BABYFACT A SMALL INVESTMENT

It was good to get a major selection in on the line on Friday when Pour La Victoire obliged at Brighton. It surprised me that 5/2 was readily available because he was certainly very well in – unpenalised for winning an apprentices’ handicap at Goodwood (runner-up successful since), with Georgia Cox now claiming the full 7lb against senior jockeys. You won’t come across many of those in the course of a season but I can promise you they show a profit overall.

Jim Old was going to run Aldeburgh at Chester today but has changed his mind. So some of the interest in this afternoon’s action has ebbed away. I don’t seem to get much of a handle on Haydock these days, partly because I worry about the ground and I see the races will be run to take in the stands’ side in the home straight. The only things that occur are Sir Michael Stoute’s decision to up Convey to Group company in the Timeform Jury Stakes and the predictable switch to sprinting for Buratino in the Sandy Lane; he will be a big danger to Gifted Master.

I’ve been waiting for Malcolm Saunders’ BABYFACT and she will have a chance in the 6.20 at Salisbury this evening, though in an ideal world it would be five furlongs at Bath on the firm, not six at old Sarum on good. Still, she meets the right sort of opposition and is worth a little each-way. You can ignore her fourth of five on wet ground at Bath last time and I think she will go back there and win, irrespective of what happens here.