Deauville Sunday
2.50 Prix Rothschild (Group 1) (3yo+ fillies) 1m
TOMORROW’S six-runner Group 1 Prix Rothschild at Deauville features an intriguing Irish raider in the shape of Johnny Murtagh’s recent Leopardstown winner Know It All.
This Lord Kanaloa half-sister to two pattern-race scorers had twice been placed in Group 3 company before she broke through at that level when defeating Celestial Object by two and a quarter lengths in the Derrinstown Stud Fillies Stakes on July 1st.
Her trainer could hardly be in better form but this first sitting at the top table is asking her a big question and, unless she improves markedly on what she has shown to date, a share of the minor place prize money may be the best she can hope for.
Watch Me is the only Group 1 winner in the field, having landed the 2019 Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot, and she boasts two other pieces of top-level form – fourth to Romanised in the Prix Jacques le Marois and an unlucky-in-running third in the Prix de l’Opera – that give her outstanding claims here.
But I was not as impressed as some observers by her comeback triumph in listed company three weeks ago (her closest pursuer, Norma, who reopposes, was beaten in relatively modest handicaps when trained in England last term) and this easy mile may turn out to be a touch on the sharp side for her.
Given her likely short price, I would be more tempted by an each-way punt on this year’s Poule d’Essai des Pouliches runner-up, Speak Of The Devil.
Trained by Fabrice Chappet, she would have landed that classic over this very course and distance if she had been granted a clear run, and she then ran well before her stamina gave out late in a hot renewal of the Group 1 Prix de Diane over an extended mile and a quarter.
The solitary British challenger is Charlie Appleby’s Summer Romance. Her recent Epsom Group 3 win has been franked by subsequent victories from both the third and fourth, but the key to that success may well have been the fact that she was allowed an uncontested lead before kicking for home at the perfect moment.
SELECTION: SPEAK OF THE DEVIL
Next best: Watch Me
The meeting’s other feature is for juveniles, the €56,000 Group 3 Darley Prix de Cabourg over six furlongs. Early signs are that the British two-year-olds have the edge over their French counterparts again this year and Archie Watson’s Mighty Gurkha and the Mick Channon-trained Cairn Gorm may notch a one-two for the cross-Channel visitors.
Beaten by just half a length when fourth behind the future Nassau Stakes winner, Fancy Blue, in the Prix de Diane, Jean-Claude Rouget’s Sea The Stars filly, Raabihah, should have little trouble in breaking her pattern duck by landing today’s Deauville highlight, the seven-runner €56,000 Group 3 Prix de Psyche Sky Sports Racing over 10 furlongs.
On the same card, See The Rose, a two-year-old daughter of Kendargent who is trained by André Fabre and owned by the Irish triumvirate of Linda Shanahan, Susan Magnier and Sean Mulryan, can extend her unbeaten record to three in the €56,000 Group 3 Prix Six Perfections Sky Sports Racing.