Bookies Blog

It’s coming to the end of February and everybody seems to be getting a little restless. As usual Cheltenham fever is spreading across the racing world and this year there are two horses dominating the Cheltenham headlines.

Paul Nicholls’ yard is home to both Kaoto Star and Denman. The horses both share the price of 5/4 at most bookmakers and so far neither horse has shown a hint of weakness in their run up to Cheltenham.

Kaoto Star was favourite ahead of Denman until in October Denman produced a stunning performance, destroying the rest of the field in the Hennessy Gold Cup. Since then Kaoto Star has also been in tremendous form, winning races such as the Betfair Chase and most recently the Commercial First Ascot Chase with incredible ease.

In fact there is so little to distinguish between the two, and they both so superior to all other entries that both totesport and betfair are offering markets which exclude them. There is some great value to be had in these markets. Betfair have priced Mossbank as a 15/2 shot to win without Kaoto Star or Denman in contention; that makes Mossbank joint second favourite behind Exotic Dancer.

Totesport meanwhile have not just left Kaoto Star and Denman out of the race in their Market, but they have also excluded Exotic Dancer. One might expect Mossbank and Neptune Collognes to share prices of around 3/1 or 9/2. Indeed, they have priced Neptune Collognes at 5/2 but Mossbank meanwhile can be backed at a whopping 10/1. There are likely to be around 10 runners in this race and if you back it each way you’ll get a return if Mossbank comes in the top six, it is absolutely cracking value.