We return to Flemington this Saturday for an off-season card that should present plenty of interesting betting opportunities.

At this time of year doing the form can often be as much of a case of eliminating slow ones as it is about finding the fast ones and there's certainly a few races where that is the case at Flemington this weekend.

In race 7 Rewarding Effort looks a bit of a last man standing against what a fairly plain lot for Flemington on a Saturday.

Rewarding Effort comes through a sound effort at the course last time over 1400m where he settled well back from a wide draw and worked home well over 1400m. That was a BM78 and he's in a BM90 now but despite that supposed rise in class this looks an easier assignment.

Rewarding Effort produced the best closing 800m of the race there and the closing splits hint at him coming right on for that run. Boding well for his chances is the fact that his form peaked when he went to the mile last preparation, winning two on end, and importantly for race that looks to be lacking a bit of early tempo he was able to take up a handy position.

From a good draw Craig Williams should have him handily poised and the early prices better than $4.00 are going to look juicy if he is travelling just a couple of lengths from the lead as they swing in.

If we are cheering Craig on Rewarding effort it seems only fair that we find a winner for Beau Mertens with the pair duelling for the jockey's premiership at present.

Beau is riding as well as anyone in Melbourne at the moment and he looks to find a good chance to chalk up another winner in the third race on the card.

Again, we are dealing with a very scrappy looking race and very few in the line up make any betting appeal.

Schism, however, does make some appeal coming off the same race that Rewarding Effort comes through last time.

Again this is BM78 to BM90 but looking more a step back in class than forward. Schism has raced consistently at the level that she produced last time and while several of the mares she takes on have the ability to hit similar levels they are doing it with nowhere near the consistency of Schism lately.

Mertens gets a wide draw from which he can be positive and seize control of things which has been the calling card of Mertens in what has been a wonderful break out season for him.

THE MELBOURNE MAIL

Bet Of The Day: Race 7 #6 Rewarding Effort @ $4.20

Each Way Play: Race 3 #5 Schism @ $9.00