Nap of the Day: Is this another Haggas star?

There's eight meetings across the UK & Ireland on Saturday, including the Scottish Grand National card at Ayr, and it's flat fare from Newbury that's grabbed my attention in regards to the Nap of the Day.

William Haggas likes to run a good one in this mile-long maiden at Newbury on Saturday.

The Newmarket handler won it 12 months ago with the 123-rated Dante and Irish Champion Stakes hero Economics - and in 2022 with Group 2 winner My Prospero (121 at his peak).

So, it's notable that he saddles three-year-old Wootton Bassett colt CROWN OF OAKS this year.

The brother to Royal Ascot winner English Oak fetched 260k guineas as a yearling in October 2023 and made his racecourse debut and only run to date exactly a year later in a Class 2 maiden at Newmarket.

He travelled in mid-division and made eye-catching headway on the eventual 1-2-3, who had already pulled away from the rest of the field, within the final two furlongs. At the line, he was finishing as strongly as anything.

It was a highly-encouraging debut in a strong-looking contest. The runner-up, Spirit Of Summer, is now rated 90 and won nicely on his reappearance at Southwell last month - while Secret Theory, who was victorious at HQ for Charlie Appleby and Godolphin, will put the form to the test again at Nottingham later in the evening. I expect him to do the business.

On a line through the aforementioned Spirit Of Summer, there's not much separating Crown Of Oaks and Nutmeg for George Scott. However, the selection can be marked up for his performance while the latter had little more to give. I can only see the gap between the pair increasing.

Mighty Boy, King Of Narnia, Point Of Contact, Indian Spirit and Ralph Beckett's newcomer Beagle Bay are all respected to varying degrees, but all lack the scope of the Nap as far as I'm concerned.

For me, he could be a Group 1 horse in time. Connections are clearly on the same sort of lines, for he holds entries for the Betfred 2000 Guineas, Dante and Irish Derby.

The big question is whether he's ready to rock after 189 days off the track. The form of his trainer - he's operating at a 25% strike rate courtesy of four wins from 16 runners in the past fortnight - offer optimism on that front.

If he's up to speed, I expect him to take all the beating on the first run of what could be a highly-successful three-year-old campaign.

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