Andrew Asquith is in the Value Bet hot seat this week and he has two bets at Kempton on Boxing Day.<\/p>\n
Andrew Asquith Value Bet: Friday December 26<\/p>\n
1pt win Jasmine Bliss in the 12:45 Kempton at 11\/1 (Sky Bet, Paddy Power, 888sport)<\/p>\n
1pt win The Jukebox Man in the 14:30 Kempton at 13\/2 (Ladbrokes, Coral, 6\/1 General)<\/p>\n
Sky Bet odds<\/a> | Paddy Power<\/a> | Betfair Sportsbook<\/a><\/p>\n The Ladbrokes King George VI Chase<\/a> looks a proper humdinger of a renewal at Kempton on Boxing Day, the best since 2015 when Cue Card and Vautour had an all out battle to the line if you calculate the average on pre-race Timeform ratings. <\/p>\n You can make a case for most of the eight-strong field and it should be a real highlight for racing fans on Boxing Day. I\u2019ve long been a fan of THE JUKEBOX MAN<\/a>, particularly with this race in mind.<\/p>\n He looked a novice right out of the top drawer when making a winning start over fences in the Grade 2 John Francome Novices\u2019 Chase at Newbury last season and strengthened the opinion that he could be one of the best in the division when following up in the Kauto Star Novices\u2019 Chase over this course and distance on this card 12 months ago.<\/p>\n Admittedly, it wasn\u2019t a vintage renewal of that Grade 1 for novices, and The Jukebox Man didn\u2019t have to improve on his Newbury form, but it was the manner of his success which was striking, tanking through what was a modestly-run event, and his jumping really was a sight to behold. <\/p>\n Unfortunately, a setback curtailed the remainder of his novice campaign, but he confirmed himself in rude health when making a winning return from nearly a year off at Haydock last month. <\/p>\n You couldn\u2019t have asked much more of him that day, very well supported and his backers never had a worry, again jumping boldly from the front back down in trip, and value for much more than the official margin implies. <\/p>\n He was allowed to set steady fractions, so the form can\u2019t be rated too highly, but again it was the ease in which he got the job done, and Iroko gave that form a timely boost at Ascot last weekend. The Jukebox Man is in a much hotter environment now, taking on a couple of top-class Irish challengers in Fact To File and Gaelic Warrior, and not to forgot equally exciting second-season chaser Jango Baie \u2013 it will really test his mettle.<\/p>\n Il Est Francais may not let him have all of his own way in front, but that rival arrives with questions to answer, and The Jukebox Man showed at this track last year he\u2019s more than happy taking a lead. Jumping is the name of the game, and I\u2019d argue he\u2019s the best of these in that department, while we have seen time and time again, once you get into a good rhythm round Kempton, particularly on a sound surface, horses can be hard to pass.<\/p>\n I\u2019d expect him to lead or be very close to it and he\u2019s reportedly done very well since Haydock. There could be a bundle of further improvement yet to come from this exciting seven-year-old. <\/p>\n The opening \u2018Get Your Ladbrokes Free Kempton Bet\u2019 Novices\u2019 Limited Handicap Chase<\/a> at Kempton on Boxing Day looks very interesting and Noble Park looks a worthy favourite given he\u2019s proved a different proposition since sent chasing.<\/p>\n Indeed, he\u2019s won both of his starts in this sphere, very impressively at Lingfield last time too when beating a next-time-out winner by 24 lengths in a race which also produced a good timefigure. <\/p>\n A subsequent 11lb rise is warranted and he\u2019s sure to launch another bold bid, but if there is a potential banana skin in the field it is the Harry Derham-trained JASMINE BLISS<\/a>, who is making her chase debut. <\/p>\n She progressed well in bumpers and also as a novice hurdler last season, but she is all over a chaser on looks \u2013 she\u2019s a lengthy, good-looking mare \u2013 and she has the potential to take her form to new heights in this sphere.<\/p>\n Jasmine Bliss\u2019 best performance so far came when winning at Southwell last season and she looked a natural faced with brush hurdles for the first time, the style in which she came right away from her main market rival in the home straight particularly taking having jumped and travelled superbly well. <\/p>\n She was strong in the market on the back of that performance for the well-established mares\u2019 novices\u2019 hurdle series final at Newbury when last seen, but for whatever reason she wasn\u2019t in the same form.<\/p>\n Jasmine Bliss typically travelled and jumped well for three quarters of the race, but she didn\u2019t have the same finishing effort as she quickly weakened out of proceedings approaching the last. The fact that she had beaten the runner-up that day so convincingly at Southwell the time before tells you that everything may not have been right with her on the day. <\/p>\n I\u2019m willing to ignore that run and I still think she\u2019s a very exciting prospect now switching to fences. Admittedly, this is a deep race for her to be making her debut in, but she represents a yard who will have left no stone unturned, unlikely to be lacking for fitness \u2013 Harry Derham has a 23% strike rate with horses returning from 250 days or more off the track \u2013 and I think she\u2019s potentially very well handicapped. <\/p>\n Preview posted at 1100 GMT on 24\/12\/2025<\/p>\n Safer gambling<\/p>\n We are committed in our support of safer gambling. Recommended bets are advised to over-18s and we strongly encourage readers to wager only what they can afford to lose.<\/p>\n If you are concerned about your gambling, please call the National Gambling Helpline \/ GamCare<\/a> on 0808 8020 133.<\/p>\n Further support and information can be found at begambleaware.org<\/a> and gamblingtherapy.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andrew Asquith is in the Value Bet hot seat this week and he has two bets at Kempton…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":209407,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":["post-209406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/209407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}