Bank Holiday Weekend

There are six meetings taking place this afternoon with flat cards from Goodwood, Beverley, Newmarket, Redcar and Windsor, whilst there is a sole jumps meeting from Cartmel.  The best of the action today comes from Goodwood where the Group 2 Celebration Mile is the highlight of the card, whilst there are also a couple of Grade 3's on offer.  Benbatl is the likely favourite for the mile race at 3.35pm and whilst he has been a star for the Godolphin team and has the best form on offer, he is also reappearing after almost a year off.  Consequently, Chindit, who has been running well in Group 1 company could be a bit of value against him.

There are no runners from Pond House today and I reckon the travelling head lads will be relieved about that judging by the motorway on the way in this morning.  It was already busy at 7am and it is only going to get worse as the Bank Holiday weekend rolls on.  Our next runners could come on Tuesday at Hexham, declarations for that meeting need to be made by 10am tomorrow.

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There was a bit of a shocker in the football transfer market yesterday with Cristiano Ronaldo looking likely to head to Manchester City only to arrive back at his old club and local rivals United.  The money these players make does annoy me, but when you think that Lionel Messi's transfer to Paris St Germain is worth almost £54 million per season, the £12 million price tag on Ronaldo looks an absolute steal...especially when you consider that United's stock value increased by £212 million in the hours following his signing.

There is plenty of footballing action to look forward to this afternoon with Manchester City looking to pile the early season misery on Arsenal, whilst Liverpool versus Chelsea also looks a potential cracker.

England's cricketers are still in control of the third test match against India, although they were frustrated yesterday by a good batting performance from the visitors.  India reached 215 runs for the loss of just two wickets.  They still trail England by 139 runs with two days left to play, but England will be hoping for a few early wickets when play resumes.

The qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix takes place this afternoon and it could be close based on practice times so far.  Red Bull's Max Verstappen was marginally quicker than the two Mercedes, but there was less than one tenth of a second between all three cars.  Mercedes set their times on the harder tyres so could well have the advantage.

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What do you call a belt made out of watches?  A waist of time!