2015 Arkle Chase Betting Preview PT 1

The second big race of the opening day of the Cheltenham Festival is always a big contest that enjoys massive betting support. You have to respect the huge amount of opportunities that the festival presents every year and this edition of the Arkle might not be the most exciting from a betting perspective unless you’ve hatched some type of cheeky plan to get the better of the widely-hailed favourite Un De Sceaux. 

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The seven-year-old Willy Mullins charge is priced at a general 4/7 by virtually all bookmakers with one or two trimming him down into 1/2. At this stage, with that particular price, you have to assume that he’s going to be a much more popular addition to accumulators than he is in being an outright win-only wager for most of the savvier punters. 

He will be making his Cheltenham debut in this one and that might be rason for many to assume that he’s not going to be able to get the job done when it really counts. He has only a single Graded victory over proper fences and that novice chase at Leopardstown only came against two other horses and he was only sent off as a lukewarm 8/11 favourite - which is a bit short for a horse in such a light race. 

He also fell in his seasonal debut at Thurles when he launched his chasing career so that’s another bit of a blemish on his record. Following that though, it’s been a pair of blow-out victories with a combined 27 lengths separating him from his nearest competition in the past two chases. 

He has proven the ability to handle larger fields though when he won at Fairyhouse in a beginners chase, facing off against a field of sixteen and coming out as the 1/5 favourite early on.