Horses To Follow » Yafta

Yafta

Yafta ran better than his finishing position in fifth place suggests in the Spring Trophy. He wasn’t badly away from stall one, but the field concertinaed in front of him on the short run to the bend, with the result that he had to be restrained by Dane O’Neill, and he was keen around the top bend. He travelled well into the home straight though, and he moved up nicely on the far side to mount a challenge at the two-furlong marker. He joined the front rank on the run to the furlong pole and, while his run just flattened out from there, he still ran all the way to the line, going down by a total of just two and a half lengths.

It was a fine run by Richard Hannon’s horse on his first run since he was well beaten in the Diamond Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot last June. Second in the Abernant Stakes and third in the Duke of York Stakes before that, he had a little bit to find with Space Blues and Safe Voyage and Happy Power on official ratings here, and he was weak in the market, sent off at 40/1, but he out-ran those odds by a fair way. He is a talented performer at Listed or Group 3 level, he won the Group 3 Hackwood Stakes as a three-year-old.

He could come on a fair bit for this run, given his absence and his weakness in the market, and the fact that the Richard Hannon horses are not zinging yet. While Yafta has form over seven furlongs, he is probably even more effective over six. Six furlongs on fast ground is probably optimum for him, and he goes particularly well at Newmarket, where his record reads 212 on the Rowley Mile and 22 on the July Course.

Haydock, 7th June 2020