Galway Plate Odds
27th July, 2009
It's another busy week of racing on either side of the Irish Sea. From Tuesday onwards Glorious Goodwood takes centre stage on the Sussex Downs, where high quality flat action can be found in abundance, while the increasingly popular seven day Galway Festival is the main attraction in The Emerald Isle.
The week long jamboree gets underway this evening on the west coast of Ireland where the highlight is the William Hill Galway Plate. Champion Trainer Paul Nicholls is seeking back-to-back wins in the handicap chase, having tasted success 12 months ago with Oslot, and is represented this time around by Roby De Cimbre.
With Ruby Walsh in the saddle the English raider is sure to prove popular with punters and the 6-year-old rates as a 9/2 chance with Stan James for Wednesday's feature.
Were Nicholls' French-bred to be welcomed back into the winner's enclosure by the Ditcheat handler it would be yet another high profile success for Terry Warner, owner of star Champion Hurdler Rooster Booster, but he faces stiff opposition from a typically competitive field.
Niall Madden's Wins Now, likely to partnered by Tony McCoy, has been well supported in recent days and now rates as a 10/1 shot with Sportingbet while Dermot Weld looks set to let Majestic Concorde take his chance. Nobody has a better record at Galway in recent seasons than Weld and Majestic Concorde is currently quoted at 12/1 with Paddy Power for the 2m 6f event.
A talented individual, Majestic Concorde was last seen out in March when denied by Willie Mullins' Deutschland but this is likely to have been the plan for some time and conditions, currently soft (soft to heavy in places), could well prove ideal.
By Tom Allen
