Neil Dyer's Cantonese heads a two-pronged attack for the stable on today’s Darwin Cup.
Cantonese has been brought along perfectly into the Cup by a trainer who knows a little bit about winning them, Neil Dyer.
Dyer has won the last two runnings with his warhorse Hawks Bay and while Cantonese isn’t at his level he won’t need to be from down in the weights this year.
He has been given the same prep that has proven successful for the yard in the past two, coming off the Roant Gold Cup, Chief Ministers Cup, and the Metric Mile.
Despite not winning on that path Cantonese’s form, adjusted for today’s weights, rates as good as any of the recent form on offer here and now he gets his chance to break through.
The positive of the stable is well illustrated by their key numbers
The stable strikes at 16% at Fannie Bay, well up on their overall strike rate, and returns a profit on turnover of +17.7%, a huge number given that it comes from a healthy sample size of 232 runners.
The booking of Blake Shinn looks a positive as well.
Shinn is a newcomer to Darwin but he comes here off an outstanding season where he rode at a strike rate of 17%, higher than any he has returned before.
It can easily be argued that Shinn is in career best form and with his talent he must be seen as an asset to any horse that he rides.
The Dyer stable is not single-handed in this years Cup with the Derby winner Royal Request looking more than just an understudy.
In fact, he looks the key danger to Cantonese with winning form in the book and upside to go with it.
There is more depth here to what he tackled in the Derby but he looks set to take the step forward and measure right up.
Gravitational had to settle for second in the Derby but he had the better of Royal Request in the Guineas and must be seen as a solid contender himself.
The Ruffian won both the Guineas and the Derby back in 2011 and his dominant success here last time shows him to be going as well as ever coming into today.
He too has to be respected on that front and looks to round out the key four chances.
Lightinthenight is high up in markets after a pleasing prep race for this but the big query with him is the fact that he has often failed to go on with a good return run in the past.
He’s a while between wins now and while he has the numbers to give this a big shake from the top of the weights he might just be one to oppose today.
