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With ten wins from the last 22 races run at Meydan, Doug Watson's team has been in imperious form that has the American 11 clear in the race to win his fifth UAE training title.

Watson has an exciting team to look forward to for the Dubai World Cup Carnival, which began last Thursday.

Based at Red Stables, in the centre of Dubai and adjacent to Godolphin’s Al Quoz Stables, Watson started the carnival with a win by Mizbah in just the sort of dirt handicap that he has farmed during the domestic part of the season.

When asked if being in such good form gives him confidence ahead of the most important stage of the Dubai season, he is unfailingly modest.

“It certainly helps,” he smiles. “We’re very lucky to have owners who send us some nice horses.”

Those nice horses include Desert Force, who looks a Group horse in the making after two smooth wins in handicap company.

He is owned by one of the yard’s main patrons, Mohammed Khalifa Al Basti, whose bright yellow silks are rapidly becoming a familiar sight in UAE winner’s enclosures.

Desert Force, an Equiano gelding who was previously trained in the UK by Richard Hannon, is entered for the listed Dubawi Stakes (1200m) on Thursday.

His handicap rating is now 108. “We wanted to run in the 95-105 handicap next week, but he’s rather blown that,” says Watson with a wry smile. “He’s a horse that Pat [Dobbs, stable jockey] has always loved and we always thought he’d be perfect for the dirt.”

Comparisons have been drawn between Desert Force and One Man Band, who provided Watson with a first World Cup card success in March last year after a decade of trying.

The Pivotal 6-year-old led home a 1-2-3 for the yard in the G2 Godolphin Mile. It was a notable breakthrough for a trainer for whom luck on the big night had previously been hard to find.

“We’d been shooting for that every year and it hadn’t come true to that point, so it was a great night,” Watson said.

That win came at the end of a superb 2016 Carnival for Watson, who was crowned leading trainer - de-throning Saeed Bin Suroor.

He also picked up his first UAE classics, the listed UAE 1000 Guineas and the G3 UAE Oaks, with Polar River, a filly he describes as the best he’s trained.

Watson, who moved to the UAE from Chicago, was originally assistant to Kiaran McLaughlin in Dubai before taking out the licence himself when McLaughlin returned to the US in 2003.

Since then, he has amassed 476 winners from 4278 runners, enjoying a fine spell in the past two years, especially since dirt replaced the Tapeta track at Meydan.

“I had a hard time training winners on that,” he reflects.

The unassuming Watson, 51, points to a “great team” as the reason for his success.

A salaried trainer on the Dubai Racing Club roster, he has nevertheless attracted some notable outside owners including prominent Canadian Charles Fipke and Kildare Stud’s Frankie O’Connor, who owns exciting debutant winner Cosmo Charlie and UAE 1000 Guineas-bound Complimenti.

With ever-strengthening ties to some big names back home plus an enduring friendship with McLaughlin, it might not be a surprise were Watson eventually to return to the US and follow in his mentor’s footsteps.

Not so.

“My job is here,” he says. “Dubai and the Maktoum family have been very good to me.”

However, having sent runners to Singapore in the past, he is far from insular, and does harbour international ambitions.

“I wouldn’t mind having a few runners in America, but obviously I couldn’t stay there all summer. I don’t want to train in America per se, my job is here.”

Watson is also very much a hands-on trainer. He checks the legs of each of his 115-strong string personally before they head onto the training track, where he works seamlessly with long-time assistant Noel Connolly.

With success heaping more pressure on the stable, the Carnival won’t be easy for him in that regard.

However, with a hardworking team and a wealth of unexposed equine talent, it is difficult to imagine that it won’t be successful.