York tips: Best value bets for day one of York Dante Festival

• The Value Bet is designed to generatelong-term profitby searching for overpriced horses in the feature weekend races and at the big Festivals in the UK and Ireland.
• Following all of Matt’s tips to advertised stakes/odds since he took over from Ben Linfoot in June 2020 would have produced over114pts profit.
• So far this year he's+22.64ptshaving tipped winners Aucunrisque at14/1, Maskada at25/1, Stage Star at11/1,Tiger Jet at16/1,Rebel Territory at7/1,Rainbow Fire at6/1, Gloire D’athon at14/1and Metier at6/1.

Value Bet tips: Wednesday, May 17

1pt e.w. Crystal Delight in 1.50 York at 14/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5)

1pt win Lucky Man in 2.25 York at 16/1 (General)

1pt win Ghathanfar in 2.25 York at 28/1 (General)

1pt win Emaraaty Ana in 3.00 York at 12/1 (BetVictor, Ladbrokes)

Crystal clear in opening event of Dante Festival

York’s Dante Festival kicks off in traditional fashion with two seriously strong handicaps and punters will once again be turning to William Haggas, who has won the Sky Bet Race To The Ebor Jorvik Handicap for the past two seasons.

Ex-Yorkshireman Haggas has a couple of bullets to fire in the 12-furlong opener this time around including recent acquisition Tasman Bay, who appeared to lose his way last year for Sir Mark Todd having shown high-class form through 2021, including a second to Alenquer in the King Edwards VII Stakes.

He’s in with a real shot off a reduced mark of 102 here but the first-time tongue-tie puts me off slightly and he’s hardly being missed in the betting.

Stablemate La Yakel has been strongest in the market since betting on the race opened up, and you can see why. Unraced as a two-year-old, he looked a fair way ahead of the assessor when winning on handicap debut at Ascot in September and I wouldn’t judge him too harshly on his subsequent Newmarket fourth when sent off favourite for the Old Rowley Cup at Newmarket.

If there’s a long-term Ebor contender in the field then it might well be him, although Sir Michael Stoute’s Real Dream is another lightly-raced individual with plenty of upside from his revised mark (91) after winning readily at Kempton earlier in the month.

Among those at longer odds, Selwan could be able to spring a bit of a surprise on his first run for Alan King – and first run in this country.

King usually means business when he books Hollie Doyle (20% strike-rate, +44.30 level stakes profit) and this 75,000 euro purchase was last seen winning a Deauville handicap on the polytrack from a horse named Mr Coalville, who won his next two starts.

Selwan has got winning turf form in minor company too, while it's worth noting King has had plenty of horses run well in this race over the past decade, including last year’s fifth On To Victory (25/1), 2021 second Raymond Tusk (40/1) and 2017 second Burguillos (3/1).

Andrew Balding's Scampi - 16/1 generally - is another to consider under a light weight on the back of his pipe-opener on pretty horrible ground at Epsom, but nothing appeals quite as much at current odds as the progressive and race-fit CRYSTAL DELIGHT.

A wide-margin novice winner on his debut for William Jarvis (formerly trained by Stoute) at Lingfield in December, he’s since gone up from an opening mark of 83 to 90 without actually getting his head in front again, but he’s run three cracking races in defeat and he looks made for this place.

He’s bumped into two very well-treated Balding-trained horses (Berkshire Breeze and Teumessias Fox) the last twice and the most recent runner-up effort at Newmarket might just have been needed as he was returning after a 77-day break and hadn’t raced on turf for 12 months.

He was a bit fresh for Jim Crowley on the rain-softened Rowley Mile course too but should settle better with a bit of company up front on this sharper track, and there certainly won’t be any excuses with the drying conditions. He rates a belting each-way bet.

Take two in puzzling sprint handicap

The Churchill Tyres Handicap also sees a Haggas horse right near the top of the market in the shape of Khanjar.

He’d looked to be going places before flopping in the Ayr Gold Cup and he didn’t fare that much better upped to seven furlongs in a Redcar Listed race when last seen, but he's just the sort of model with which his yard does exceptionally well.

The first visit to York will be a new experience, though, and it will be made all the more difficult by the presence of some hard-knocking course regulars such as Summerghand and last year’s winner Dakota Gold.

Mr Wagyu is one of the older brigade who looks to be on a fair enough mark at present, while Just Frank would be interesting if reverting to the prominent tactics that served him so well at points during his time with Les Eyre.

They aren’t the only ones with good York form, however, and LUCKY MAN’s career record here reads an impressive 2215. While not always living up to his name, the Richard Spencer-trained colt looks one to take a chance on despite having yet to be seen this year.

He had a busy old time of things through 2022 but thrived on action and was runner-up to the subsequent Listed winner Harry Three in the often-informative, three-year-old sprint handicap here last June, before registering even stronger form against older horses later in the year, most notably when fourth in the Ayr Gold Cup.

Now able to race off a 1lb lower mark than at Ayr, he’s temptingly treated and while he obviously won't be alone in this regard, connections are likely to have been working back from this fixture for a while.

Drawn in three, he’s on completely the opposite side to Dakota Gold but there is pace in the low numbers too courtesy of Lethal Levi (two) and Soldier’s Minute (seven), among others, so I won’t get too hung up on race tactics for Lucky Man and cut to the conclusion which is that he is all but guaranteed the strong pace he needs to be seen at his best.

With Lucky Man likely to be ridden just off the pace, I quite like to have one who will up with the vanguard too as they sometimes just don’t come back to the chasing pack on the Knavesmire.

And despite having to race from fractionally out of the weights, GHATHANFAR has a few eyecatching bits of form, including some which ties in with Lucky Man, and the return of headgear could be a positive sign for him.

He’s no spring chicken at seven but is clearly one of those sprinters who gets faster with age and the addition of a visor/cheekpieces sparked a serious amount of improvement in him last season.

He finished just a head behind Lucky Man when the pair of them followed home the classy Gale Force Maya over this course and distance in July (replay below) and, with Lucky Man getting the three-year-old allowance on that occasion, Ghathanfar is now effectively 11lb better off in terms of actual weight carried.

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Tracy Waggott’s charge (also declared for the opening race over the minimum trip here on Thursday) has been quiet enough so far this season - the yard had their first winner of the year at 20/1 earlier this month - but two outings on bad ground at Redcar and Doncaster have looked dead against this horse and his mark has dropped rapidly as a result.

A little too rapidly, one might argue, as he’s now 1lb ‘wrong’ coming back here, but he’s another with some really attractive career course form figures (3621374) and it wouldn’t be a surprise if James Sullivan bounced him out from stall one and looked to head for the far rail.

If the returning visor perks him up as hoped - he has finished first, second and third the three times he’s run in first-time/returning headgear - he might be able to significantly outrun his odds.

Ryan mighty in Duke Of York

Last year’s leading sprinter Highfield Princess is undoubtedly the major draw in the 1895 Duke Of York Clipper Stakes but she’s one to take on under the penalty on her first start of the new campaign.

I wasn’t expecting to see Marshman until Haydock later in the month so the decision to run here looks a bold move and he is respected getting so much weight from everything, but EMARAATY ANA is surely the one to be on at the prices.

A class act in his own right, Kevin Ryan's horse landed the Gimcrack here in his youth and he was runner-up in the Nunthorpe before winning the Betfair Sprint Cup at Haydock in 2021.

Emaraaty Ana seemed to find a new level of consistency towards the end of last season and once again produced his best efforts on home soil both here at York and then at Haydock, before running a brilliant race in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint.

The one possible issue you’d have is that he took a while to come to hand last year, but he’s not been out to Dubai this time, which was said to have set him back a little, and I reckon he could be ready to do himself justice at what is a huge meeting for his yard. Granted, he wasn't much cop on his one previous attempt at this race but the ground had gone against him that day and he was about a stone below his best.

Emaraaty Ana gets a 5lb swing with Highfield Princess for a four-length defeat in the Nunthorpe and certainly shouldn’t be a double-figure price here on that basis alone.

First published at 1500 BST on 16/05/23

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