Reporter: Andy Gibson
The ground at Haydock was a mixture of good and good to soft and maybe, therefore, slightly quicker than the official description of good to soft and soft in places. A fascinating renewal of this grade two contest involving the winner of the Persian War plus the impressive looking Masked Man who won by 12 lengths at the same Chepstow meeting in early October. Throw in the wide margin Plumpton scorer Diamond Hunter, plus Double Measure who ran the well touted The Blue Room close also at Chepstow in early November, and I think we had a race that could work out well in the coming weeks.
The front two horses finished well clear of the remainder and so it is a little surprising to see the winner handed a mark of 135 given that the hot favourite and third horse to finish came into this race with a 143 rating. Presumably the handicapper has tended towards the notion that Sticktotheplan will be better if stepped back up to an intermediate trip? He battled well from the last to the line and beat a horse into second that posted a very good time last time out at Chepstow. The next performances of the front two to finish will hopefully be very informative, particularly if either or both run in handicap company off their initial ratings. I suspect we may see the winner head for the Tolworth Hurdle at Aintree on Boxing Day next.
His initial rating of 133 looks generous enough when compared with the rating of the Olly Murphy favourite who finished nearly four lengths behind him. The front two horses finished well clear and both could be well above average in the novice hurdle division.
The obvious conclusion to draw from this staying on third place is that he will need to go back to a two-and-a-half-mile race to show his best. I assume this is the stance taken by the handicapper given the initial marks allotted to the front two horses.
Despite not being hard ridden he did not lose any ground on the runner up from the last to the line. I suspect we will see more from him on another day when competing in a handicap off his new 125 rating.
He was just beginning to lose ground on the first four to finish on the approach to the final hurdle. I believe he would have finished just behind Double Measure if jumping the last hurdle well.
