Jamie Lynch: Song in the charts?

'God it's a barren, featureless desert out there, isn't it?

'The other side, Sir.'

General Melchett is about as far away as it gets from the razor-sharp minds involved at Coolmore, but I've always hoped and thought that there's a Ballydoyle bunker which is almost an exact replica of the war room in Blackadder Goes Forth; an ornate and opulent office where the Senator and Sergeants assemble to talk tactics, to sort strategy, to peddle power.

Around the grand war table, where Risk is the game but not the aim, there's a chain of command and a chain of events that makes every move a methodical and meaningful one, the classy cavalry divided to conquer, a fail-safe battleplan, with each plan battled and each battle planned.

The upshot of the precise policy and preparation are the formidable Festival firefights; seven winners at Royal Ascot and three last week at the July meeting, as well as long-range missile hitting its Grade 1 target in Belmont, using SSGS technology - the Spencer Special Guidance System.

Blueprints are drawn for all divisions, from the two-year-olds to those slow things which are only allowed to carry the orange colours, but the master plan is the one for the second half of the season, the definitive diagram through which all of the better Ballydoyle horses are filtered, and I just happened to get my hands on it...

The bottom section, the bigger targets, the end games, is where the intrigue lies, and where any value lies, as by the time a target has been zeroed in on, so has the price. Plotting the path now can pay dividends, whether it's following the logic line for Order of St George to the Arc, the mile road for The Gurkha to the Breeders' Cup Mile, the female footpath for Alice Springs to the Filly & Mare Turf, the faux Group 1 faultline for Sir Isaac Newton to the Arlington Million, or Schubert in a fibresand maiden next February.

But the best ante-post bet may be one that isn't obvious from the set-out structure, yet could be on the radar after the weekend. The foundation flowchart is Plan A, but Plan B is enacted when there's no natural fit and the race needs a horse more than the horse needs the race. And there's a certain race, a classic race, for which the normal Ballydoyle supply line looks a bit thin this year, presenting an opportunity.

SEPTEMBER 15th, 2018

Guantanamera wasn't covered in 2013, but her mating with Declaration of War in 2014 brought a colt, and he could be very good, given what her last two foals have turned into.

240,000 guineas seemed a lot to pay for the yearling filly in 2013, as Guantanamera hadn't  produced anything of note by then, while the sire, Duke of Marmalade, was still fairly untested and unfashionable, but Simple Verse repaid Qatar Racing all and more of her purchase price when winning - then losing temporarily, then winning again - the St Leger last year with a performance that was high on stamina as well as class, two qualities that her year-younger half-sister, Even Song, is revealing all the time.

Tall and rangy, she's been brought along steadily by Aidan O'Brien, but the more time that's passed, and the more distance she's tackled, the better Even Song has looked, way too good for the Ribblesdale field, putting her in pole position for the Irish Oaks on Saturday.

It's not just the dam that points Even Song in the general direction of Doncaster, as her sire also already has that box ticked, the steel and stamina of Mastercraftsman surfacing in Kingston Hill when he won the 2014 St Leger.     

No colt has really put his hand up as yet for the St Leger, hence it's 5/1 the field, topped by Idaho, but he looks more in the mould of his brother (Highland Reel) who went globetrotting at ten and twelve furlongs despite winning a St Leger trial - 'I never thought he'd want a mile and six,' said O'Brien following the Gordon Stakes. I'm not sure Idaho wants it, either, after twice outstayed by Harzand.

O'Brien could easily polish up one or both of Housesofparliament and Sword Fighter, who've recently thrown their hat in the St Leger ring, but neither are top hats nor top-class cats, at least not compared to Even Song.     

The 14/1 for Even Song for the St Leger is too tempting for me, and I'll be watching the post-Oaks interview every bit as intently as the race itself, hoping for a crumb of classic comfort. If the words 'stayer' or 'Doncaster' are even on the tip of O'Brien's tongue, then I'll be breaking out the Cubanisto and breaking out into Cuba's unofficial song - Guantanamero. You know the one.

There's a song for all occasions. There's Even a Song for Doncaster in September, perhaps.