Best Cup field in years
Impressive depth among 30 nominations
NEXT Wednesday’s Geelong Cup is shaping up as one of the strongest renewals in recent memory after nominations were released yesterday.
Geelong Racing Club chief executive Daniel Salter said he could not be happier with the depth in this year’s list of 30 nominations, which is up on the 23 of last year.
Juddmonte International-owned galloper Finche will head the weights at 60kg; the son of Frankel is to make his Australian debut for Chris Waller, with stablemate Libran to carry 59.5kg and Roger Charlton’s Withhold half a kilogram less with Kerrin McEvoy booked to ride.
Waller has also nomi- nated seven-year-olds One Foot In Heaven and last start The Metropolitan winner Patrick Erin, as well as Herbert Power runner-up Brimham Rocks.
Team Williams has three nominations, but only Midterm — a son of Galileo who ran fifth in The Metrop — is expected to run, while A Prince Of Arran, who ran third in the Herbert Power, is also in the nominations.
Of the locals, Darren Weir has Yogi — third in the Bart Cummings — down in the weights, just ahead of the Trent Busuttin and Natalie Young-trained Sully, while Gai Waterhouse has nominated four-year-old mare Northwest Passage.
“It looks really strong at the moment but we won’t know until Monday after acceptances who comes through,” Salter said.
“We’re always hopeful we get a bigger field, that’s better for everybody, so fingers crossed. It’s another thing that’s out of our control like the weather, so we’ll have to wait and see.”
A number of runners remain on the fringe of the Melbourne Cup field, but may need more than the normal 1kg penalty to get in.
While Geelong has had some underwhelming fields in recent years — just 12 runners in 2017 — the form from the Cup has nearly always proven to stand up at Flemington.
Last year’s winner Vengeur Masque ran second in the Lexus Stakes before winning the Queen Elizabeth Stakes, while 2017 winner Qewy ran fourth in the Melbourne Cup at his next start.
Salter said the club’s committee would continue to negotiate for Melbourne Cup exemption for the Geelong Cup winner. “We always continually have those conversations but we’ve got a little way to go to get to that level,” he said.
“We’ll have people from Racing Victoria and the VRC down here on Cup day and I’m sure our committee will be getting in their ear.
“If we continue to have good form come out of here then we’re more of a chance.”