Azzurri tags the boy from OZ
CONFUSION surrounding two Melbourne Cup runners has ended with Racing Australia allowing Yucatan and Sound Check to run under their original names at Flemington.
Aiden O’Brien-trained Yucatan won the Herbert Power Stakes at Caulfield on October 13, elevating him to Melbourne Cup favourite while Sound Check ran in the Caulfield Cup the following week.
Yucatan was registered as Yucatan Ire last week after Australian officials discovered an unheralded South Australianbased maiden of the same name.
Unsung country trainer Matthew Seyers’ reluctance to buckle amid the naming fiasco around the Melbourne Cup favourite was a catalyst for the initial change.
“We couldn’t care less if that other thing stayed as Yucatan and raced as Yucatan,” Seyers said.
CONTINUED PAGE 46 INNISFAIL’S Jarrah Patti will line up against the world’s best Oz Tag players in Coffs Harbour this weekend.
The 33-year-old has been selected in the Italy squad for the Oz Tag World Cup.
A latecomer to the sport – he did not start playing Oz Tag until 2014 – Patti said he will be looking forward to the challenge.
“The Australian and New Zealand teams are going to be the heavy favourites but we’ve got a red-hot side,” Patti said.
“Most of the boys are based in Sydney, so they’ve been training together, but there’s me and a guy from the Gold Coast who will join the squad.”
A conversation with former NRL referees boss Bill Harrigan, the founder of Oz Tag, led Patti to the Italian side.
“When I found out there was an Oz Tag World Cup I made contact with Bill,” he said. “I asked him about the selection criteria for playing with Italy because my grandparents were born there and he gave me the contact number of a bloke in Sydney who was running the Italian team.
“I was asked to go to a trial in Sydney but I had another commitment that weekend, so I sent them a heap of footage and I made a squad of 25.
“We played in an emerging nations carnival against Samoa, Malta and Greece and I made it into the final squad of 17.”
There will be 32 teams represented at the Oz Tag World Cup, including an Australian Indigenous side. Weipa’s Karl Adams will represent the Far North in that team.
“It’s going to be a very entertaining event,” Patti said.
Matches start Friday with finals to be played Sunday.