Ned Broy

The recent form tells an interesting story. Ned Broy's last six races, read from most recent backwards, go 5-3-2-8-6-10 — and that second place is the eye-catching detail. After some disappointing efforts that saw it finish sixth and eighth, it then ran into a purple patch: tenth one day, sixth the next, then eighth, then suddenly second, then third, and most recently fifth. That trajectory, rough to smooth, suggests the horse may be finding its rhythm. It raced just yesterday, so whatever that form means, it's fresh.

Ned Broy races in the lower tier of British racing — Class 5, where horses are competing at an accessible level rather than chasing the sport's biggest prizes. It has run three times at that level without winning, which on its own sounds flat, but the placed efforts show it belongs in those races. The question is whether a first win is around the corner or whether Ned Broy is simply one of those horses that makes the frame regularly without quite breaking through.

The yard behind it, trained by Iain Jardine at Carrutherstown in Dumfries and Galloway, has sent out 57 winners this season alone — that's a trainer who clearly knows how to get horses to win races. Having a productive yard in your corner matters. Jardine's team will have seen horses take time to click, and with Ned Broy showing signs of improvement in its most recent runs, there's reason to think the first win may not be far away.