Picture improves for Sandown ahead of Coral-Eclipse

Fears of testing conditions remaining for Sandown's Coral-Eclipse card on Saturday may prove misplaced, after a change in weather forecast at the Surrey track.

Although the ground at Sandown has dried out since the heavy rain last week that left a small section of the track under water, clerk of the course Andrew Cooper has warned all week that further rain was expected to turn conditions soft for the big two-day meeting, which gets under way on Friday.

However, only 3mm of rain arrived on Tuesday evening, less than half of what had been forecast, and further heavy showers, originally forecast to produce 10mm or more of rain on Wednesday evening, have also cleared from the picture with only 2-3mm now predicted and conditions set to remain largely dry from Friday morning onwards.

"The outlook really has improved considerably within the last 48, and even 24 hours," Cooper told Sportinglife.com on Wednesday morning.

"We only caught 3mm last night, which in itself is much better than we might have been fearing, and the amounts now showing on the forecast are unlikely to be hugely impactful on conditions.

"It's actually been predominantly dry since last Friday and we're now Good to Soft on the Round Course, but I think we could be looking at being 'Good, Good to Soft in places' or something like that by Saturday, if the new forecasts we're seeing prove accurate."

Cooper had already announced a restriction in field size for the seven-furlong maiden on the Friday card that will help allow him to offer two different rail configurations and considerable fresh ground for Saturday's action.

"We've got four different possible configurations for that bend and it's really only one that we can't use as a result of the heavy rain we had last week," he said.

"The waterlogging we had was in a very isolated area, a 30-yard-section at a noticeably low spot on the course near to the railway station bend.

"We let it be for 24 hours, pumped some water off the track on Friday, left it alone over the weekend, then did some further pumping on Monday and got rid of some more water.

"We've had to rejig our rail plans down the back straight for the two days, but we'll definitely be able to offer fresh ground for at least a mile of the course on Saturday.

"In places it's going to be on the slower side of good down there, but the latest forecasts are definitely giving us plenty of encouragement."

News of the improved forecast is sure to be welcomed by connections of Time Test, who set their stall out to line up earlier this week, despite fearing that their four-year-old is noticeably less effective on soft ground.

However, it might also lead to a re-think from Aidan O'Brien, who is juggling options for five possible runners.

The Gurkha heads the ante-post betting with Sky Bet at even-money, ahead of My Dream Boat at 11/4 and Time Test at 4/1.