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Anthony Van Dyck is a deserving favourite to win the Caulfield Cup for trainer Aidan O'Brien despite history counting against the 2019 Epsom Derby winner.

He's a Derby-winning son of the greatest thoroughbred stallion on the planet and he's the best horse ever sent to Australia by one of the most successful trainers the world has known.

Anthony Van Dyck undoubtedly has class to match his pedigree, he has speed, stamina to go with it, and he is the favourite for Saturday's Caulfield Cup.

For all that, he's a long way from winning it.

Anthony Van Dyck, a son of Galileo, is the seventh of his trainer Aidan O'Brien 's eight Epsom Derby winners, and is one of the four original Caulfield Cup topweights the master of Ballydoyle has supplied in the past five years.

And in his bid for victory, it is this weighty issue that could be his most formidable obstacle.

In the 27 years that European horses have been regular spring visitors to Melbourne, it is the classier, more heavily handicapped of them that have invariably struggled.

Even among locals, the Caulfield Cup has been elusive to horses highest in the weights.

Only one original topweight has won the race in its 140-year history. That was Dunaden who carried 58kg in 2012, the year after he'd won the Melbourne Cup.

Anthony Van Dyck is handicapped to carry 58.5kg, and no horse since Tobin Bronze (61.5kg) in 1967 has carried more than 58kg to victory.

The O'Brien team, however, is as confident as ever.

"This is probably the best bunch we've brought here," said O'Brien's travelling head lad CJ Comerford.

"Last year we won two races in Melbourne with Hunting Horn and Magic Wand and we were third in the Caulfield Cup with The Cliffsofmoher two years ago and with Johannes Vermeer the year before that.

"So we've an idea of what's needed."

After winning last year's Derby, Anthony Van Dyck's form held up with placings in the Irish Champion Stakes and the Breeders' Cup Turf at Santa Anita.

He failed in Hong Kong in his last run as a three-year-old before running perhaps his best race since his Epsom win when second to Ghaiyyath in the Coronation Cup at Newmarket, with Stradivarius third, before a fifth on unsuitably soft ground in the Group Two Hardwicke Stakes at Royal Ascot.

Anthony Van Dyck sealed a trip to Melbourne by beating Stradivarius in the Prix Foy over 2400m at Longchamp last month.

"The Prix Foy wasn't run to suit him, but he did what he had to do," Comerford said.

Another useful pointer has been the decision by top jockey Hugh Bowman to defer a suspension to allow him to ride Anthony Van Dyck and therefore forego his commitment in the Cox Plate.

Irish trainers will supply a further two Caulfield Cup runners, Buckhurst (Joseph O'Brien) and True Self (Willie Mullins) with another two from England, Dashing Willoughby (Andrew Balding) and Prince Of Arran (Charlie Fellowes).

Buckhurst, from the stable of 2017 Melbourne Cup winner Rekindled, appeals as a progressive type who has slipped into Saturday's race without attracting undue attention from the handicapper.

At his last start he finished a comfortable fifth to the Melbourne Cup favourite Tiger Moth in a Group Three race at Leopardstown, a result that earned the winner a 2.5kg penalty for the Melbourne Cup.

True Self, from the stable of dual Melbourne Cup placegetter Max Dynamite, is on her second visit to Melbourne having won the Group Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Flemington last year and has since raced in Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia, Ireland and England.

Last start she finished down the track under 61kg in the Ebor, one of England's biggest handicap races.

She drops to 52kg on Saturday, has barrier four and is in good order.

Prince Of Arran had True Self in second place when he won the Geelong Cup in 2019 and then went on to finish second in the Melbourne Cup.

He hasn't won since, but last start was third to the outstanding Enable at Kempton.

The visitor in the best form is Dashing Willoughby who won successive races over 2400m and 3200m before finishing fourth in the Group Two Lonsdale Cup at York in August.

Barrier two might not be much help to him, but he's well treated with 54.5kg.