Gift lights up the start of Aintree

Iris’s Gift, the game winner of Cheltenham’s bonusprint.com Stayers’ Hurdle, is the star on show in the opening race of Aintree’s three-day Grand National meeting tomorrow.

The Jonjo O’Neill-trained grey, who defeated Baracouda by one and a half lengths at the Festival, faces seven rivals in the Martell Cognac Laurel Pub Company Liverpool Hurdle including stablemate Sh Boom, Stayers’ Hurdle third Crystal D’Amay and veteran Deano’s Beeno.

As well as Iris’s Gift and Sh Boom, O’Neill also saddles Hasty Prince while County Durham-based handler Howard Johnson has just the one entry in Royal Rosa.

The last named, a record 340,000 guinea purchase at last year’s Doncaster Spring Sale, has tasted defeat only once over timber when going down to Sh Boom at Haydock.

Royal Rosa heads into tomorrow’s Grade Two contest on the back of a victory over Royal & SunAlliance Novices’ Hurdle winner Fundamentalist at the Merseyside venue.

Irish raiders Holy Orders and the mare Áine Dubh complete the line up.