Here’s hoping that we might all be ready to ‘Rumble’ at Newbury tomorrow

October 23

Well, we’ve all been praying for rain all summer, and it has finally arrived this week. Nap Hand looked to be all at sea in the mudbath at Plumpton on Monday and punters, who made him 7-4 favourite, knew their fate some way from home.

Doubtless, underfoot conditions will be testing for Newbury’s two-day meeting this week-end, though it’s blowing a gale as I look out across the track following the overnight rain, so we’ll be hoping for the best with Midnight Rumble in the mile and a half handicap on our local course tomorrow.

Midnight Rumble did run well in a juvenile hurdle at Warwick last January, but overall he seems to much prefer the Flat, though his only success was on the polytrack at Lingfield 16 months ago.

However, the fact that he has since finished second four times on the level, including his last run at Epsom, which came after an absence of three and a half months, suggests that Midnight Rumble should give Rossa Ryan a good ride, albeit in a higher grade race than he has been competing in recently.

You can normally rely on Doncaster producing better ground than most courses, whatever the weather, but Yorkshire have experienced a bigger drenching than most, and the advance official going forecast for Town Moor’s meeting tomorrow is “heavy”.

What the ground will be by the time Lola Moon heads out for their finale, a mile and a quarter handicap, is anybody’s guess, but if only he could reproduce the highly promising performance he gave us on his racecourse debut at Newbury in April then he could outrun his odds. Hector Crouch rides for the first time.