RACING: Ouija Board may have been a brilliant, seven-length winner of the Epsom Oaks, but her trainer, Ed Dunlop, insisted yesterday the placed horses that day cannot be dismissed in Sunday's Irish version at the Curragh.
As expected, Ouija Board was supplemented into the Darley Irish Oaks at a cost of €40,000 yesterday. She joins 10 other fillies left in the classic, and they include the Epsom runner-up, All Too Beautiful, as well as Punctilious, who finished third.
The supplementary fee was paid out after Ouija Board, ridden by her big-race jockey Kieren Fallon, worked over six furlongs at Newmarket in the morning.
"She is in great form," reported Fallon. "The hardest part is keeping them right for the big day. You're always afraid in the week running up to a big race that something is going to happen."
Dunlop was similarly upbeat.
"I'm as happy now as I was going to Epsom," he said. "I think she grew after Epsom and her coat dulled a little. But in the last two to three weeks I've been very happy with her."
The forfeit stage resulted in little change in the ante-post market, Ouija Board remaining a red-hot favourite to complete the Oaks double.
Paddy Power make her a 4 to 6 shot with All Too Beautiful next best at 3 to 1. Cashmans go 8 to 11 about the favourite.
But Dunlop is loath to count any chickens. "I strongly believe the runner-up and the third will be more suited by a more galloping track than Epsom so that is obviously a concern."
That view was backed up by Frankie Dettori, who will try for a third Oaks success in four years aboard the Godolphin hope Punctilious.
"She did not handle Epsom one bit and will be more at home on a right-handed track," said the Italian yesterday. "The favourite is very good, but I would say the 10 lengths she beat us by at Epsom is flattering. Punctilious is not the best work horse at home but she looks well."
Aidan O'Brien has left in Royal Tigress alongside All Too Beautiful, while the German-trained La Ina, runner-up in last month's German Oaks at Hamburg, is also one of the entries.
Four British-trained fillies are in the Oaks, with the Ribblesdale runner-up Sahool joining John Dunlop's Rave Reviews.
Mick Channon has left the Coventry Stakes fifth Turnkey in the Group Three Anglesey Stakes on Sunday, and the older horse Naahy will represent the trainer in the Minstrel Stakes on the same day.
Sunday's card will be the first meeting covered in a new deal between Paddy Power and RTÉ. The bookmaking chain will sponsor all 35 days of the station's live racing, starting with the Oaks meeting on Sunday.
Other news yesterday concerned Horse Racing Ireland's (HRI) figures for the first half of 2004, which included a 12-per-cent increase in betting figures.
The HRI chief executive, Brian Kavanagh, described the figures as "extremely encouraging" and pointed to the four-per-cent increase in attendances to a total of 565,982.
"The figures were affected by a difficult month in June which saw some fixtures hit with bad weather and clashes with the GAA provincial championship and Euro 2004. Up to the end of May the attendances were 11 per cent ahead of last year, and we expect those levels to continue in the second half of the year," Kavanagh said.
Tote turnover for the first half of 2004 was up 12 per cent to €20.2 million, with the on-course bookmakers up five per cent to €84.7 million. Off-course betting exceeded €1 billion, an increase of 22 per cent on the same period last year.
Tonight's feature at Killarney is the €30,000 Murphy's Handicap Hurdle, where Blue Away could be the solution, while Boundary may edge out the ex-Cheltenham bumper winner Liberman in the two-mile maiden.
