Pro­fes­sion­als will be look­ing for a 'spe­cial' in the Maid­en Stakes over twelve fur­longs of Wolver­hamp­ton poly­track to­day, Richard Fa­hey's charge should Suf­fice!

One of six 'decs' Suf­fice ticks enough box­es, judged on three out­ings to date. His most re­cent, nigh on five weeks ago, rep­re­sent­ed a close shave when this Iffraaj geld­ing fin­ished with great gus­to, on­ly to find my con­fi­dent time-hand­i­cap nap, Srini­gar Girl, just too strong. A head sep­a­rat­ed these joint-favourites af­ter a mile and a quar­ter.

An ex­tra two fur­longs shouldn't rep­re­sent a prob­lem for Suf­fice. Nei­ther will fore­cast, Roger Var­i­an-trained favourite, Full Swing un­less he im­proves con­sid­er­ably.

Once-raced, Full Swing has scope for im­prove­ment but lacks ex­pe­ri­ence and Suf­fice might find mul­ti-raced, Roc de Prince more of a hand­ful if able to re­pro­duce an ear­li­er TH mark.

How­ev­er, Roc de Prince hasn't raced for more than four months, was well beat­en last time out and all the por­tents in­di­cate fourth time lucky for Suf­fice.

This sev­en-race pro­gramme fin­ish­es with two di­vi­sions of an 'aged' hand­i­cap over sev­en fur­longs. We're drawn to Brown Vol­cano for the sec­ond leg.

Brown Vol­cano has failed to win in eight out­ings but promised much, when sec­ond in a strong­ly-run maid­en over five at Bath last turf sea­son, sub­se­quent­ly los­ing his way. That's of­ten the case for ju­ve­niles, when sub­ject­ed to pres­sure ear­ly in their ca­reers.

Thank­ful­ly, this geld­ing by Waky Nao (!) has re­turned to form since step­ping up in trip to sev­en fur­longs and use­ful ap­pren­tice, Thomas Brown got a re­al tune of out Brown Vol­cano last month when the fast-fin­ish­ing com­bi­na­tion was beat­en on­ly a length by Prince of Pas­sion, over course and dis­tance.

Brown Vol­cano was drawn worst, seemed slug­gish in the ear­ly stages but came from way back. Such an eye-catch­ing fin­ish just has to be sig­nif­i­cant, a 'win­ner wait­ing to hap­pen?'

Brown is again booked and so that might just be the case, a crack­ing each-way bet, with­out doubt.

Sand­wiched be­tween Prince Of Pas­sion and Brown Vol­cano was Ace Mas­ter, one of eleven de­c­la­ra­tions for the oth­er di­vi­sion.

Ap­pren­tice Mark Coumbe claims 3lbs al­lowance and that might just tilt the bal­ance in favour of this Roy Bowring-trained five-year-old.

SE­LEC­TIONS

?AT WOLVER­HAMP­TON

11.30 SUF­FICE (nap)

1.30 ACE MAS­TER (e.w.)

2.00 BROWN VOL­CANO