5 meetings today

5 meetings today and 4 of them are over jumps, with Musselburgh staging the only flat racing. We cannot understand why a better effort is not made to stage decent flat racing on a Sunday in the UI.K. and the card is very weak. Best race is the grandly-named Musselburgh Gold Cup at 16.35 CET, but this is just a bog standard 2 mile handicap.The interesting one here is Irish raider King of the Picts (Pat Shanahan/ Tagdh O´Shea), who has not run on the flat for ages - and then only over shorter distances- but has very good form over hurdles. Best of the Brits could be bottom-weight Sir Frank Morgan (Mark Johnston/ Joe Fanning), a late developer who has won 3 races this year -all over this trip at Wolverhampton.

The best jumps racing comes as usual from Ireland, with the Grade One Powers Gold Cup, a novice chase over 2 1/2 miles at 17.40, the headliner. There are only 4 runners, but it is still competitive with all 4 being multiple winners and in good form. Willie Mullins saddles two of them, including the top-rated Ballycasy (Paul Townend), who weakened in the RSA at Cheltenham, but still ran a good race and will find this shorter trip much more to his liking. He will almost certainly be a hot favourite, but Rebel Fitz (Mike Winters/ Barry Geraghty) looks a big danger; he was not far off top class over hurdles and has taken well to fences and it could be that the drying ground will suit him better.

Top event at Cork is the Grade Three Imperial Call Chase over 3 miles, amnd on ftraztings Toner d´Oudaires (Gordon Elliott/ Davy Condon) and German-bred Noble Prince (Paul Nolan/ Alan Crowe) stand out. The last time they met, back in October, the former finished well in front at levels, but Noble Prince now gets 6 lbs which could bring them much closer together.

Another runner today with a good German pedigree is Local Hero (Steve Gollings/ Paul Bohan) who has top weight in the Sussex Champion Hurdle (!), a 2 mile handicap at Plumpton at 16.55, easily the best race in the U.K. today. This looks a very tough race but he definitely has a chance, and his Cheltenham performance, when 7th in a huge field over a longer distance, clearly puts him on the short list.