Coral Lanzarote Hurdle – 3.17 Kempton Park – Saturday 10th January

Positive temperatures and rain from tonight onwards mean that this weekend’s fascinating programme of jumps racing should be just fine, beginning with a potentially very informative Grade 1 Ballymore Novice Hurdle at Naas on Friday and running through two excellent cards at Warwick and Kempton Park on Saturday.

The Hampton Novices’ Chase at Warwick at 1.52 on Saturday features a horse that should be on many people’s radars for good races this year, and that is Ben Pauling’s The Jukebox Kid. He’s available at 12/1 with Paddy Power or SkyBet, but I’m going to stop short of having him on the P/L as a recommended bet, as only a small handful of firms have the race priced up. But rest assured, 3m around Warwick will suit this horse very nicely and he really should be sub-6/1 in my book.

More widely available are prices about the weekend’s big betting race, the Coral Lanzarote Handicap Hurdle at 3.17 at Kempton Park on Saturday, and with that in mind it’s worth siding with one at double figure prices at this mid-week ante-post stage.

Of those at single figure prices, Lanesborough is clearly going the right way and will be the rightful favourite should he run here, but the others are opposable on one score or another. Which means that the 12/1 each-way available with William Hill, Unibet, Ladbrokes or Coral about Jeremy Scott’s Came From Nowhere is worth a 1-star * ante-post bet.

Being hugely unexposed and progressive is a mightily potent combination in races like this and Came From Nowhere could not have won a decent race at Hereford three weeks ago any easier. Some of that visually facile success is down to the intelligent ride from Lorcan Williams, in keeping Came From Nowhere as wide as possible on the better ground, but he barely came off the bridle and could have any amount of improvement left.

It’s therefore notable that Scott is willing to tilt at such a big pot with a horse clearly thriving and the ceiling of his ability is still possibly a long way off.