O’Faolains Boy

15th-Feb-2014

Many Clouds is an exciting young chaser, his form is stacking up well and he goes well on testing ground. Likewise, Gevrey Chambertin is an exciting young horse and he looked to have the potential to make it as a chaser when winning the Fixed Brush Hurdle at Haydock, following in the footsteps of his brother Grands Crus and his other stable companion Dynaste. However, both are fashionable horses now and both are too short here in my book.

I am backing O’Faolains Boy and Baby Shine. I would have the pair of them much closer to the front pair in the market than they are.

O’Faolains Boy impressed on his chasing debut at today’s track just before Christmas when he shaped like the most likely winner for most of the race before lack of a recent run seemed to take its toll.

He was getting 4lb from Easter Day in that graduation race, but Easter Day had already had two runs over fences and two runs already this season, so he had the edge in terms of fitness and experience. O’Faolains Boy’s jumping was largely accurate and safe, and he looked sure to improve with that run under his belt.

He hasn’t had the chance to improve on that yet because he has run just once since and that came right in the middle of a period during which his trainer’s horses were badly out of form. A lot of them were sick and O’Foalains Boy was found to have scoped badly after he was pulled up at Haydock. Again he had jumped well up until he was pulled up. It is easy to put a line through that run.

Rebecca Curtis’ horses are turning the corner now, the horses that she has run over the past couple of weeks seem to be much healthier, and that is a significant positive. Thankfully, Barry Geraghty pulled O'Faolains Boy up pretty quickly at Haydock when it was obvious that he was struggling and that spared him an unnecessarily hard race.

He should improve for stepping up to three miles for the first time over fences – he ran well from the front in the Albert Bartlett Hurdle last year and had already proven before that that he stays this trip well – and, in receipt of weight from three of his rivals, 8/1 is a fair bit too big in my book ...

O'FAOLAINS BOY WON (ADV 8/1, SP 8/1)

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