Musir to make a bold bid for Dubai showpiece

Gio Ponti, Gitano Hernando, Richard’s Kid and Twice Over will all be bidding to improve on last year’s placings in this weekend’s Dubai World Cup, the climax to the Dubai Festival, at Meydan. This year’s line-up is set to feature runners from six countries and is worth almost £4million to the winner.

Twice Over looks a deserving favourite, though Coral (11/4) have decided to oppose Henry Cecil‘s six-year-old on account of the fact that he’s been done no favours by the draw. He did win a second Champion Stakes at Newmarket last October, however, and landed his prep race over course and distance so seems sure to be thereabouts having followed the same path as three previous World Cup winners.

Buena Vista will become the highest-earning racehorse in training if she wins but the brilliant Japanese mare has never raced on a surface like Tapeta before and has an even worse draw than Twice Over. She has reportedly worked well on the all-weather surface but there are doubts about whether she’ll have the pace for this trip in top-class company despite winning over a mile in Japan and Coral will happily lay you 12/1. Gitano Hernando was favourite last year but never got near the leaders in a slowly run race. He has finished behind Twice Over in his last two runs so it’s no surprise to see him priced up at 16/1 this year by William Hill, while Gio Ponti (a general 10/1) comes here without a prep race once again and Capo Blanco (a general 9/2) is also returning from a break, though he did beat Twice Over in last year’s Irish Champion Stakes at Leopardstown and has a good draw in stall four.

The Mike De Kock-trained Golden Sword (16/1 with Blue Square, 888sport and Coral) would have been interesting with a better draw as he finished within three lengths of Sea The Stars in the 2009 Epsom Derby and has looked a reformed character of late but stablemate Musir could be the value bet. He was surprisingly beaten on his reappearance and did finish behind Twice Over here on his latest start but last year’s UAE Derby winner has been trained specifically with this race in mind by his shrewd handler and the 16/1 available with Boylesports, Coral and William Hill looks outstanding each-way value.