Best bet for day two of the Yorkshire Ebor Festival

It’s a strange card on Thursday with some tricky two-year-old races and a couple of even trickier handicaps plus one of the races of the week but that sadly looks like a no bet heat now. I am actually only having one bet in fact on Thursday.  

The going will surely be on the softer side of the good, good to soft in places stated for the start of the meeting on Wednesday as, like most of us, they got plenty of rain up on the Knavesmire; it led to some funny results on day one, plenty of double figure winners, but at least Ghaiyyath was a winner for me. The forecast is for sunny weather the rest of the week and into the weekend.  

We are straight into the Pattern races on day two with the Group Two 6f Sky Bet Lowther Stakes for the two-year-old fillies getting Thursday underway at 1.45. Sacred was beaten at Ascot but there was no disgrace in losing the G.2 Queen Mary Stakes to Campanelle and the Haggas trained daughter of Exceed And Excel has an obvious chance. The pair were two-and-a-half lengths clear of the field that day and the form is solid with subsequent winners in behand plus the form of her Newmarket debut win is holding up nicely as well. Biggest concern will be if they get a further downpour or two but the same came be said for the main opposition such as Santosha and Hala Hala Hala so she is the pretty confident pick and I took 2-1 on Wednesday afternoon. Paddy Power are doing their money back as a free bet promo if you finish 2nd, 3rd or 4th on the race though only up to a tenner.   

At 3.15 it is the race of the day the Group One 1m4f Darley Yorkshire Oaks for the Fillies & Mares. No Enable of course which has surely left this at the mercy of the 1,000 Guineas and Oaks winner Love. She is unsurprisingly long odds-on and it looks a case of all she has to do is show up in truth. Perhaps her only danger would have been if stablemate Magical had come for this but she went for the Juddmonte International on the opening day. Listed course winner Franconia needs to improve about a stone which is a big ask, I may have backed Frankly Darling each-way, who was of course my Oaks bet but seems unlikely to reverse that near ten-length drubbing, but with less than eight lining-up there is no real value in that bet now.  

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