Glorious Goodwood & Galway Gambles - Tuesday

Will Hannon & Hughes have another Glorious Goodwood?

Glorious Goodwood starts tomorrow - Crockford considers if Richard Hannon and Richard Hughes will have another Glorious Festival.  



Richard Hughes starts the Festival hoping for a hat trick of being top jockey of the meeting. As he commented to the Racing Post at the weekend, "If I ride fewer than five winners I won't feel I've had a good Glorious Goodwood". Hannon and Hughes have dominated the meeting on the South Downs for the last few years and look well placed to do so again this year with a hatful of fancied horses.

Tomorrow sees an interesting renewal of the Gordon Stakes which again serves as a useful pointer to the final classic of the season. The highly touted Michelangelo will start as favourite for the race for this season's magic combination of Gosden, Buick and the Rothschilds. If he wins as expected his current quote from Ladbrokes for the St Leger of 10/1 will tumble and the same being true of Noble Mission currently offered at 25/1 by the Magic Sign. Noble Mission however will not be a patch on his brother Frankel who is guaranteed to add another Group 1 success to his career record on Wednesday in the Sussex Stakes.

Day two of Galway week should see another profitable day for the King of Galway (Dermot Weld) who should follow up from today's treble. Weld runs horses in the last five races tomorrow at Ballybrit and is said to particularly favour the chances of Rock Critic. The second day of the Irish meeting could also see Mullins and Bolger land some prize money with their chances in the first two races and last two races respectively.

Crockford's Dead Cert - Rock Critic (5.35 Galway Festival)
Punters would be mad to not listen to Weld who says that this horse is one of his best chances of the week. As the trainer said to the Racing Post this smart horse has "shown his liking for Galway, where he has won three times". Weld is right when he says that a "horses for courses approach pays dividends". Rock Critic is a big price with this recommendation at 11/2.

Crockford's Whisper - Cai Shen (2.00 Glorious Goodwood e/w)
Having run well at Ascot in a much higher grade this Hannon/Hughes horse stands a brilliant chance of sealing a win for them in the first race of the meeting. Ryan Moore also stands an each way  chance with the other Hannon entry King Torus.

Archer selects Jacob Cats

Archer's Selection - Jacob Cats (4.50 Glorious Goodwood)
Archer would have heeded the advice of Richard Hughes (the meeting specialist). Hughes has highlighted his mount Jacob Cats as being one of his greatest chances of a win at the Festival. With that recommendation the Tinman would have looked no further for his booking.





Crockford's Galway Gambles:
4.00 Zuzka
4.30 Cooldine (e/w)
5.00 Volease de Coeurs
5.35 Rock Critic
6.10 Big Break
6.40 Moonbi Creek and Eighteen Summers (e/w)
7.10 Mona Brown and Storm Lightning (e/w)

Ron Harris and connections stand chance in last at Goodwood

Crockford's Glorious Goodwood Gambles:
2.00 Cai Shen (e/w) and King Torus (e/w)
2.35 Michelangelo
3.10 Libranno
3.45 Dominate (e/w)
4.15 World Record (e/w)
4.50 Jacob Cats 
5.25 Noverre To Go (e/w) and Hamoody (e/w)


(First Photograph - Goodwood Racecourse by Nigel Freeman - Creative Commons)