York Saturday

IT didn’t look likely two furlongs out, but Stevie Donohue got the gaps on Sinjaari and once the pair saw daylight, they motored home on the stands’ side to deny 66/1 shot Certain Lad in the John Smith’s Cup at York on Saturday.

The four-year-old was giving Yorkshire trainer William Haggas his third win in what is traditionally one of the most sought after heritage handicaps on the calendar.

Sinjaari, a son of Camelot, was having his first start of the season but was sent off an 11/1 shot, given some very smart form last season including a second to Headman in the London Gold Cup. He was a little bit disappointing on his three tries at a mile and a half last season but on the evidence of this run, that distance is well worth another go.

He has reportedly had a few issues and this was just his ninth run, so there is plenty of scope there and he could turn out to be a group-race contender. He was raised 8lbs to a mark of 103 so another big pot handicap could be in the plans of his trainer, and it wouldn’t be a huge surprise if he turned out to be a solid pattern-race performer.

Certain Lad looked like the winner when hitting the front for apprentice George Bass and can be unrated unlucky to have bumped into a well-treated sort, considering he was comfortably clear of the chasing pack.

Mick Channon’s horse has been busy this season, having had three runs in Meydan earlier in the year, winning one of them. He is rated 108 now so is well worth having a go with in a listed or Group 3 event.

The Group 3 John Smith’s Silver Cup attracted a small field, and the favourite Moonlight Spirit bombed out badly, but it produced a close finish between Eagles By Day (Danny Tudhope), making his debut for David O’Meara and Communique (Mark Johnston/Joe Fanning) with Jamie Spencer third on his comeback ride aboard Universal Order for David Simcock.

The winner was returned at 14/1, and scored by half a length, with the first two pulling three lengths and more clear of the others.

Eagles By Day was bouncing back to form having disappointed in the Hardwicke Stakes at Royal Ascot, where he was 11 lengths adrift of Communique in last place. That was his first run for almost a year, though, and he’d been third in the King Edward VII Stakes at the same meeting 12 months earlier.

Those runs had come for Michael Bell, but he switched to O’Meara after his seasonal reappearance, and to be fair to Bell, it’s clear that he had derived plenty of benefit from that run, while the return to faster ground and a belated step up in trip were also instrumental in this improved showing.

A son of the Galway Hurdle and Saval Beg Stakes winner Missunited, who was also runner-up in the Gold Cup at Ascot in 2014, Eagles By Day has shaped as if staying should be his metier, and he was found to have bled from the nose when well-beaten in the Bahrain Trophy on his previous try at this sort of trip.

He will be aimed at either the Ebor at York next month, or the Lonsdale Cup at the same meeting.

FOR a long way it looked like Breathtaking Look (Stuart Williams/Ben Curtis) was going to make her proven class count in the Group 3 Summer Fillies Stakes at York on Sunday but she was cut down in the dying strides by Queen Jo Jo (Kevin Ryan/Sam James), who ended up racing alone on the stands rail.

The 25/1 shot was not the best away, but benefited from a furious gallop set by Miss Celestial and Breathtaking Look, and as the others in her group drifted across to join the main phalanx, James pulled his mount wide and kept her straight to launch a winning challenge.

Queen Jo Jo was suited by the opportunity of racing against her own sex in this lower grade, while the very strong pace was also very much in her favour.