn’t been liked by the market but he has ran big races in defeat, finishing second in the trial for this race having possibly ran from too far back where the winner and likely favourite for this race Mimi Kakushi sat closer to the hot pace. Under a more positive ride we can see Asawer capture the first classic of the Meydan Carnival.
16:55 – Get Shirty
Get Shirty gets the nod by default. I have negative marks against the rest of the likely dangers but the one that I do think could be the most dangerous is Ardakan, who was excellent last year in a number of big races for German trainer Markus Klug but being sent to Marco Botti was not the trainer upgrade I envisioned. Get Shirty won at Royal Ascot and he is possibly just shy of being a group class stayer but at this listed level he will be hard to beat. A victory here will set him up for a run in the big Saudi stayers handicap next month.
17:30 – Zainhom
A full field handicap over 7f around the bend makes this an interesting race and as such we are paying 5 places rather than the standard 4. I rather like Zainhom here. He ran 4th in his last run and typically is the type to need a few runs to get fit and today is the day for him to strike before stepping back up to group races in the carnival.
Friday’s Meydan selections:
14:35 – Rawy
15:10 – Home City
15:45 – Asawer
16:55 – Get Shirty
17:30 – Zainhom
*All prices are bang up to date with our snazzy widgets, while odds in copy are accurate at time of publishing but subject to change.
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