Classy City Island out to redeem himself after sloppy start to chase career

Killiney Novice Chase | Grade 3 | 2m4f | 5yo+ | RTV

Last year's brilliant Ballymore Novices' Hurdle hero City Island made a bad start to life over fences at Leopardstown at Christmas and few will be willing to support him again here off the back of such a poor chasing debut.

City Island drew many oohs and aahs from the Leopardstown crowd from the outset. He pecked at the second, was far from fluent at the next, dived at the third-last and lost all chance when making another bad mistake two from home, after which he was pulled up by jockey Mark Walsh.

The vibes before that eagerly anticipated chasing debut was that City Island was schooling brilliantly at home but, presented with the task of trying to go the speed of two-time Champion Hurdle runner-up Melon over 2m1f, he fluffed his lines.

Martin Brassil has issued a similarly upbeat bulletin on his stable star before this assignment and it can only be viewed as a positive that the Grand National-winning trainer is willing to roll the dice just two weeks after the Leopardstown mishap.

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Carefully Selected has a perfect record when going off favourite or joint-favourite and he looks set to be sent off market leader here

There's a chance Carefully Selected is escaping scrutiny given a large part of the pre-race debate has been focussed on City Island, but it's worth noting that Willie Mullins' chaser was far from fluent himself at Fairyhouse on his first try over fences in November.

In accounting for Lord Schnitzel, again in opposition here, Carefully Selected made a series of small errors before leaving his hind legs behind him at the second-last, a mistake that would have cost most horses.

But jumping isn't the main question hovering over Carefully Selected.

Already being hailed as a type who could be tailor-made for the National Hunt Chase over 3m6f at Cheltenham, Carefully Selected could struggle with Sunday's 2m4f trip, which is shorter than ideal.

Still, this is a horse who had enough class to finish second in a Champion Bumper a couple of seasons ago and even over an inadequate trip he will rate as a more solid proposition than City Island, who is on something of a retrieval mission.

The market has this as a match between City Island and Carefully Selected but Dallas Des Pictons, second in last year's Martin Pipe, and the unexposed Speak Easy are worthy challengers.

What they say

Willie Mullins, trainer of Carefully Selected
The ground was too quick for him to run at Leopardstown's Christmas meeting. The 2m4f trip will be shorter than ideal but we need to get more experience into him and that is a more important consideration than the distance at this stage of the season. He did well to win on his chasing debut at Fairyhouse in November when he came back well to score in good style over 2m5f after appearing to throw the race away when blundering at the second-last fence.

Martin Brassil, trainer of City Island
I was disappointed with the outcome at Leopardstown but I noticed a lot of horses jumped moderately there – for whatever reason, I don't know. I've done plenty of schooling with him and he's been fine. I'm hoping he'll be fine at Punchestown but, as the fella says, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. He'd done everything right up to the race but he wouldn't have been going as fast in his schooling and he was following a fair horse [Melon] at Leopardstown. Even though he launched himself at the third-last, he was still back up with the leaders jumping the second-last. We decided after Punchestown last season that we'd go chasing and I don't think you should deviate from a plan unless something drastic happens. The transition isn't always smooth but he loves his jumping and loves jumping fences. It's just a matter of him adapting to things at speed.

Gordon Elliott, trainer of Dallas Des Pictons
Dallas Des Pictons has had a light season so far but he began to thrive this time last year and I'm looking forward to seeing how he gets on.

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