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Albury Racing Club may consider a new date for the $180,000 Albury Gold Cup after a disappointing entry list of only 18 horses for Friday’s Listed race.
A return to a two-day carnival on successive days will also be looked at after Racing NSW split the dates last year to cater for a heat of the Country Championships.
The Albury Cup is one of the richest country races in NSW over 2000m and in most years has attracted excellent support from leading Sydney and Melbourne stables.
Winning trainers over the last 12 years have included David Hayes twice, Anthony and Lee Freedman, the late Guy Walter, Tony McEvoy, Graeme Rogerson and Robert Smerdon twice.The only major stables with entries this year are the Hayes/Dabernig team from Lindsay Park in Victoria and Sydney’s Gai Waterhouse/Adrian Bott partnership.
The majority of nominations this year have come from local and country stables with the opposition the Albury Cup faces this year from race meetings in Sydney and Melbourne having an obvious impact on entries from the metropolitan stables.Sydney stables are pre-occupied with the Golden Slipper meeting at Rosehill on Saturday while Melbourne hosts a Group One meeting at Moonee Valley on Friday followed by the Mornington Cup meeting on Saturday.
The Golden Slipper program includes the G3 Manion Cup (2400m) with prizemoney of $150,000, the Mornington Cup (2400m) is worth $300,000 and that meeting also includes a $90,000 Benchmark 90 race over 2000m.Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott will decide on Tuesday if they will send the classy gelding Supply And Demand to Albury after he received the topweight of 62kg.
Supply And Demand, unplaced at his last start in the G1 Australian Cup at Flemington, is the only entry handicapped above the limit of 54kg.Waterhouse has been trying to win an Albury Cup for more than 10 years but her best finish has been a third placing with Hippopus in 2016. Her Grafton Cup winner Queenstown was fourth in 2015 and Bonfire could manage only ninth in a high class field last year.
The Lindsay Park stable has nominated Sin To Win, a last start third over 1800m at Flemington when second-up from a spell.Ballarat trainer Archie Alexander has entered Wheal Leisure and Survived, fourth in last year’s Albury Cup behind Green Sweet.
Wheal Leisure and Sin To Win are also nominated for Saturday’s Mornington meeting.A notable omission from the Albury Cup entries is the Canberra Cup winner Almost Court.
Co-trainer Barbara Joseph said Almost Court will have his next start in Sydney in the $150,000 Neville Sellwood Stakes (2000m) at Rosehill on Saturday week.