CURRAGH PREVIEW:THE NEW Approach team of Jim Bolger and Kevin Manning will be hoping for a bumper Group One weekend if Finsceal Beo lands today's Audi Pretty Polly Stakes at the Curragh, but the double-Classic-winning filly may have to give best at the 10-furlong trip to Mad About You.
Finsceal Beo is returning to the course and distance over which she was runner-up to Duke Of Marmalade in last month's Tattersalls Gold Cup, since which she has finished third to Haradasun over a mile at Royal Ascot.
It looks significant that Bolger is upping her in trip again and it's a tip many will take since there was a suspicion she just failed to get home in the Tattersalls after appearing to be travelling best of all at the two-furlong pole.
The counter argument is there's no better mile and a quarter horse in Europe right now than Duke Of Marmalade but on balance, and on this easier ground, stamina does still appear to be an issue.
In contrast, the trip, and most importantly, the ground look ideal for Mad About You, who was third behind Halfway To Heaven in the Irish Guineas, after which Pat Smullen was convinced that only the very fast going had prevented a memorable win.
Dermot Weld has held fire on a number of top-flight entries since then in order to wait for the Pretty Polly and even with the cross-channel duo of Anna Pavlova and Promising Lead also in the race that patience can pay off.
Today's main support is the Group Three At The Races Curragh Cup, which sees the seasonal reappearance of the top stayer Septimus.
Aidan O'Brien's horse has yet to win a Group One but his 122 rating is very high class and the Melbourne Cup is an end of season target.
He will undoubtedly strip fitter for today's run but that official mark puts him in a different league to this opposition which includes last year's winner, Peppertree Lane.
Aidan O'Brien's Group One focus tomorrow will also stretch to Paris, where last year's Irish Derby hero Soldier Of Fortune bids to add to his Epsom Coronation Cup victory earlier this month with a win in the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud.
Christophe Soumillon rides the Galileo colt, leaving Johnny Murtagh free for duty at home, where he can pick up tomorrow's main support, the Group Two One 51 Railway Stakes, on Mastercraftsman.
The course and distance winner's sole piece of form doesn't stack up against the Coventry Stakes second Intense Focus, but O'Brien's juveniles almost invariably improve considerably for a run.
The Tommy Stack-trained Myboycharlie would like further than the five furlongs of the William Fry Sapphire Stakes, but more important is the easier going than he faced in last month's Greenlands Stakes.
