Daily Racing Tips – Thursday, August 1

Houso should find conditions to suit after finding the line nicely for second at Seymour on a bottomless track last time out.

The five-year-old by Rich Enuff was competing off a five-week break that day, so he is open to natural improvement out to 1400m now on less of a turnaround.

Daniel Stackhouse should look to utilise his early speed to offset the wide gate, and with his only win coming on soft conditions at Stony Creek three back, a little sting out of the track only strengthens his claims.

Sparkling should find this a winnable assignment back to country level.

Matt Laurie’s mare spent time taking on tougher races than this earlier in the year, winning her maiden here at Cranbourne before going on to run second at Sandown.

The daughter of The Autumn Sun was outclassed up to Group 2 level in the Armanasco Stakes at Caulfield last time out, but she did run a nice race fresh at Kilmore last time in work that suggests she’ll be competitive here.

Half Yours is a four-year-old with serious ability out of the Ciaron Maher stable.

The gelding out of Irish Group 3 winner St Jean shed the maiden tag in fine style on return at Geelong last month, picking up nicely over his final few strides to win with plenty left to give through the line.

He strikes similar wet conditions here out to the mile now and has big claims with Ethan Brown piloting again.

Mantua just needs a couple of scratchings to go his way to earn a spot in the field.

If that’s the case, this son of Fastnet Rock should prove very difficult to hold out if he can improve on a last-start runner-up effort at Bendigo that saw him finish well behind Dreamzel.

Ciaron Maher’s four-year-old has mixed his form over 1000m during his short career, but he’s raced at Saturday grade in the past and has drawn a perfect gate to run on late.