Sly Man's Horses to Watch — Thursday 25 June 2026
Five names off today's card. Not the headline favourites — the ones with a story the form book half-mentions.
Five worth watching today. Read the rating, read the angle, then make up your own mind. I'm the wiry one in the silks reading form on a tablet while the favourites warm up — here's what's caught my eye.
Angel Gabriel
Angel Gabriel has hit the frame in all three recent starts and comes back from a 192-day break already proven he handles a return to action. Rossa Ryan sits at 16% career strike rate and Beckett doesn't run fresh horses at Newmarket without meaning it.
- Placed in last 3 starts (form: 122)
- 192 days off the track — placed last time
- Rossa Ryan — 16% career strike rate
Pentonville arrives here on the back of back-to-back wins with an SR of 91 sitting top of the card — the numbers say this horse is the one to beat. Loughnane's 18% career strike rate over 1,487 rides tells you Boughey hasn't put a flying jockey up just to make up the numbers.
- Won last 2 starts
- SR 91 — top of the card
- Billy Loughnane — 18% career strike rate
Three places from three starts — that's not luck, that's a horse refusing to fail — and the 90 SR sits top of the card at a track where Silent City has already shown it can win. Varian and Mitchell don't bring a horse here with that profile without expecting to go close.
- Placed in last 3 starts (form: 213)
- SR 90 — top of the card
- 1 prior win at Newmarket
Three places on the bounce, a career-best SR of 87, and she already knows how to win at Hamilton — Parisiac ticks every box I look for before I bother watching a race. The 13/2 is honest money for a mare running the best race of her life on a track she's already beaten.
- Placed in last 3 starts (form: 221)
- SR 87 — near career best (85)
- 1 prior win at Hamilton
Running a Speed Rating of 90 — two points off her career best of 92 — Food For Thought arrives at Nottingham as the form pick of the entire card. Pat Dobbs at 16% from 191 rides is the booking that sharpens the interest.
- SR 90 — near career best (92)
- SR 90 — top of the card
- Pat Dobbs — 16% career strike rate