Cocktail Hour should leave punters merry
Smullen has four great chances for his boss, Dermot Weld, and the combination’s Cocktail Hour is the nap choice in the Irish Stallion Farms’ EBF Median Auction Fillies Maiden.
She makes a relatively quick reappearance, having proved a costly failure at Roscommon a week ago.
The daughter of Notnowcato proved no match for Andrew Oliver’s Uleavemebreathless, going under by two lengths. But, in the context of the opposition now, it was still a decent effort and Cocktail Hour will be hard to beat.
Feature event is the Listed Ardilaun Hotel Oyster Stakes and Weld and Smullen can also supply the answer to this with the progressive Midnight Music, the only four-year-old in the field.
She won the big two-mile Monday night handicap here at the festival and then moved into Pattern company at Gowran Park last time.
Over a trip, an extended nine furlongs, that was short of her best, Midnight Music emerged with reputation enhanced when filling third spot behind Twirl and Soon.
The duo’s Three Kingdoms is worth a final chance to deliver in the modest Renmore Maiden. He was a disappointing favourite at Clonmel last Thursday, third to Hail and Precious Stone, but moving up two furlongs in trip and a softer surface can prove the key to him.
Weld and Smullen might also have the answer to the opening Donnellys’ Of Barna EBF Maiden with once-raced Magnolia Ridge, a promising enough sixth to Dont Bother Me at Leopardstown. The market has to be monitored closely, however with Aidan O’Brien introducing two newcomers in Eye Of The Storm, who is by Gaileo, and the Montjeu colt, Kingdom.
