Wakanda to Make it Third Time Lucky in Rowland Meyrick

After finishing second in this race for the past two seasons, Wakanda can make it third time lucky in the Rowland Meyrick Chase at Wetherby on Boxing Day. The Sue Smith trained stayign chaser has been unlucky to bump into a couple of really well handicapped individuals over the past two years, but there doesn’t appear to be any of those in the field this time around, leaving him to swoop and take the prize.

This horse is nothing but a professional and he is ultra consistent, so there is no doubt that he deserves this prize. He has only been seen once so far this season and that was over hurdles at this course earlier in December, which was clearly a prep run with this race in mind. Sue Smith will have ensured that she has done all she can with him, and that race will have put him spot on for Boxing Day, enough to bag him the win I think.

His two main dangers are horses that ran against each other last time out, Lake View Lad and Captain Chaos. They finished one-two in the Rehearsal Chase at Newcastle earlier this month, and both come here in good form. It was Lake View Lad that got the better of the battle that day, although both have been put up in the weights for their runs, and that could be enough to prevent either from taking this prize. Baywing finished down the field in the same race and he needs a stiffer test really, but if the rain did come in the lead up to the race and the ground turned heavy then he couldn’t be discounted.

Having said that, we shouldn’t get too much rain and that leaves this race at the mercy of Wakanda. He has come close before on two separate occasions, but in 2018, Boxing Day looks set to be his day at Wetherby, with a win in their feature race.