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Ebor Tips: Best Value Bets for York Sky Bet Ebor Festival Saturday August 24
After a 33/1 stunner with Canoodled on Friday, the red-hot Matt Brocklebank has four bets to consider at big prices on Sky Bet Ebor day.
- Matt Brocklebank's Value Bet is designed to generate long-term profit by searching for overpriced horses in the feature weekend races and at the big Festivals in the UK and Ireland.
- Value Bet tips are initially available to logged-in readers through Sporting Life Plus, before the full column appears on the main Sporting Life website and App 15 minutes later.
- Following all Matt's selections to recommended odds/stakes since the start of 2024 would have produced over 163pts in profit (227pts staked, ROI of 72.11%).
Value Bet tips: Saturday August 24
1pt win Tactician in 2.25 York at 17/2 (William Hill)
1pts win Shouldvebeenaring in 3.00 York at 8/1 (General)
1.5pts e.w. Burdett Road in 3.35 York at 12/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6 bet365, William Hill)
1pt win Harry Three in 4.10 York at 18/1 (Ladbrokes, Coral 1/5 1,2,3,4,5)
Road worthy of major Ebor respect
BURDETT ROAD was a 12/1 chance for the Triumph Hurdle at the time of being ruled out of Cheltenham back in February, and he looks well worth backing at similar odds for Saturday’s Sky Bet Ebor which has seemingly been the horse’s principal target ever since.
The injury setback came at a terrible time for connections as he’d taken to jumping extremely well, having been gelded last autumn, but it can’t have been a particularly serious one as trainer James Owen has been talking about a potential York comeback for months and at one stage it looked like Burdett Road was going to head straight to the Knavesmire for his first Flat run in nine months.
As it transpired, a prep was deemed the most sensible approach, presumably to take a bit of the freshness of him, and it was hard not to be encouraged by the way he shaped when getting acquainted with big-race rider Silvestre De Sousa for the first time over a mile and a half at Ascot last month.
Keen enough out the back for a furlong or two, he then consented to settle and got into a reasonable rhythm, but still had his seven rivals in front of him well into the home straight.
De Sousa didn’t exactly throw the kitchen sink at him, but Burdett Road did respond well in the final furlong to get past three tiring opponents and it did look a lot like he was only beginning to engage top gear approaching the line.
That bodes well ahead of the Ebor as he’s got another couple of furlongs to tackle this weekend, something that isn’t guaranteed to suit but looks every inch that it might, not least as he’s out of Galileo mare Diamond Bangle.
She didn’t make the track herself but has also produced East India Dock for the Gredley family, a horse who was second over the Ebor trip at Doncaster earlier this summer and finished fourth to Align The Stars in the bet365 Handicap at Haydock just last month. He steps up to two miles for the first time at Goodwood on Sunday.
As a general rule, juvenile hurdlers tend to be very strong stayers whatever the discipline and I’ve absolutely no fears over Burdett Road getting the trip on Saturday, while his BHA mark of 101 looks perfectly reasonable even before the jumping improvement from last winter is factored in as his previous Flat run saw him finish third to Passenger in a Group 3 at Windsor 12 months ago.
In fact, the winner, runner-up West Wind Blows and fourth home State Occasion are now officially rated 117, 112 and 111 respectively so it could be argued he’s a very well handicapped animal.
That’s propped up by the fact the only horse from last month’s Ascot race to have run since, the second Insanity, went on to win an even stronger Ascot handicap off a 3lb higher mark at the Shergar Cup meeting. He was then, admittedly, well held here on Friday.
Decent ground suits Burdett Road best and stall three certainly shouldn’t pose any issues so everything points to a massive performance from the unexposed four-year-old, who looks the bet of the week to me.
Tactics no problem in strongly-run Melrose
Burdett Road’s recent Ascot form is also represented in the Sky Bet Melrose as the third, Tabletalk, lines up here but he didn’t look to be crying out for a longer trip and I wouldn’t be surprised if one or two had a bit more stamina.
Sir Michael Stoute’s Reaching High is a standout on the back of his taking win at Wolverhampton over this distance, but preference is for TACTICIAN, who I thought would be favourite had Oisin Murphy opted to ride him.
Murphy keeps the faith in Andrew Balding stablemate Wild Waves, which does admittedly muddy the waters a little, but I’m going to stick to my guns and back the very stout stayer with an excellent pedigree.
Said to be a bit “babyish” from the outset, Coronet’s half-brother is clearly getting the hang of things now based on his two handicap efforts at Ascot during last month.
The first saw him narrowly denied by Dancing In Paris over the Melrose trip, before he made amends with a most tenacious performance upped to two miles last time. He only got there just in time as the odds-on favourite but would have been an unlucky loser as he got in a bit of trouble in the straight and just wasn’t suited by the stop-start gallop they’d gone through the early stages.
A fiercely-run race is just what he requires and he’s only gone up another 5lb which looks perfectly fair as he’s obviously dead progressive.
Tactician is also very much in the right hands as Balding has won the race twice in recent years including with subsequent Group-race stayer Coltrane. This horse looks right out of that mould and – looping back to the jockey situation – it’s hard to read PJ McDonald as a negative booking as he’s got a brilliant strike-rate (four wins and three seconds from just 10 rides) for the stable so far this year.
Elsewhere, the opening Sky Bet Strensall Stakes looks a really tight one to call and the closest I came to striking a bet was last year’s third Flight Plan, who now goes without the cheekpieces tried for the first time at Pontefract last month.
He’s a good horse on his day and only really came good around this time last year, going on from here to win the Group 2 over a mile at Leopardstown during the Irish Champions Festival, but he just can’t be trusted on this season’s evidence.
Shoulda Woulda Coulda...
On the subject of reliability, Audience obviously looks quite shrewdly placed – without a penalty – in the Group 2 Sky Bet City Of York Stakes, but they should be queuing up around the block to oppose this horse at such a skinny price.
He’s very talented and almost beat Kinross in this event last year but both of his wins this season have looked a little odd and, if he doesn't fire, I reckon the value lies with SHOULDVEBEENARING, who won the Premier Yearling sales race (from Washington Heights) at this meeting in 2022.
He’s been kept busy by Richard Hannon but proved he wasn’t just a smart two-year-old when placed in the Betfair Sprint Cup and Prix de la Foret towards the end of last year.
This year has been a bit in-and-out but he looks well set for a productive autumn again after winning a Group 3 over six furlongs at Deauville last month.
He had no right to get up that day after being forced to switch to the stands’ side at a key moment but he’s a tough little customer and showed great guts to overhaul Electric Storm late on.
The grey remains relatively unexposed over this trip and his natural turn of foot could be a real asset in a race lacking an abundance of pace. Oisin Murphy – who takes over from Sean Levey – will be alive to the fact Audience could get his own way again and a more prominent sit than usual could really suit Shouldvebeenaring around here.
The magic number for in-form Cox
Clive Cox has had a very good week already, with Ghostwriter third to City Of Troy in the Juddmonte and Diligently winning the huge juvenile pot, and it could get even better for the yard with HARRY THREE in the Sky Bet Constantine Handicap.
He didn’t enjoy the small-field Listed race at Chester last time, where Quinault set the fractions and made all the running, and I can excuse him a no-show in the Wokingham too as the ground was just way too quick for him at the Royal meeting.
Harry Three went off just 9/1 under Ryan Moore at Ascot, following a promising comeback run at Salisbury having spent almost two years off the track, and it’s clear Cox has kept him in training with a view to landing a nice race or two this year.
He still held a Group 1 entry until only recently which says a lot about a horse tried in the Maurice de Gheest and Haydock Sprint Cup as a three-year-old, but it looks like valuable handicaps will be more realistic now and the assessor dropping him a total of 8lb for his three runs back this year gives him a cracking chance in this.
Now rated 97 again, he hacked up in a 19-runner handicap off precisely that mark over this course and distance prior to winning a Listed race in France two summers ago, and Danny Tudhope looks a great booking as he’ll keep Harry Three covered up for as long as possible.
The hood that worked so well for him as a three-year-old is back for the first time in the current campaign and it’s hoped Thursday night’s rain has taken the sting out of the ground for this horse to take his chance as he’s way over-priced in my book.
Published at 1600 BST on 23/08/24
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