NAP of the Day: Opera Singer to hit all the right notes at Goodwood

Racing on Thursday is dominated by the action at Goodwood and Galway - and it's to the former we go for the NAP of the Day.

The highlight at Glorious Goodwood on Thursday is the Nassau Stakes, a Group 1 over 1m2f for fillies and mares.

According to the 15:35 Goodwood Odds, it revolves heavily around Opera Singer and Emily Upjohn for Aidan O'Brien and John & Thady Gosden respectively.

While I think it would be unwise to rule out the winners of the 1000 Guineas (Elmalka) and the French Oaks (Sparkling Plenty) so nonchalantly, I do agree in the main.

Emily Upjohn hasn't been the force she once was in the last 12 months, but her narrow second to subsequent King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes runner-up Bluestocking in the Pretty Polly at the Curragh in late June was a real return to something like and conditions are very much in her favour here.

However, she must concede eight pounds to OPERA SINGER which rates a big ask.

Just two pounds separate the pair on official ratings and given I believe we're yet to see the best of O'Brien's three-year-old Justify colt, there's only one outcome in my mind.

It's well-documented that the selection, a Group 1 winner at Longchamp on Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe day as a juvenile, wasn't 100% for her seasonal reappearance in the Irish 1000 Guineas at the Curragh back in May, so the fact she managed to finish third was a testament to her ability.

She improved substantially for the run to place in second behind subsequent Falmouth Stakes hero Porta Fortuna by just a length in the Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot a month later.

O'Brien said he was "delighted" with that run and that "everything has gone well since". He's also put to ease doubts about his filly coping up with the step up in trip, suggesting it was always the plan to come here and that "she can probably go even further".

At 2/1, I think she's a great bet in the Nassau Stakes.

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