Keith Melrose negotiates Haydock's Placepot with a 48-line perm

Most of the races that make up the Haydock Placepot are handicaps of quality ranging from decent to useful, albeit with a bit of a twist in many cases.

There are grounds to take a fairly cautious approach to getting through the opening two-year-old race. Start with and Cliffcake as both have the sort of background that points to showing plenty from an early stage. The same goes for , who can be stuck in as a bit of a wildcard at likely bigger odds.

The following sprint is for three-year-olds and has loads of unexposed sorts. is chanced, with his yard having started well and set him some stiff assignments last year. Also include , who has a soft-ground win to his name already.

In the next, there is more to go on. gets in, having maybe just failed for stamina over 6½f at Doncaster last time. also has a fair amount of experience without suggesting she is the finished article yet.

A banker would ease pressure on the perm and looks to provide that in the 1.45. He has won both starts since joining Mick Appleby from Ireland and has more to give.

was still improving when his season ended in 2019 and, having placed here over hurdles since, makes the cut in leg five. joins him, as for all the misgivings over his application he looks among the likeliest to be in the shake-up.

Loads of unexposed sorts once more in the closing leg. and have solid form to call on and neither forces us to guess on their ability or fear that they are exposed.

Placepot selections

12.15
1 Cliffcake
4 Inhaler
7 Meshakel

12.45
1 Brad The Brief
7 Byline

1.15
5 Galadriel
11 Iva Go

1.45
9 Garsman

2.15
5 Blue Laureate
6 Moon King

2.45
4 High Flying Bird
6 El Naseri

Perm: 3x2x2x1x2x2 = 48 lines

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