HAWK HIGH, who provided Tim Easterby with a memorable success at last season’s Cheltenham Festival, heads to Kelso today with strong claims on the feature race on the card.

The £22,500 Timeform Morebattle Hurdle is the target for the North Yorkshire gelding, who will have the services of Brian Hughes, the jockey who steered him to victory in the Fred Winter Juvenile Handicap Hurdle at Cheltenham last March.

Since then Hawk High has won at Aintree on his seasonal comeback and has filled a creditable fifth place behind Champion Hurdle contender The New One at Haydock.

On his latest start, the five-year-old ran a blinder to finish third in the valuable Hogmaneigh Hurdle at Musselburgh on New Year’s Day, when he might well have finished even closer but for a mistake at the final flight.

In Glingerbank, who has won his last two races at Doncaster, Hawk High has one progressive rival among his four opponents, which also include the Tony McCoy-ridden Tanerko Emery, who is the second highest-rated horse in the five-strong starting line-up.

Hawk High is the top-rated entry and he can underline his superiority by coming out first in this prestigious event.

McCoy teams up with Holywell in the £20,000 Ivan Straker Memorial Chase and all eyes will be on the Jonjo O’Neill-trained runner.

A horse who took time to find his niche over fences last season, Holywell came good with a vengeance by emerging as one of the top staying novices and a horse prominent in the betting for this season’s Cheltenham Gold Cup.

His campaign remains at ground level after one promising effort and one failure to complete.

He now re-appears after more than two months off the track and urgently needs to promote himself if he is to make Cheltenham in four weeks.

This race should be well within his grasp on ratings and it will be disappointing if he can not return to the winning trail.

Edmund may prove the answer to the Monteith Memorial Handicap Chase.

Ann Hamilton’s gelding is a fairly useful horse on his day and he was far from disgraced when fifth to Habbie Simpson at Newcastle just before Christmas.

Thorpe has 7lb and more to concede to his rivals in the opening Kelso Annual Members Novices’ Hurdle, but the task may not be beyond him.

Lucinda’s Russell gelding, a Haydock winner on his reappearance, has run some decent races since in defeat. He should be firmly in the mix under Peter Buchanan.

At Leicester, Cloud Creeper gets the vote in the Cavalry Handicap Chase.

The eight-year-old, trained by Philip Hobbs, has finished runner-up over hurdles and fences on his latest two starts.

He was beaten only a neck in a chase on his most recent outing last month and should make a bold bid to go one better this afternoon.

Artifice Sivola should go well in the Weatherbys Novices’ Handicap Chase.

Beaten only a couple of lengths by Bobbits Way at Plumpton last time on his chasing bow, Lucy Wadham’s five-year-old is fancied to step up under Grand National-winning jockey Leighton Aspell.

The Fernie Novices’ Handicap Chase offers Desert Joe the chance to get off the mark over fences. The Alan King-trained gelding, who unseated his rider on his chasing debut, has since finished second at Market Rasen and Newbury.

He is a work in progress open to further improvement and he may be able to turn the tables on Newbury winner Azure Fly.

Kelso today: 2.00 Thorpe, 2.30 Edmund, 3.00 Hawk High (NAP), 3.30 Holywell, 4.00 Warriors Tale, 4.30 Sir Du Bearn.

Leicester today: 2.10 Boss In Boots, 2.40 Desert Joe, 3.10 Artifice Sivola, 3.40 Cloud Creeper, 4.10 Mr Mercurial, 4.40 Thedreamstillalive.

Today’s other meetings: Chelmsford and Fontwell.