Rich Ricci's Superstars

October 20^th

I am delighted to announce that in addition to Alan Potts (French Imports), Paul Ferguson (Novice Note Book starting soon) and Cameron Stansfield (Paddock Reports), that from next week RacingUK pundit Andy Richmond will be supplying weekly content from a trading perspective to appear in ‘Guest Contributions’ as part of the All-Inclusive Service. In addition to expert analysts within the Sport section, I’d say that’s a very strong team.

If you caught ATR early last evening then you were treated to Rich Ricci running through plans for his legion of superstars. This was no ten-minute skip through however as he candidly spoke for as long as 45 minutes. That’s 45 minutes! For someone who likes to take on short-priced favourites it can be a little boring for me seeing his horses all too regularly outclass their rivals but it is hard to begrudge him his successes when he gives so much as in this instance. It was absolutely tremendous stuff which I am sure will be available to view on their website and app but if you don’t have the time to catch that, I was tweeting the highlights as it was happening and you can view those by scrolling down the Home Page to my twitter feed rather than repeat them all again in this blog.

It was also interesting hear Ricci say that Willie Mullins flew over to Australia for just one day to monitor the progress of his Max Dynamite ahead of his Melbourne Cup bid before jetting back. Now that's what you call professionalism. 

I must admit that it has taken me a very long while to warm to Matt Chapman’s presenting style but he has fully won me over in the last year or so and I am certain that no other broadcaster could have got Ricci to talk for so long and so openly as you could tell he was enjoying being interviewed by him. In fact, I would say that Chapman is much needed on Channel 4 Racing now and especially The Morning Line which he would give the much-needed livening up to. I like the guest pundits they have on the morning show and they have a top class anchor for the afternoon but, aside from that, I am struggling to find reasons to switch over from the dedicated racing channels. 

I have a sneaky feeling that Arsenal might be a little value tonight against Bayern Munich but Seville vs Manchester City tomorrow will probably attract the main financial footy interest from me this week. In addition to Matt from Football Elite who provides superb statistical content (including for us once a month in ‘Sport’), I also like to read Mike Holden’s football views and he made a good case in The Racing Post on Saturday that Seville should be backed to lead at half-time given how lacklustre Manchester City are in Europe in the early stages and especially away from home. However, I think Mike that you need to get your map out as although your main bet on Saturday of Cambridge to beat Northampton came up trumps, being based not too far away from Northampton, I can assure that there would be no one from these parts calling it a local derby! It’s a good hour and 20 minutes’ drive the last time I did it. If Seville lead at half-time I’ll overlook that though.