Skelton fires three at Greatwood in bid to keep on top

Dan Skelton could once again hold all the aces in the Unibet Greatwood Hurdle as he fires a three-pronged attack on Cheltenham’s Sunday feature.

The Lodge Hill handler has won the race with both West Cork (2021) and North Hill Harvey (2016) in the last 10 years while Be Aware finished second 12 months ago.

He now saddles new recruit Mirabad – one of the likely favourites – Knickerbockerglory and former County Hurdle hero Favoir.

Skelton said: “Mirabad has always been coming to this race and I’ve been very happy with his preparation and he’s had an away day. I wouldn’t be worried about the ground with him, no concerns.

“Knickerbockerglory is not getting any younger but has never been in better form. He needs it at least soft or maybe heavy for him to really be effective and all this rain will suit him.

“Favoir can go in heavy ground as well and has got a run under his belt. He’ll run his race I’m sure.”

Joe Tizzard will saddle with his first runner in the race, Alexei, who finished second to Sam Thomas’ reopposing Celtic Dino in the Welsh Champion Hurdle before romping home at Ascot most recently.

The Tizzard stable have been associated with great chasers such as Cue Card, Thistlecrack and Native River down the years, but this could be the classiest hurdler to emerge from Venn Farm.

Tizzard said: “We won’t have come across this ground before and he bolted up on decent ground at Ascot last time.

“But he’s an improving young horse and we’ve never had too many in these big handicap hurdles so we’re looking forward to it.”

Meanwhile, Celtic Dino will shoulder the burden of top-weight after his Chepstow success, with his in-form handler hoping he can continue climbing the hurdling ladder.

“He’ll be carrying top-weight, but I don’t see why we shouldn’t be going there really,” said Thomas.

“He could be one for a proper spring campaign and hopefully go to the spring festivals like the Scottish Champion Hurdle or something like that.”

Alan King is another with more than one chance in the race and while Helnwein has been knocking on the door of late, it is Castle Carrock, well regarded and tried in Grade One company last term, who has been subject to plenty of support in the build up to this contest.

King told his website, www.alankingracing.co.uk: ”I probably made a mistake running Castle Carrock in the Grade One at Aintree’s Grand National meeting as the handicapper put him up 6lb for finishing sixth.

“Ideally he wants two and a half miles and Kelso, where he ran his second race for us, would have been plenty sharp enough a track for him, but this looks the right race to start him back.

“We also run Helnwein and though we’ll probably have another crack at chasing with him at some stage, he runs well fresh, so this race should tell us which route we should take.”

Nicky Henderson’s previous winner Iberico Lord, Tom Lacey’s Chepstow scorer Gibbs Island and Fergal O’Brien’s Serious Challenge are other notable names in action, while Ben Pauling is hoping for a resurgence from Fiercely Proud before embarking on a chasing career.

“The Ascot form is hot and he had a fibrillating heart at Newbury after that,” said Pauling.

“He’s best fresh, I’ve done a lot of work with him at home, he’s been for two racecourse gallops.

“We felt we wanted one more go at this race because last year by this time he’d unseated before the race and got loose at Cheltenham in October and been to Ascot and fallen.

“He’ll go novice chasing after this.”