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At the start of the current season William Haggas described his strategic change of keeping more older horses in training as making him ‘more like a National Hunt trainer’. Six months into the season it is clear that ,as yet, the policy has not gone to plan. Since Royal Ascot when Opportunity and Alobayyah won…

No runners on Tuesday after Mondays rather strange entries, which as expected were not betting opportunities. Haggas has entered 30 horses on Saturday and Sunday with the expectation that the forecast rain will produce better ground. Keep an eye open for any horses entered this week that have previously been trained at Somerville Lodge and…

Somerville Lodge has three runners on Monday and nothing on Tuesday. The three on Monday present a real problem for punters and bookmakers pricing them up. First up is Encore who has her first run for William Haggas having began life with Ed Walker as a 2yo. She ran perfectly well on her debut at…

Due to the possibility of soft ground, there has to be a level of doubt that Maltese Cross will run in the Arc this season. If he does and I do believe it will be his main Autumn target the 10/1 currently on offer is generous. Daryz will be the market leader but the true…

An excellent York for Somerville Lodge and finally a big race Saturday winner thanks to the win of IFRAAD in the Melrose. That was backed up by excellent runs by Lake Forest and Opportunity who looks a very good bet in the Irish St Leger. I would not write off Klassleader and it looks very…

Other than Lady Rosalind taking up an engagement in the big Tattersalls sales race at Newmarket– she is a big outsider and is not a betting proposition – this Saturday sees Somerville Lodge concentrating on York. Each week since Royal Ascot I have warned about the poor Saturday record for the yard because of the…

The York Ebor Festival continues and the better ground has seen nearly all the horses on the first two days run very well. Rhapsody landing the each way money finishing 2nd at 9/1 on Thursday. After the good start to the meeting there is every chance that the yard will send out the market leaders…

The brilliant victory of Maltese Cross in the Voltigeur on Day 1 at York has done much to clear away the gloom that has largely hung over Somerville Lodge for much of the summer. There seems little doubt that the hot dry conditions are the reason. A good friend pointed out that with his runners…

Hope has returned, maybe dampened and still smoldering. High Degree was allowed to drift to 2.94 on the exchanges -his long overdue second success at least ended the weekend with a payout. The difficulty with backing the William Haggas trained horses since Royal Ascot is a majority seem to be performing at 95-97% of expected…

There seems very little point to continue to look back over historic trends relating to Somerville Lodge. They have always been one of the foundations that provided successful betting opportunities backing horses trained at Somerville Lodge month in month out. Since Royal Ascot they have proved worthless ! For the sake of habit Haggas’s last…