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Debutant Roman Chief took out the $75,000 Restricted Maiden Race over 1400m in effortless fashion on Sunday.

Despite a delayed debut due to a pulled shoulder injury, the three-year-old son of Caravaggio still showed plenty of potential with three trial wins, garnering lukewarm support from punters to jump at $21 at his first-up run over seven furlongs.

Bar Raging Rabbit who fly-jumped at the start and dislodged jockey Koh Teck Huat (not injured and went on to score aboard Opunake in the very next race), the field got off to an even despatch with the fleet-footed Genrich (Zyrul Nor Azman) leading the bunch while Seamlessly (Louis-Philippe Beuzelin) and Lightning Strike (A'Isisuhairi Kasim) sat one pair behind.

Third in running was the pair of $13 favourite Ace of Diamonds (Dylan Mo) and Roman Chief (Manoel Nunes). After Seamlessly and Lightning Strike moved up to sit on the outside of the leader at the bend, Nunes also left the paint and plotted his path outwards for the final assault in the straight.

With Nunes pulling out the persuader at the 350m, Roman Chief responded by pulling away from Lighting Strike before bolting in with a soft four-and-a-quarter length win from Creative Dreams (Simon Kok Wei Hoong), who sprinted home late on the outside.

Sweet N Sour (Shafrizal Saleh) ran another one-and-a-quarter lengths away in third. The winning time for the 1400m on the Long Course was 1 min 22.41secs.

Winning trainer Michael Clements was pleased that the break worked out well for the Gandharvi Stable-owned gelding.

"He's a late-maturing horse," said the naturalised Singaporean.

"Good trial wins but he had a slight setback. He was going to race a couple of months ago but he pulled a muscle on his right front shoulder, so we gave him a break for that and it's paid off.

"He's come back good and I'm really impressed with his win today.

"I said to Nunes that's his first-up run and he has a heavy weight (57kgs), so he'll have to look after him early so he can finish off strongly.

"We were hoping that he can get back on the Long Course and come back to him in the straight.

"It's good for the owner (Kuldeep Singh Rajput). He's patient and has a lot of young horses.

"He's (Roman Chief) a miler for sure so we'll set him up for that later on."

Nunes concurred with Clements that Roman Chief is a nice miler in the making.

"He was good on 1400m and he really impressed me with the way he hit the line and kept going," said the four-time Singapore champion jockey.

"He's a very intelligent individual. I just put him behind horse no 3 Lightning Strike and he was very relaxed behind him.

"I took him out at the top of the straight and he responded very quickly. He has a very good future here. He will go over 1600m no problem."

Roman Chief has earned his first pay cheque of over $40,000 after his debut win.