Luke Azzopardi had been hoping to head down to Melbourne this weekend to run his smart stayer Mrs Emgrand in the Group 1 Topgun event, but instead the pair will head to Nowra on Monday night, chasing that club’s feature event, the Gold Cup.
“I wasn’t disappointed but I thought … I don’t know how they work it out (the field selection), but I think we’ve beaten a lot of them in the field, but didn’t get an invite,” Azzopardi said. “But look it doesn’t matter, she won at Wenty (last week) and if she runs a good race at Nowra I’ll be very happy.”
The Nowra Gold Cup carries $10,000 to the winner, and Mrs Emgrand will be a short-priced favourite to bank the winners’ cheque. She heads into the 722m event on the back of a placing in the Sydney Cup final behind Boom Down and Blue Moon Rising, and that last start 41.98s win at Wentworth Park.
“I always thought she could run that sort of time,” he said.
“The Sydney Cup was probably her toughest run and I was a bit disappointed to be honest, but she had a bit of an incident there a couple of weeks before the series.
“I took her there to give her a 280 finish-on, and the lure flew off before the 520m boxes and she pulled up. I didn’t know what was going on and I thought she was injured, then the next thing she is coming back to the 280m boxes with the lure in her mouth.
“Thankfully she wasn’t hurt, but then she had been easing a bit at that section every time she raced there during the Sydney Cup series, but last week, it was the first time she didn’t ease, she kind of accelerated there.”
Mrs Emgrand will be having her first run at Nowra tonight, but Azzopardi doesn’t see that as a problem.
“No she hasn’t been there. I wanted to go and trial her at Nowra but I just didn’t have time and I said I’ll just see how she goes and if she goes alright I might wander down to Melbourne with her.
“She has got to improve a bit (to be competitive against the best in the Bold Trease during the Melbourne Cup carnival) but I think she can improve a bit and I hope she does.”
Azzopardi expects grand old campaigner Ebby Ripper, who will have her 125th start in the Gold Cup, to be the danger.
“She is a great bitch Ebby Ripper. She is always a danger, she is so honest, she just keeps coming. “
