Aguellid

The recent form makes for interesting reading: second, a run to set aside, second, second, third. That is a horse that keeps turning up and running its race, placed in four of its five outings, but repeatedly finding one too good on the day. At Class 4 level — the bread and butter tier of British racing, a step below the big occasions — it has run four times without winning. That is not a crisis, but it does raise a question: is this a horse that will eventually break through, or one that is quietly very good at finishing second?

Philip Hobbs and Johnson White, who train out of Bilbrook in Somerset, are clearly not losing faith. Their yard has sent out 37 winners already this season, so they know what a horse in form looks like, and they seem genuinely encouraged by what they are seeing. After Aguellid's latest run at Exeter, the trainer pointed to plenty of positives and flagged a return in a few weeks — not the language of a team scratching their heads, but one that believes there is a win in this horse if the right opportunity comes along.

The key question now is whether that opportunity materialises. Aguellid is consistent enough to suggest it belongs at this level, and consistent enough to suggest it might just need a race that falls perfectly in its favour — a smaller field, a softer test, a day when the one or two horses that keep beating it are elsewhere. Plenty of horses have gone on long placing streaks before finally getting off the mark. Whether Aguellid is one of those, or whether it settles into life as a nearly horse, is the story worth following.