3 minute read

Hong Kong stayer Dominant will have his Australian target race settled after he contests the Group One Ranvet Stakes at Rosehill.

A definitive target race during The Championships remains undecided for Dominant, the Hong Kong stayer which will make his Australian debut in the Group One Ranvet Stakes at Rosehill on Saturday.

Dominant has been entered for the Queen Elizabeth Stakes and the Sydney Cup and the horse's Australian chaperone George Moore says it is too early to pick one race over another.

"We haven't made any decision yet and to tell you the truth we don't know who will be riding him on that day because we haven't got a jockey booked," Moore said.

Moore is looking after Dominant for his father, the leading Hong Kong trainer John Moore and he has been impressed enough with Sydney's new quarantine facility at Canterbury to hint at bringing the stable's best racehorse out in 2016.

"In a matter of time we might bring Able Friend here next year depending on what the owner wants to do," Moore said.

"If he came here we would have a good shot at the mile races."

Able Friend is on a Group One winning streak with the promise of more to come, most notably at Royal Ascot later this year.

"It's not going to be a bad thing for him to stay in Hong Kong for an extra couple of months to let him mature a bit more," Moore said.

"And then we'll go from there and I'm sure he'll be winning a lot more international races in the future."

Dominant is one of the outsiders in a seven-horse Ranvet field which includes Japan's Tosen Stardom, last year's winner Silent Achiever and Contributer, the form weight-for-age horse of the Sydney autumn.

The Hong Kong visitor was given an easy time in a piece of work at Canterbury on Thursday morning.

"Instead of working him over the mile today we worked him over 1200 metres just stretching his legs really with nice three-quarter pace work," Moore said.

On the strength of wins in the Apollo Stakes and the Group One Chipping Norton Stakes, the John O'Shea-trained Contributer is a clear-cut favourite to make it three wins in four Australian starts.