Ante-post tips: How To Bet £20 on the Betfair Sprint Cup

With no rain forecast at Haydock this week, I expect Ed Walker will have a smile on his face at the prospect of the Betfair Sprint Cup being run on fast ground on Saturday.

Walker has made it clear that Starman, who is one of 14 entries in the Group One feature, needs top of the ground to show his best and, at the time of writing, the ground is good, good to firm in places at the Merseyside venue.

The Darley July Cup winner is a best-priced 11-8 after his odds were slashed on Monday following the release of the entries, and when a favourite is chalked up at short odds in a race of this calibre, I usually aim to take them on.

However, it is hard to look past Starman who beat the best sprinters in Britain when overcoming traffic problems to win an above-average renewal of the Newmarket showpiece and had excuses last time out.

Although the ground was described as soft in the Prix Maurice De Gheest, it was not as bad as what Starman had encountered when disappointing on British Champions Day last year, but it was drying ground which Walker said became “stamina sapping”. The combination of unideal conditions, plus the extra half furlong, proved too much for Starman towards the finish after he had travelled strongly into the race and hit the front a furlong out.

The return to better ground, as well as the drop back in trip, will suit on Saturday and a repeat of his July Cup effort will certainly see him prove hard to beat, especially as there could be even more to come from him, given his lightly-raced profile.

Walker also provided a positive update on his stable star when speaking to Racing TV’s Tom Stanley on Nick Luck’s Daily Podcast on Monday.

Walker said: “He seems in great form and everyone is happy. We went there (Deauville) with concerns about the ground but in terms of everything else, I couldn’t really see him getting beat. He ran great and came there to win his race, and got his head in front, but I think he just ran out of stamina in conditions that were against him.

“It was pretty soft ground, but it just started to dry and became sticky and tacky, stamina-sapping ground, and with the extra half furlong on top, I think the combination of the two were his undoing. I don’t think he lost anything in defeat.

“He’s been in great shape since France and this has always been the plan. Haydock is straightforward and we won’t be making any excuses before the race, anyway.”

Art Power is a youngster who I thought would reach the top of the sprinting division this season after Tim Easterby, who has won this race twice in the past, said his speedster “has some growing to do and is not the finished article yet” at the end of last year.

Despite that, the four-year-old still produced some good efforts in defeat at the highest level and although he is yet to record his first Group One victory, he was only worn down close home in this year's Diamond Jubilee at Royal Ascot before producing arguably a career-best effort in the Darley July Cup.

He set a ferocious gallop in the latter contest and raced with just one horse away from the main pack throughout, so did well to finish as close as he did in the circumstances plus also proved there that he acts on good to firm ground.

His only other start without cut in the ground was when he was not at his best in the 2020 Nunthorpe, and it is easy to forgive his latest effort over five furlongs at Goodwood where he had an unfavourable draw plus did not appear to handle the track.

Like Starman, a return to this trip will be beneficial and he finished a respecatble fourth in this contest last year.

On his July Cup effort, he does not have much to find with the favourite and if Silvestre de Sousa can get the fractions right from the front, he certainly has the ability to go close, so is worth having a small each-way on at a general 8-1.

£15 win on STARMAN at a general 11-8.

£2.50 each-way on ART POWER at a general 8-1.

The Betfair Sprint Cup - Sponsor Betting: 11/8 Starman, 7/2 Creative Force, 6/1 Glen Shiel, 8/1 Art Power, 8/1 Supremacy, 10/1 Gustavus Weston, 20/1 Chil Chil, 20/1 Happy Romance, 25/1 Garrus, 33/1 Brando, 33/1 Summerghand, 40/1 Emaraaty Ana, 50/1 Vadream, 66/1 Nando Parrado.