Newcastle and Wolverhampton (a.w.)

Today´s jumps meeting at Newcastle is an additional fixture to make up for the many abandonments in the north over the past month and ironically was itself almost lost to the weather. However it has now been given the green light, and the man to follow is clearly trainer Howard Johnson, who saddled 3 winners here a week ago. We rate his Washington Irving, who runs in the novice hurdle at 16.00 as the best thing of the day.

A smart horse on the flat when trained by Aidan O´Brien, and rated highly enough to be used as a pacemaker in the English and Irish Derby, he made an excellent start to his hurdling career when winning easily on his debut over the sticks and should remain unbeaten. Other possible winners for the stable are Stormy Weather at 14.15, Door Boy at 14.50 and Blacks Bridge at 15.25. Unfortunately it is not yet clear who will be riding these horses, as stable jockey Denis O´Regan broke his collar-bone in a fall in Ireland yesterday and will be out of action for about a month.

There is the usual modest card at Wolverhampton´s all-weather track. Best bet here should be Robert Cowell´s Marosch in the 3yo handicap over 7 furlongs at 14.45. He was a very easy winner this CD last week and a 6 lbs penalty should not stop him going in again. The handicap for older horses over the same trip at 17.05 looks much more tricky. There are question-marks over several of these runners, and Rubensstar (Pat Morris/ Stevn Craine), 3rd at Lingfield on Friday, and Carnivore (David Barron/ Jim Crowley), who has a good record here and was a close third at Kempton last time, look the safest options.