Festival hope Ashroe Diamond likely for Doncaster assignment

Connections of Mares’ Hurdle contender eyeing Grade Two contest later this month.

Ashroe Diamond is likely to tee up a Cheltenham Festival bid at Doncaster on January 27.

Willie Mullins’ top-class mare has the Grade Two Yorkshire Rose Mares’ Hurdle as an aim as she finds herself ineligible from most races restricted to her sex in Ireland due to winning a Grade One last term.

She made a perfectly satisfactory comeback this season when third in the Hatton’s Grace against the boys at Fairyhouse.

“We were delighted with her first run back, she was one of the last to come in because of the cut she got in the Honeysuckle (Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle, at Fairyhouse in April),” said James Fenton who manages the Blue Blood Racing Club who own the mare.

“It was a bad enough cut, she needed staples in it and it was a bit of a mess and needed plenty of work.

“We are very limited in Ireland when it comes to Grade One-winning mares as they are omitted from a lot of the graded races.

“We’d have liked to have run her in the BeattheBank at Leopardstown over Christmas that Shewearsitwell won last season, but as a Grade One winner she couldn’t go in it.

“So we’re probably looking across the water and she’s going to be entered in Doncaster on the 27th (Yorkshire Rose Mares’ Hurdle) and the plan is to run at Cheltenham in the Mares’ Hurdle.

“She’s doing everything right at home and she’s a proper mare this year, we’re looking forward to getting her out.”

He went on: “She’s been kept in training because we think there’s more to come. I felt she was a little bit hard done by last year. She hasn’t made Cheltenham yet and when we discussed it I said there’s still a bit more there.

“We just felt she deserves one more year over hurdles, she is a Grade One winner already, there isn’t much to prove going over fences but I do think she’s good enough to win the Mares’ Hurdle and if she’s in the first three, we’ll be delighted.

“Myself, Willie, Patrick (Mullins) and David Casey will all have our views of the best route and when you have that kind of a team saying what you should be doing and where you should be going, you probably should be listening.”

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