Newland wary of unexposed novices as he targets second Cup with Le Patriote

When it comes to winning valuable handicaps there are not many as shrewd as Richard Newland, so when he says he believes there are one or two progressive novices in Saturday's Grade 3 Imperial Cup better treated than his Le Patriote it is wise to take note.

Newland's charge is hardly old and regressive himself. He joined the yard in November after seven starts in France and made his debut in the Lanzarote, when seventh. He was then fourth in a handicap at Cheltenham on trials day and won a 2m3½f handicap at Ascot last month off a mark of 127.

He is 8lb higher in the ratings but if topweight Call Me Lord runs he would carry 10st 9lb and Newland, who nominated the Imperial Cup immediately after that Ascot win, said: "The intention is to run. He's been training fine but it's a bit harder now he's gone up the weights.

"He's on a reasonable weight in the context of the race but he's a fair bit higher in the ratings. I'm looking forward to running him. It's very hard in my experience to win two big handicaps in a row, the handicapper usually gets your measure and there are one or two unexposed novices in this I think."

Should Le Patriote make it two on the bounce he could bid for three, especially with race sponsor Matchbook doubling the bonus offer to £100,000 for any horse who follows up at Cheltenham.

"We'll give it a go, he'd get into the festival only if he got a penalty anyway so he'd have to win at Sandown," added Newland, who won the Imperial Cup in 2015 with Ebony Express.

One of those unexposed novices Newland could be referring to Whatswrongwithyou, like Call Me Lord trained by Nicky Henderson, who was made favourite at around 7-1 on Monday after 29 remained at the forfeit stage, while Demon D'Aunon is another.

The ground at Sandown on Monday was a mixture of good to soft and soft, but clerk of the course Andrew Cooper believes it will be somewhere between soft and heavy by the weekend given the forecast.

He said: "We escaped comparatively lightly in terms of snow, we had a few inches, no more. The ground is a mixture of soft and good to soft, a bit dead, and the week ahead is relatively mild. There's some rain towards the end of the week, we're anticipating a reasonable quantity but it's hard to be too specific.

"If we get that rain I imagine we'll be soft/heavy for the two-day meeting but we'll save extensive fresh ground for the Saturday. There are no problems anticipated at this stage but there's the potential for quite testing ground."

After racing on Saturday Sandown hosts a Cheltenham Festival preview, hosted by television presenter Oli Bell and featuring Henderson, Richard Johnson and Alan King. Tickets are £5, in aid of the Injured Jockeys Fund.

Imperial Cup card

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