The first 2yo race in France takes place at 11.00am UK time at Lyon-Parilly this morning and features an Elusive City half-sister to stakes placed Axdavali.
Axdaliva is expected to go well at 6/4 but has a long journey from her Normandy yard to contend with and it wouldn’t be a surprise if either of the Con Marnane-owned juveniles repelled her challenge.
Connections have a fine record at the track with juveniles and particularly in this race. In 2018, Awesome Day was their sole representative, who made all and won in brilliant style by three lengths. A year later, Ask Me Not won at a shade of odds-against, albeit he was less convincing and was swept off his feet in the early stages of the 900m race. The race was obviously not staged in 2020 and connections weren’t represented last year.
Florian Guyader may have only trained 5 juvenile winners last year from 20 representatives on the track, but he had to contend with a yard move to Maisons-Laffitte and he still surfaced a few good ones, including Group Three Prix du Cabourg winner Have A Good Day. In fact, Have A Good Day was also the winner of the first juvenile maiden in which owner Con Marnane was represented last year, leading home a 1-2 for the yard in the Prix du Premier Pas at Chantilly.
A bit of guesswork is required here but Guyader has used Marie Velon a lot. The two are an item, romantically-speaking, and Velon does a lot of homework with the juveniles. I think it’s therefore fair to assume that Velon rides the first string here and Cotai Glory’s Bottle Of Bubbles is worth a decent investment this morning at the prices. Followers may also want to play a reverse forecast with the stablemate Texas Hold’Em, who is the sole colt in the line-up (fillies also tend to come to hand earlier).
11.00am Lyon-Parilly – 1.5pt win Bottle Of Bubbles @ 11/2 (William Hill, Paddy Power, Betfair or 5-1 and 9/2 is generally available)
