Sine Nomine booked for Rowland Meyrick test

Fiona Needham will send her Cheltenham Festival hero Sine Nomine to the William Hill Rowland Meyrick Handicap Chase at Wetherby before any further plans for the season ahead are made.

The eight-year-old is a regular on the point-to-point circuit and has won four of her six hunter chases, highlighted by landing the St. James’s Place Festival Challenge Cup Open Hunters’ Chase in March.

She stepped up to Listed company for the first time last month on her return after a 257-day break from that Cheltenham success at Market Rasen in the Bud Booth Mares’ Chase, but paid for a mistake five fences out and unseated John Dawson.

Needham will now see how the mare fares at the West Yorkshire track before plotting a route for the rest of the season.

“The plan is the Rowland Meyrick,” the trainer said.

“It was unfortunate (at Market Rasen). She was running well. I was pleased with how she was running. She wants softer ground and that’s why she wasn’t out until then.

“She was a little bit fresh and it was a bit of miscommunication shall we say.

“She should come on for the run. I would like to think I had her straighter than I normally do for her first point to point, but she’s still come out of it well and she will come on for the run. Hopefully we’ve just got a bit of the daftness out of her.

“I don’t know what the target is and we’ll see what happens at Wetherby. To go back to the St. James’s Place we’d have to pull out to go back hunter chasing.”

Needham will take her time before deciding to stay up in grade or return to the hunter chasing circuit.

She added: “We’ll see what happens Boxing Day and that was always the plan. We’ll see what happens and if we’re outclassed it’s nice that she’s still qualified for Cheltenham and Aintree (hunter chases) so we have that option.”