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Pre-race spotlight – Casablanca

Brother to Group 1 winner to debut at Randwick on Wednesday.

Casablanca as a yearling.
Casablanca as a yearling. Picture: Inglis.

The wait is almost for Kia Ora Stud and TFI, who on Wednesday will see one of their headline purchases from last year's yearling sales step out at the Randwick Kensington meeting.

Casablanca will make his debut in the $60,000 TAB Handicap (1300m) that is race two on the card.

A $1.4 million yearling, Casablanca is the third foal from Group 1 winner Rising Romance, a daughter of Ekraar.

Rising Romance's first foal was Yearning, who won the 2021 Thousand Guineas, six months after her younger brother – who races as Magic – topped the Inglis Easter Yearling Sale when sold for $2.5 million.

Yearning and Magic are both by Snitzel, as is Casablanca.

Rising Romance returned to Snitzel the three seasons after having Casablanca, producing a colt that died after birth in 2021 before failing to get in-foal the following season.

Casablanca, who is trained by Gerald Ryan and Sterling Alexiou, cut a knee in a training mishap which interrupted his two-year-old season but he had one trial in February before being put away.

He returned to the trials on August 11, finishing an encouraging second in a 1030m hitout at Rosehill, before not being knocked around when seventh of eight over 1000m at Hawkesbury on August 21.

Ryan Maloney has been booked for the ride in Wednesday's race, in which Casablanca has drawn barrier eight in the field of 12 plus five emergencies.

Also engaged is last year's Magic Millions Gold Coast sale-topper Suspect (I Am Invincible x Suspicieuse), a $1.9m half-brother to Dubious who has run two encouraging races to start his career, and Kenedna's half-brother Mutasalem (The Autumn Sun), while Home Affairs' half-brother Marenaro is one of the emergencies.


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