RIBBLESDALE STAKES

(GROUP 2)

THE Ballydoyle team soon struck again when Magic Wand, possibly uneasy with give in the ground in the Oaks, comprehensively

  • reversed
the form with runner-up that day Wild Illusion. She also appeared to stay a mile and half just that bit better.

Dettori made much of the running on Highgarden but, in a race where very few got into the argument, Moore was always tracking him on the winner with William Buick sitting in their slipsteam on Wild Illusion.

Both fillies were going well to the turn but when Magic Wand (100/30) was asked to go on she responded immediately and, like Hunting Horn, soon put the race to bed. The money came late for Wild Illusion (9/4 favourite) but, though she ran on willingly enough, she had no answer to the winner’s pace on this faster ground and was beaten by four lengths.

“We were very happy with Magic Wand’s fourth in the Oaks,” O’Brien said. “The ground went unusually soft at Epsom and she came out of it well in every sense.

“The winner that day, Forever Together, may go for the Pretty Polly at the Curragh and this filly might head for the Irish Oaks; then they might go for the Arc or something like that. Magic Wand beat Forever Together at Chester and we were hoping the ground would be like that today.”

The master of Ballydoyle was saddling his 64th Royal Ascot winner.