Puffin Billy is making good progress since he suffered a setback in defeat at Exeter

Puffin Billy: Building towards Cheltenham

Puffin Billy is making good progress since he suffered a setback in defeat at Exeter.

Previously unbeaten, Oliver Sherwood's promising five-year-old returned lame when behind Melodic Rendezvous and Sherwood subsequently found puss in his foot.

That explained his rather lacklustre performance and Sherwood is still planning on running him at Cheltenham, although he is no nearer deciding whether it will be in the Supreme over two miles or the Neptune over five furlongs further.

"He's fine," said Sherwood. "We got a shoe back on him on Friday, he's been swimming regularly and he did two canters this morning.

"He's a very clean-winded horse so we wouldn't have actually done much with him after the Exeter race before now anyway.

"I never count my chickens, but we'll start building him up towards Cheltenham on Monday and fingers crossed he gets there.

"I wouldn't even start thinking of which race before we know he's definitely going to make it, though."

Puffin Billy can be backed at 25-1 for the Supreme but is as low as 10-1 for the Neptune.