Newmarket Tips: Tom Collins pinpoints two bets on Craven day
By Tom Collins
12 April 2022
The Group 3 Craven, a three-year-old contest run over a mile, is the featured race at Newmarket on Wednesday. Will we see this year’s 2,000 Guineas winner? Quite possibly.
Charlie Appleby and Godolphin have won this race twice in the last three years, including with subsequent Derby winner Masar in 2018, and the powerful combination will be represented by odds-on favourite Native Trail this time around.
Unbeaten after four starts as a juvenile, Native Trail earned himself a lofty rating of 122 last season and has already struck twice at Group 1 level. This scopey son of Oasis Dream is as short as 3.65 for the Qipco 2,000 Guineas, so victory here is expected if he’s to win the first Classic of the year.
With just seven runners and Native Trail dominating the market, the Craven isn’t the most attractive heat for bettors and my attention will be focussed elsewhere. Here are two horses worth a second look on the card.
3.00 Newmarket, 6f Group 3 Abernant Stakes
Trainer Hugo Palmer has started this flat turf season in fine form (1-1 in the last 14 days) and he sends out Ebro River in the Abernant Stakes, the main supporting race to the aforementioned Craven.
This son of Galileo Gold was an extremely precocious two-year-old and was campaigned as such. Ebro River ran nine times last season and earned almost £200,000 prize-money, but such a heavy campaign can have a negative impact on a horse’s future progression and it’s unlikely that he will live up to his rating of 113 this year.
There is no doubt that he remains the horse to beat on last season’s efforts, but there’s little value in the relatively short odds on offer. I much prefer the chances of Garrus, who perhaps ran below expectations on SBK Lincoln day at Doncaster last month but deserves another chance.
Charlie Hills’ grey sprinter was short of room at a crucial moment and performed better than his finishing position suggested, albeit he never looked like winning during the race. He ran well behind Lazuli on his sole previous start at this track last year and is more than capable of recording a second Group 3 victory if he has come forward since his seasonal reappearance.
Selection: Garrus @ 5.7
4.45 Newmarket, 1m handicap
Get your trackers at the ready because this closing handicap is sure to produce numerous subsequent winners. Ikhtiraaq, who will make his debut for Sir Michael Stoute, and three-race maiden Brayden Star catch the eye with future engagements in mind, but I don’t want to take on Tylos off his opening handicap mark.
This son of Night Of Thunder ran second to subsequent Grade 1 Summer Stakes winner Albahr (rated 111) on debut, before filling the same berth behind sharp performer Harrow at Ffos Las on his second start. That rival backed up his victory with two big-race strikes for Andrew Balding and earned a rating of 100, so Tylos’ head defeat can be read in a positive light.
He was found the perfect spot to break his maiden at the end of his two-year-old campaign and returns off a mark of 87, which underestimates his talent. The one concern is that he hung left under pressure last year, but hopefully that errant tendency can be put down to inexperience and he will run straight as a gun barrel on his three-year-old reappearance.
Selection: Tylos @ 5.8