The Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup has long since been the blue riband event of the entire Cheltenham Festival. For this year's 2022 renewal, it looks to be a fascinating race with plenty in with very good chances.
Starting off with last season’s second and this year's favorite, A Plus Tard, who's got a brilliant chance for Henry de Bromhead and Rachael Blackmore and in the colors of Cheveley Park. This horse has a very good Cheltenham Festival record as well, having won the Novices Handicap Chase in 2019 before finishing third in the Ryanair in 2020 and second in the Gold Cup last year. His performances this year have been super as well, winning the Betfair Chase around Haydock in November before just being touched off at Christmas time at Leopardstown.
He was touched off by Galvin, who's the second favourite in the market and has been the improver of the lot this year for Gordon Elliott with his regular rider Davy Russell. He came second in the Down Royal Grade One at the start of the season before improving no end on that to win the Savills Chase at Christmas, beating the aforementioned A Plus Tard. He looks to have bags of ability and bags of improvements still to come and the extra two furlongs in the Gold Cup should suit this horse down to the ground. However, the price has slightly been sucked out at this stage and he probably wouldn't be a betting proposition for me.
That moves us on to last year's winner Minella Indo, who will have Robbie power in the saddle this time around havi
Cheltenham: the case for Minella Indo
ng won the race with Jack Kennedy up on him last year. This horse has got a magnificent chance again of retaining his title and we've seen in recent years with Al Boum Photo that this can be done. His season has been revolving around a return to Cheltenham and the Gold Cup and despite a few hair-raising runs, especially at Kempton over Christmas - he still looks to have a likable profile going into this race. He was second in the Irish Gold Cup last time out which was an improved effort, and he seems to improve an awful lot for going over to Cheltenham each year, with his performance’s taking a notable rise in class every season that he's gone over.
That moves us on to the winner from the last two years prior to Minella Indo and that is Al Boum Photo, who probably represents each way value in this race. That being said, he's now an older horse and perhaps is a little bit vulnerable to these young improving types in front of him, as he showed last year when running a very admirable third in this race. His performance at Tramore over New Year's Day was another facile victory as was expected given the price he went off at and he seems to be coming here in ok form.
The four of these are all trained by Irish trainers, and I believe that's where the winner is going to come from. There are a few English horses in there too, such as Chantry House and Protektorat, that may have each way claims but they wouldn't be for me.
To summarize, I think the Gold Cup is a wide-open race this year but I'm going to side with last year's form and I'm going to be suggesting backing Minella Indo and Al Boum Photo in this race. Minella Indo is around the 5/1 mark, so you can decide whether you want to back him win only or each way at that price, and Al Boum Photo is around double that at 10/1
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