Lady Salisbury Runner

There are five meetings taking place this afternoon with flat cards from Salisbury and Haydock, a jumps meeting from Sedgefield and all-weather flat cards from Chelmsford City and Newcastle.  David has one runner on the flat today as Lady Reset (pictured above) contests the 1m2f handicap at Salisbury at 3.35pm.  She has been in excellent form this season, winning twice on the level and once over hurdles and is 1lb lower than when runner-up at Sandown on her penultimate start.  She was given too much to do in a steadily run race last time so she looks to have each-way chance, although there are some progressive three year olds in the line-up and with just six runners it pays only two places.  Mollie Phillips is a promising young apprentice who has ridden plenty of winners lately and claims a handy 5lbs off her back.

I see that the jumps handicappers have announced that there is going to be an overhaul of the handicapping system and it has not come a moment too soon.  Earlier in the week the Irish flat handicappers said they will be taking a couple of pounds off of their horses' backs to level the playing field and now the jumps handicappers seem to be doing the same over here, although the disparity between the British and Irish horses is far greater over the sticks.  Given the cross-over between Irish horses running in Britain and vice versa, it still baffles me why they cannot come up with a single handicap.

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Manchester United's new signing Cristiano Ronaldo broke Irish hearts last night as he lifted Portugal to a 2-1 victory over the Republic Of Ireland in World Cup qualifying.  The Irish looked set for a famous victory, leading 1-0 until Ronaldo scored in the 89th and 96th minutes to put Portugal ahead.  In so doing, he became the leading International goal scorer of all time with 111.

It is England's turn tonight as they play Hungary.  England are currently top of their group, unbeaten after three matches but Hungary are right behind them.  Let's hope they can build on their great European Cup form.

The fourth test match between England and India gets underway this morning at the Oval with the series finely poised at 1-1 with two matches to go.  England were utterly dominant as they beat the visitors by an innings last time with a day to spare.  More of the same please!

I see that former F1 world champion Kimi Raikkonen has decided to retire from the sport at the end of the season, leaving his space at Alfa Romeo up for grabs.  At 41, Raikkonen has competed in more Grand Prix (341) than any other driver.  It is a shame he is going as he is one of the last great characters on the grid.  He could be replaced at Alfa by another Finn, underperforming Mercedes man, Valtteri Bottas.  That would leave the Mercedes seat at the mercy of George Russell who should have been there last season.

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Why did the banana go to the doctor?  Because he wasn't peeling well!