Jim Crowley blog: 'It was an easy choice to make'

Top jockey Jim Crowley is back with another exclusive Coral blog, previewing his rides on Saturday at Newbury.

It was a straightforward choice for me to make here, choosing Alyanaabi over Al Aasy, as the former is the younger, less exposed runner, getting plenty of weight from the latter. That said, it wouldn’t be the biggest shock if Al Aasy won, he won this last year and is a classy performer, but I had to go for the horse with the potential to improve.

I just felt Alyanaabi lacked a change of gear in the St James’s Palace Stakes, against those top class milers. He should enjoy the step up in trip, and he looks bred to get it. This is a small field so it could get tactical, so although we’ve never made the running on him, it wouldn’t be a problem if we did. Al Aasy by contrast has to be held up.

Naqeeb actually ran OK at Royal Ascot, we've been trying different ways of riding him, trying him over different trips, and at Ascot I actually dropped him out and he ran OK as I say, as the time before we’d made the running and he ran no race. We're stepping him up again here to two miles, I'll hold him up again and hopefully he can run a big race and be doing his best work at finish. 

In the big Super Sprint I ride a filly for Karl Burke, a trainer I’ve had some nice success for this season. Invincible Annice has only won a Musselburgh seller so needs to take a big step forward here again some very nicely weighted rivals, and she is priced accordingly.

Elyam is a nicely bred Shadwell homebred, I rode her dam Tajaanus so know the family well. These sort of races at Newbury often throw up a good sort, and with many of these making their debut, we don't really know what we're up against. Richard Hannon tends to have his two year olds fairly straight for their first run, and he’s been pleasing in his homework, but this fellow will improve for whatever he does here, and I hope he's a nice horse for the future.