Chopsticks

The McConnell yard has been in fine form this season, sending out 36 winners, so the infrastructure and knowhow are clearly there. Chopsticks, however, has been a tough nut to crack. Beyond that Sligo win — now 11 months ago — the horse has managed 11 placed finishes from 29 races, meaning it has run into the prize money more than a third of the time without quite converting. That tells you this is not a horse who trails home last and collects its hay; it competes, it runs into positions, but the win has proved almost impossibly elusive.

The distances where Chopsticks shows best are the longer ones, between a mile and six furlongs and two miles. In 14 races over that range it has won once — that same Sligo success — but a 7% win rate at those trips tells you this is genuinely where the horse belongs. The recent form reads 9th, 11th, 4th, 3rd in the last four completed runs, which suggests it is capable of threatening but not yet able to close the deal again. Regular jockey Shane Foley has ridden Chopsticks 10 times without a win between them, which is a frustrating partnership on paper, though placing the blame is difficult when a horse's entire career record contains just the one victory.

Chopsticks raced just one day ago, so this is a horse very much in the thick of things. Whether another win is coming is genuinely hard to say — but then nobody predicted Sligo either.