Get 20/1 Odds on This Coral Cup Contender

Updated: September 20, 2024 at 7:56 am GMT+1

Coral Cup (2.50pm, 15th March) – Ivanovic Gorbatov at 20/1 with Coral

JCB Triumph Hurdle winners historically struggle to make that transition from Grade 1 juvenile level to the top level over hurdles.

Since winning that race at the Cheltenham Festival last year, Joseph O’Brien’s Ivanovich Gorbatov has struggled to bridge the gap and is yet to make his mark at the top of the 2-mile hurdling division.

Nonetheless, the manner in which he travelled and jumped around the Cheltenham racecourse lingers on in the memory and we all know how important Festival form is!

With that in mind, the Coral Cup might be right up his street and at double figure odds of 20/1 he catches the eye for a speculative handicap Cheltenham Festival bet.

All of his last four starts have been in Grade 1 company and despite not quite being good enough to win one, he has acquired plenty of experience and a handicap mark of just 148 is certainly exploitable if the O’Brien and JP McManus’ charge can improve for the step up in distance to 2m5f for this Coral Cup test.

With first choice jockey Barry Geraghty missing the Cheltenham Festival through injury, it remains to be seen who will ride Joseph O’Brien’s Ivanovich Gorbatov, but Davy Russell has ridden the five-year-old twice in the past and we all know how brilliantly Russell rides around Cheltenham.

Mark Walsh is also an option for the horse, but JP McManus could even opt to give a chance to a talented apprentice who could take some further weight of the horse’s back.

The Coral Cup is one of the toughest races for Cheltenham Festival betting and there’s any number of potential dangers.

Big handicap winner Modus, along with Betfair Hurdle second Movewiththetimes are all high up in the betting for the two mile and five furlong handicap hurdle. The Irish are sure to have plenty of other firepower too.

But in the market as it stands, Ivanovich Gorbatov catches the eye as a likely type to appreciate a test in this race and hopefully get there in one piece and run a big race.