Veteran Furze Fighting fit
The popular 11-year-old will line up for the two-mile race for a sixth successive year and he will be bidding for a second win after enjoying victory in 2003.
The French Furze was only fifth behind Harchibald last year and he is likely to be an outsider this time as he will be having his first outing since finishing well down the field in the Scottish Champion Hurdle in April.
“He’s had a good few goes,” Richards said yesterday. “He’s been second three times and then he was lucky enough to win it so he doesn’t owe anybody anything.
“We are just having a bit of fun with him nowadays. He’s in fantastic shape, very fit so if any of the others are caught cold he might be the one to catch them.”
Richards has also entered Smurfit Champion Hurdle hope Faasel but he is unlikely to make a quick reappearance after finishing a narrow second at Haydock last time.
The Greystoke handler added: “We just put him in to see what the entries were, I don’t think we were really going to run him.
“If it had had just cut up to four or five horses or something we might have had a go.
“He’s come out of the Haydock race good and he will probably go to Cheltenham next. I think he’s a lot better horse with a pair of blinkers or visors on him and we will probably go down that route from now on.”
