Daily tips for October 3

Racing for October 3

Horse racing: Bendigo (Vic), Wyong (NSW), Dalby (Qld). Harness racing: Redcliffe (Qld), Penrith (NSW), Ballarat (Vic). Greyhound racing: Warragul (Vic), Grafton (NSW), Shepparton (Vic), Maitland (NSW), Albion Park (Qld), Warrnambool (Vic), Sandown Park (Vic), Angle Park (SA), Dapto (NSW), Hobart (Tas), Mandurah (WA).

The Anthony Cummings-trained Vergara can build upon a solid first-up effort when contesting the bizarrely named Cabac-Sunny-LTG-Bambach Maiden Plate (1100m), the second on the seven-race card at Wyong today. #12 Vergara resumed in good order at the course last start four weeks ago when placing behind Checonsul over 1200m. The daughter of Snippetson hit the lead soon upon straightening and looked the winner before she was collared 100m from home. Blake Shinn partnered Vergara on that occasion and suggested her tendency to over-race might have been what cost the filly a maiden success. Form out of the race has proven useful, with runner-up High Grace and fourth place-getter Command More each shedding their maiden tags at provincial level since. Cummings has elected to remove the blinkers, which ideally will result in Vergara settling and not using up valuable energy reserves early on. From barrier 5, jockey Peter Robl and Vergara should enjoy a cosy run in transit, settling in the second pair or perhaps just outside the lead.

Suggested bet: Wyong R2 #12 Vergara (E/W 1x4) LOSE (4th)

Other tips

Wyong R3 #1-2 Boxed exacta WIN ($4.10)

Wyong R7 #4 Easter Island ABANDONED

Bendigo R2 #8 Sense Of Hite (win) 1st ($1.90)

Bendigo R6 #4 Beauty Cash (E/W) 3rd ($3.60)

Bendigo R8 #9 Hogan’s Warrior (E/W) LOSE (U/P)

Dalby R3 #7 Writtenintherain (E/W 1x4) 2nd ($1.50)

Dalby R4 #2 Puff’s Girl (E/W) LOSE (U/P)

Dalby R6 #8 Amaizing Dragon (win) LOSE (4th)

NHL for October 3

I’m still keeping the powder dry on the NHL front so thought I’d highlight some of the advantages of betting on the world’s premier ice hockey league.

Take an average day on the North American sports schedule in October. College football, NFL, Major League Baseball playoffs but there’s no doubt that the best value comes from a card of six or seven NHL games. Sure, hockey may not be palatable to many sports fans but sports betting is all about maximising profit. With several games on the card, we can pick our spots and don’t have to settle for just one game. The books also focus on those higher-profile football and baseball games. The NHL card will garner less attention from the odds maker and the sports bettors (for all the games combined) when compared to a single NFL or MLB playoff game. If you wager on sports because you view it as an investment and find the value in sports handicapping, then do not miss the NHL season this year.

Daily tips (no best of the day, leans listed below)

Toronto Maple Leafs @ Philadelphia Flyers -5.5 $2.04 WIN (3-1)

Buffalo Sabres @ Detroit Red Wings -1.5 $2.65 LOSE (1-2)

Anaheim Ducks WIN $2.00 @ Colorado Avalanche LOSE (1-6)

MLB playoffs for October 3

AL Wild-card Game: Tampa Bay Rays (92-71) @ Cleveland Indians (92-70), Progressive Field, Cleveland, OH, Thursday, October 3, 10.05am

The Cleveland Indians raced through September with the best record in the major leagues, including a 10-game winning streak to close out the regular season. Their reward for that finishing kick is hosting the Tampa Bay Rays in a one-game AL wild card playoff for the right to play the top-seeded Boston Red Sox in the Division Series. The Rays earned their entry on Tuesday by winning 5-2 at Texas in a one-game tiebreaker. That game at Texas forced Tampa Bay to use ace David Price for all nine innings, leaving him unavailable to face Cleveland. They’ve also travelled from Tampa to New York to Toronto to Texas to Cleveland, a journey covering 3627 miles, in the past week. The Indians would have preferred to save Ubaldo Jimenez, but an uncertain status forced him to go in his regular rotation spot on Sunday. Cleveland feasted on sub-.500 opponents in September but was 36-52 in the regular season against teams with winning records, including 2-4 against the Rays.

Rays RH Alex Cobb (pictured, 11-3, 2.76 ERA) finished up the regular season strong with wins in each of his last three starts. The Boston native surrendered a total of three runs on 23 1/3 innings while striking out 26 in those three turns and yielded more than two earned runs just twice in his last nine starts. Cobb made his first start of the season against Cleveland on April 6 and scattered four hits in 7 1/3 scoreless innings to earn the win. The Indians monitored RH Danny Salazar (2-3, 3.12) carefully over the final month of the season, pulling him from games before 90 pitches. The 23-year-old Dominican struck out eight and allowed two runs on six hits over 5 1/3 innings on September 25 before being lifted after 89 pitches – his highest total since August 7. Salazar will be backed up by a bullpen that now includes former ace Justin Masterson. Despite an impressive showing in Arlington, the Rays are 8-22 in the last 30 meetings in Cleveland but I lean to the experience of the Rays here.

Suggested bets: Game total +7 (two units @ $1.95) LOSE, Tampa Bay WIN (one unit @ $1.83) WIN (4-0)

Football (UCL matchday 2) for October 3

Group A: FC Shakhtar Donetsk v Manchester Utd, Donbass Arena, Donetsk, Ukraine, Thursday, October 3, 4.45am

After two successive Premier League defeats the pressure is already on manager David Moyes at Manchester United. Without mincing words, they were simply terrible in the weekend’s 3-2 loss to West Bromwich Albion in the EPL. He takes his side to the Ukraine on Wednesday night to take on Shakhtar Donetsk knowing a defeat here will fuel the critics further. Both sides won their opening match in the group so whoever wins here will be in a good position on the Group A table. Moyes will hope to have Robin van Persie (pictured) back after the star striker  missed the last three matches with injury. One man who won’t feature here is Rio Ferdinand. Jonny Evans looks set to partner Nemanja Vidic at the heart of the defence. Anderson and Wilfried Zaha have not travelled to the match. Marouane Fellaini and Patrice Evra didn’t featured against West Brom but are likely to return here.

This meeting in the Donbass Arena will be the first time United have faced Shakhtar, but the EPL champions have never lost to Ukrainian opposition. United have won three times and drawn once in their four Champions League encounters with Dynamo Kiev.  Shakhtar, the reigning Ukrainian champions, have never lost to English opposition on home soil in the Champions League. Shakhtar Donetsk has lost some key personnel in recent seasons. The likes of Willian and Fernandinho are now plying their trade in the Premier League but the Ukrainians still have quality in former Arsenal forward Eduardo and Croatian star Darjo Srna not to mention Luiz Adriano and the man who scored twice in their first game Alex Teixeira so Donetsk still have enough to cause any side problems all over the pitch. Both sides are prone to conceding so this looks a good match to attack the both teams to score market.

Suggested bet: Both Teams Score (2.5 units @ $1.69) WIN (1-1)

Other tips

CSKA Moscow WIN $1.68 v FC Viktoria Plzen WIN (3-2)

Bayer Leverkusen WIN $1.64 v Real Sociedad WIN (2-1)

Juventus Only to Score $2.25 v Galatasaray LOSE (2-2)

Real Madrid 3+ v FC Copenhagen WIN (4-0)

Paris St Germain WIN $1.75 v Benfica WIN (3-0)

RSC Anderlecht DNB $1.86 v Olympiakos FC LOSE (0-3)

Manchester City v Bayern Munich +2.5 $1.72 WIN (1-3)

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