Matt Brocklebank looks to sign off a profitable week at Royal Ascot with a Saturday winner – he has two selections on the fifth and final day of the meeting.
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- Following all Matt’s selections to recommended odds/stakes since taking over the column in June 2020 would have produced over 210pts in profit.
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Value Bet tips: Saturday June 22
1pt win Khaadem in 3.45 Royal Ascot at 22/1 (William Hill, Coral)
1pt e.w. Glenfinnan in 5.05 Royal Ascot at 40/1 (Coral 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)
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A wide-open Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes is the jewel in the final-day crown at Royal Ascot and it looks ripe for a shock, which was precisely what transpired last year.
On that very theme – and in a bid to cut to the chase somewhat – the 2023 hero KHAADEM looks like he’s being underestimated again around the 20/1 mark.
Alright, he’s not the 80/1 he returned 12 months ago but that just looked a much deeper edition of the Group 1 race, with Sacred (officially rated 113 at the time) and Highfield Princess (119) filling the placings ahead of two Aussie raiders in Artorious and The Astrologist.
The latter pair wouldn’t the be fastest speedballs to be sent from that part of the world to compete at this meeting down the years, but we only need to go back to earlier this week and the King Charles III Stakes for a sharp reminder of just how much better the sprinters Down Under tend to be than our domestic campaigners over this sort of distance.
In Art Power and Kinross, Khaadem does come up against two horses with BHA ratings of 116 but they’re not exactly at the peak of their powers and they were both among those to be well beaten off last year.
Given his patchy record, it could be argued that everything just fell into place for Khaadem on the day last June and there’s clearly an element of that, but fast ground and a searching early gallop looks the scenario once more and he’s coming here second time out for the year – as was the case last season.
This year’s comeback effort was less encouraging, admittedly, the now eight-year-old finishing down the field in the Duke of York in the middle of last month, but he was drawn high – away from the bulk of the action over on the far side – and didn’t get much cover early on either which wasn’t ideal.
He had to be withdrawn after playing up at the start of this race in 2022 and then got loose after unseating his rider before going on to win 12 months ago too, but Oisin Murphy will have done his homework and here’s hoping for a relatively smooth time of things in the preliminaries as he looks a big price, with all eyes seemingly on stablemate Mitbaahy following his recent success at the Curragh.
Elsewhere, I’m leaning towards Middle Earth getting his revenge over returning St Leger winner Continuous in the Hardwicke Stakes, while Haatem versus River Tiber in the Jersey looks the sort of clash I’ll gladly sit back and watch without a financial interest, although Heron Stakes runner-up Kikkuli – the half-brother to Frankel – did interest me a little bit.
Instead, I’ll focus on the main handicap of the afternoon and there’s no getting away from the fact any number of them can be given some sort of squeak in the Wokingham Stakes, including outsider GLENFINNAN.
He is still totally unexposed as a six-furlong horse and has had just the three runs since moving from Andrew Balding to sprint specialist Michael Dods this spring. The first effort at Newmarket looked to be needed but he improved massively when returned to this course and distance and took his Ascot record to 2-3 with a narrow win from Thursday’s Buckingham Palace runner-up Billyjoh, despite racing keenly in the early stages.
Previous winners of that typically strong early-season handicap include Fresh (2021) and Orazio (2023) and they were sent off 15/2 and 7/2 for the Wokingham on their very next start, finishing second and sixth respectively.
Yet Glenfinnan can be backed at huge odds, presumably because he was beaten two and a half lengths into third off this 4lb higher mark at Hamilton earlier in the month.
However, I took more positives out of that run than first meets the eye as, after again racing with the choke out, he stuck on as best he could in a race not really run to suit – the winner Manila Scouse making the running and quickening from the front end.
What Glenfinnan clearly wants is a hell-for-leather pace to chase down and he’ll get just that here. I haven’t a clue whether gate four is a good thing or not in truth as higher numbers have tended to dominate in recent runnings on fast ground, and most of the fancied horses are high this time, but what he does have is three of the fastest in the field – Apollo One, The Bell Conductor and Lethal Levi, close by in stalls two, five and six, so I can’t read into the draw too negatively.
At the prices I think he’s well worth an each-way interest.
Published at 1600 BST on 21/06/24
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