Jane Mangan’s William Hill blog: Galway Festival Day Six
William Hill ambassador Jane Mangan previews the sixth day of the 2024 Galway Festival.
Saturday, Galway
Saturday is Day Six of the Galway Festival and it opens with a maiden hurdle over two mile one furlong (1.55pm), for which there is a huge field of 20 declared. This is a race where I like Barry Connell’s Apple’s Of Bresil, who won a bumper at Sligo last time, but before that, competed against some very good horses in competitive winter bumpers. This is his second run over hurdles after finishing third to Ballyburn in a maiden at Leopardstown, and albeit he was well-beaten that day, he was competing at Leopardstown at Christmas and the first and second are both very useful horses. He showed an aptitude for jumping that day and I think that he will take a lot of beating in the opener.
The second race of the day is a two-mile-six-furlong handicap hurdle (2.30pm) for which I like Teed Up, who slightly disappointed me in the feature race on Monday night on the Flat. I hope that reverting back to hurdles will help, because he’s been busy on the Flat of late. He is very much capable of making his presence felt based on his win here over hurdles off of a mark of 114 last year. The yard has been out of luck so far this week, but I think the first run over hurdles since the Galway Festival, last year, is a positive whilst still looking well handicapped.
The mile maiden (3.05pm) looks like it will be going back to Ballydoyle. They’ve had a duo of impressive juvenile winners so far this week, and they’ve also had an impressive debutant winner at Goodwood. I think Puppet Master has the ideal opportunity to go one better than his debut at Killarney where he was a good second to Apples And Bananas. Wayne Lordan is jocked up here, taking over from Jack Cleary from Killarney, and he should be very hard to beat in the maiden.
Next up is the maiden over a mile (3.40pm) for three-year-olds and older, and this one looks like it could be one going to Rosewell. Dermot Weld is uncharacteristically quiet at Galway this week, but Newtown Duke has all the credentials after that lovely display on debut behind Flighted Fancy at Limerick where he finished off quite well having made up plenty of ground from the back of the field. I think Chris Hayes will use his stall eight to go forward and make sure that this is a good test over the mile.
In the nursery (4.15pm) I like King Thistle for Johnny Murtagh and Ben Coen, who teamed up to good success at Goodwood earlier this week. King Thistle met Elzem at Listowel when conceding four pounds, this time around he is receiving four pounds, so with a total eight-pound swing in the weights, I think the form can be reversed and King Thistle should be very hard to beat despite from stall 13.