Devil is fiendishly tempting

The Imperial Cup (3.15) provides a nice teaser to the Cheltenham Festival and whoever solves the Sandown puzzle can go into next week’s four-day fiesta with a spring in their step.

Ruby Walsh has long been confident about the prospects of Ted Spread, who was an easy winner last time and who has his sights set on bigger things next week.

When trained on the flat by Mark Tompkins, he was considered a St Leger type and with that sort of class to call on, he should surely be competitive off a mark of 135 over hurdles. He deserves to be sent off favourite for today’s race and I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t go very close.