Dave Nevison's Saturday tips: Hero can rise to challenge

I made a strong case for Doyen Du Bar over a five furlongs further at Market Rasen and, given the way he travelled for much of the race, I felt I had made the right argument.

However, he patently didn’t stay the distance and Nicky Richards has immediately dropped him back down in trip. This is still only his fourth run for the that yard and, now that his trip is firmly established, he has a great chance of landing his first handicap for them.

He has never been out of the frame in three runs at Kelso, winning over hurdles, and now that he has been dropped considerably in grade he has a good chance of defying top weight in this.

Dedicated Hero has not run well over hurdles this season, but those runs were at a time when Sandy Thomson’s yard in general was very much out of form.

This horse won a Grade Two over hurdles at Haydock last season and a mark of 123 would be a steal if he were to return to form.

That certainly seems possible on the basis of a very good chasing debut when second at Ayr recently and the marked return to form of the yard in recent weeks.

A course and distance winner last season, we can ignore Dedicated Hero’s latest run as he was hampered and unseated at the first. Cheekpieces for the first time are another positive for me.

Gabbys Cross was pulled-up over hurdles last time after losing a shoe, but his previous start over fences came when finishing third at Sandown in a similar Veterans event.

Nick Scholfield’s stable is still going along very nicely and the rookie trainer has interestingly applied cheekpieces for this run as well as engaging Freddie Keighley to claim 5lb here. He can run well at a decent price.

Florida Dreams is difficult to catch right and has only won one handicap, but in my view definitely has another win in him when circumstances are right. He ran a very good fifth in the Morebattle on this card last season, but a look through his recent hurdles runs suggests that this two and a half mile trip is his best nowadays.

He has run very well over this trip a couple of times this season and, last time, the step up to three miles seemed to stretch his stamina too much. This is not the most competitive hurdle for this lofty grade and he looks a placepot banker at least.