A horse which hasn’t made the cut for Godolphin’s Golden Slipper team threatens to be the best of Sheikh Mohammed’s star-studded crop of two-year-olds.
Inner Circle, a half-brother to Group One winner Guelph, held up his family’s reputation with an all-the-way win on debut at Rosehill on Wednesday.
It has earned him a start in the Pago Pago Stakes at the same venue on March 14 and a possible tilt at the two-year-old ATC Sires’ Produce Stakes – the Group One race won by his dam Camarilla and Guelph.
Inner Circle took Godolphin’s season tally of individual two-year-old winners to 14 and while he isn’t in the Golden Slipper mix, O’Shea holds him in the highest regard.
“I won’t be surprised if in 12 months time he ends up the pick of them,” O’Shea said.
“We didn’t put him in the Slipper because mentally I think he’ll be much better later on.
“We will probably just go to the Pago Pago then see what happens. If we want to run him again after that we will.
“To me, he is the epitome of a Golden Rose sort of horse.”
Despite the ease of his 1-1/4 length win over Edge Away, Inner Circle gave the Godolphin team a scare pre-race when he reared up and slipped over near the tie-up stalls.
Gai Waterhouse also produced a colt at Rosehill who she hoped could go on to better things.
Raphael’s Cat, a son of Redoute’s Choice, went head to head with Navua Mist before wearing him down to win the TAB Place Multi Plate.
He is likely to meet Inner Circle in the Pago Pago but Waterhouse says the Golden Slipper isn’t on the colt’s autumn agenda.
“He’s a very nice horse, he’s a natural two-year-old,” Waterhouse said.
“(But) he’s not a Slipper horse.”
– AAP
