Lucky 15 Tips: McColgan can bring the magic at Naas

With just the three meetings taking place across Britain and Ireland on Sunday, the focus is on quality over quantity. All three meetings are National Hunt cards and there’s graded action on offer on both sides of the Irish Sea.

Naas hosts a Grade 3 chase over two miles and their main race is well supported by a couple of Listed events, whilst the main event in Britain is undoubtedly the Grade 2 National Spirit Hurdle at Fontwell, which is the course’s biggest race of the year. Below are my four Lucky 15 Tips and they include a Willie Mullins-trained runner in the Naas’ finale, which is a Listed novices’ handicap chase.

Horse Racing odds

15:00 – Fierce Handay @ 11/2

The combination of JP McManus and Noel Meade looks pretty interesting and handicaps seem to suit the lightly raced FIERCE HANDAY. He has had just seven starts over hurdles so far and his three handicap efforts have been easily the best of them.

Winning a novice handicap at Fairyhouse in December, he hit the front approaching the final flight of hurdles and went clear on the run-in to score by just shy of four lengths.

Meade’s six-year-old followed that up with a solid second at Leopardstown and should be in the mix upon returning to handicaps after a below-par effort last time out.

15:30 – Melbourne Shamrock @ 7/4

Keep an eye on the market here, because if the money starts to come for an Emmet Mullins runner, you should definitely take note. MELBOURNE SHAMROCK makes his handicap debut off the back of four starts in maiden company and we could see vast improvement.

Stamina is clearly his forte as he won a point-to-point over three miles in soft ground before joining Mullins’ yard. The seven-year-old came very close to getting off the mark when second by a head over three miles at Fairyhouse in December and he should be winning races sooner rather than later.

An opening mark of 121 looks pretty reasonable and there could be any amount of improvement to come.

16:00 – Low Kick @ 5/2

Bumpers have been a good source of winners for Gordon Elliott this season and he has already landed 19, at a strike-rate of 23 per cent. That’s extra impressive when you consider the number of times that he runs more than one in the same race.

LOW KICK could become winner number 20 on the evidence of the five-year-old’s solid third on rules debut for previous connections. He probably bumped into a smart one at Navan on stable debut and could be set to go one better this time around.

17:00 – Magic McColgan @ 9/1

It’s unusual to see a Listed contest in Ireland which hasn’t been won by Willie Mullins in the last decade but the Nas Na Riogh Novice Handicap Chase is on that list. That could be set to change however, as the lightly raced MAGIC MCCOLGAN can do the business on Sunday.

She managed to win a mares maiden hurdle at Punchestown last season and showed some promise when second in a chase at this venue last month. Handicaps could be the making of her and a mark of 118 looks very workable, as the best is surely yet to come.

If all four of our selections won, today's notional 50p win Lucky 15, at the prices indicated (they can of course fluctuate), would return around £1,050 for a £7.50 total stake. If you can improve upon our selections (of course you can) - then go for it!

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Lucky 15 tips with Betfred Insights.