Stat of the Day, 22nd October 2014

Stat of the Day

Stat of the Day, 22nd October 2014

I was slightly worried that Midnight Lira might need a run after a six month absence from the track and so it proved to be the case. She was three lengths clear over the last fence, but the line couldn’t and wouldn’t come quick enough for her and she was eventually overhauled with the post in sight, going down by half a length to the well fancied Jewellery.

Our selection had drifted out from our advised 13/2 BOG to a tasty 9/1 at the off, which would have given us a nice payout had she held on, but thankfully I’d gone E/W due those fears about rustiness and that meant we made a small (0.63pts) profit on the day to keep the scoreboard moving for the month.

October is generally attritional with some strange results, but we keep on plugging away and Wednesday takes us to HQ for the…

2.00 Newmarket:

Where I’m hoping that Coral have got it all wrong by pricing Luca Cumani’s Handicap/Nursery debutant Yorkshire up at 8/1 BOG.

After 3 runs for Kevin Ryan, this is his debut for Mr Cumani…

Luca has a decent record taking horses from other yards and getting them to run well first time out. Since 2008, he has given a yard debut to 22 horses coming to him with three to ten previous starts under their belts and with 11 of them going on to win at the first time of asking, that 50% strike rate has generated level stakes profits of 31.9pts at an ROI of 145%.

E/W backers will be interested to learn that 14 of the 22 (63.6% SR) have been placed returning E/W profits of 22.2pts.

It’s also Yorkshire’s handicap debut…

Another area where Team Cumani excel. Since 2008, the yard has 45 winners from their 164 flat handicap debutants, an impressive 27.4% strike rate which has produced  81.5pts (+49.7% ROI) profit to date. At the lower end of the scale ie Classes 4 to 6 (Class 5 today!) that record improves to 34 winners from 112 (30.4% SR) for 72.1pts (+64.3% ROI) profit.

The horse steps up in trip by two furlongs…

Which might seem a bit of a niche area, but Luca tends to do this with his unexposed handicap runners. In the past few years he has asked 72 of unexposed handicappers (ie 2 or less hcp runs) to step up in trip by a full two furlongs from their last run. 22 of the 72 (30.6% SR) have gone on to win recording level stakes profits of some 40.3pts (+55.9% ROI along the way with those on handicap debut winning 13 of 35 contests (37.1% SR) for 29.1pts (+83.2% ROI).

Yorkshire also drops in class here…

And Mr Cumani’s class droppers have won 29 of 102 races (28.4% SR) in the last five years with the resultant 66.4pts profit equating to over 65p in the pound from every bet placed. Those dropping to today’s Class 5 level are 7/17 (41.2% SR) for 20.3pts at an ROI of 119.3%.

And although it’s a small sample size, Luca Cumani’s record with flat handicap debutants dropping in class and stepping up in trip is 7 winners from 15 (46.7% SR) for profits of 26.7pts at an ROI of 177.8%.

There’s not a great deal to tell you about the horse, himself, other than he showed little as a sprinter on two runs on good and good to firm ground, being outpaced on both occasions and finishing well down the field. But his best run came at Newcastle on good to soft ground over a 6f trip at a more leisurely pace, when he finished 3rd of 8 runners and it is hoped/expected that the soft ground will be even more to his liking today allied to the extra distance.

He might not seem a likely winner based on his past form, but the stats suggest this could well be the type of race he needs and I’m pretty confident that he’ll at least run to a place. With that in mind and my overall feelings that 8/1 BOG is too long for this one, it’s a 0.5pts E/W bet on Yorkshire with Coral. To see the full market positions for this race…

…click here for the latest betting on the 2.00 Newmarket

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REMINDER: THERE IS NO STAT OF THE DAY ON SUNDAYS

Here is today’s racecard.