SHREWD CALL heads to Monmore on Saturday as the RPGTV/GWA Greyhound of the Month for July after the David Mullins-trained and Kelly Searle-owned runner edged out Nottingham’s Dark Ocean in a viewers’ poll on the channel.

Winner of the £3,000 Colossus Bets Kent Silver Salver at Central Park, Shrewd Call also claimed a £10,000 bonus put up by the sponsor for an unbeaten run through the event, which he duly achieved in the GBGB Category Two competition.

Shrewd Call ended the month by winning a heat of a sprint event at Hove surrounding the Coral Sussex Cup/Regency gala and was named in a list of four nominations for the July award.

In addition to Shrewd Call, Pat Rosney’s RPGTV All England Cup winner Bower Luke was nominated as was Angela Harrison’s RPGTV Angel of the North heroine Waltham Magic. Completing the list was Annaliese Thompson’s Dark Ocean, who won all four of his races on RPGTV at Nottingham in July.

However it was Shrewd Call who landed the vote – in a close call – much to the delight of his owner Kelly Seattle, who said: “The Twitter poll attracted a lot of interest and it turned into a really good battle right up to the end with Annaliese’s Dark Ocean.

“I placed my vote quite early when the poll opened and in the first 24 hours I think we were leading with about 60 per cent of the vote. Next time I checked, there was only about 24 hours to go and it wasn’t looking good for us!

“Dark Ocean had half the vote and we only had 30 per cent, so I asked all my friends and fellow owners in the kennel to get voting. Rhianne (Mullins) did the same.

“Then, thankfully, to give us the extra bit of help we desperately needed, Karen McMillan at Romford Stadium asked everyone to get behind ‘Team Mullins’ and vote and we managed win by the narrowest of margins.

“I messaged Annaliese the next morning and I don’t think either of us knew who was going to win. There was also a lot of support for Waltham Magic late on, so it really was a close-run thing but he managed to win it.

“One of the owners of Dark Ocean, Paul Howard, got in touch to say congratulations and good luck with the dog which was a really lovely thing to do.

“Our boy is absolutely bouncing. He trialled at Monmore last weekend before racing and ran the track really well, so it’s Monmore for him now and then possibly the Greene King IPA Sprint at Yarmouth. Maybe afterwards we’ll think about the Night of Stars in Ireland.

“I’m just happy to take one race at a time and enjoy every possible second I can with him.”