Flat and jumps fraternity both catered for in Autumn Sale

Timely reminders of the variety on offer at the Goffs UK Autumn Sale have continued to flow this autumn ahead of this year’s renewal, which kicks off its two-day run on Wednesday.

Cover girl Mabs Cross, who was knocked down for just £3,000 to Peter Fahey in 2015, gained recompense for her near miss in the Nunthorpe Stakes with a deserved victory in the Prix de l’Abbaye.

The sale has also been represented to good effect in recent weeks by Thomas Hobson, one of the highlights of the horses in training offered in 2013 who followed up his win in the Doncaster Cup by running second to Stradivarius in Saturday’s British Champions Long Distance Cup at Ascot.

This year’s sale opens tomorrow at noon with a catalogue of 156 yearlings. A number of proven Group 1 sires are represented, notably Mabs Cross’ sire Dutch Art, Lawman, Showcasing and Ruler Of The World, alongside various first-crop names such as Cable Bay, Hot Streak, Make Believe and Fountain Of Youth.

“This sale was traditionally held in November,” said Tony Williams, managing director of Goffs UK, “and we swapped dates with the Goffs Autumn Sale in Ireland to see how we fared, and it seems to have worked well. Our yearling entries are up and we have a good cross-section of sires represented.

“Both our yearling and horses in training sales have been really strong this year, and we’re optimistic that this sale will be good too.”

Another 244 horses, including supplementary entries, are catalogued to the horses in training and point-to-point/form horse section on Thursday.

“We’ve been well supported with decent drafts from Godolphin, Shadwell and some of the good training yards,” said Williams. “We’re still taking supplementary lots and I think we will end up with around 20 additional entries.

“Obviously we have the Aintree sale but we’ve also proven that those high-end pointers can be sold at Doncaster. Many of the good point-to-point vendors are represented and I think that point-to-point/form horse section will end up being a really good session.”

A strong entry from Willie Mullins is set to be one of the headline drafts of Friday’s session.

Mullins has eight horses catalogued including the classy six-time winner Montalbano (336), the winner of his penultimate start over fences at Ballinrobe, three-time scorer Camelia De Cotte (337), a recent fourth in the Like A Butterfly Novice Chase at Tipperary, and Buck’s Billionaire (261), a half-brother to Big Buck’s who has been placed this season in bumpers at Kilbeggan and Navan.

Moltalbano: one of the eyecatching lots in Autumn Sale catalogueCredit: Caroline Norris

Carry On (285) and Aggressive (290), a pair of three-year-olds who landed their bumper debuts for Kevin Ryan and David Elsworth at Huntingdon earlier this month, are other eye-catching entries.

Much of the action, however, is likely to come from the supplementary catalogue, which includes last time out point-to-point winners Time Is Honey (296), Monsieur D’Arque (297), Buck’s Bin’s (298), Donatello Mail (301) and Unexpected Depth (302).

Cardigan Bay (295), the recent seven-length winner of a bumper at Fontwell for Charlie Longsdon, is another interesting addition.

Meanwhile, among those that should generate dual-purpose interest is Maifalki (291), another supplementary entry who defeated subsequent Group 2 winner Alignement when landing the Listed Prix de Craon on his most recent start for Jason Ward.

His presence enhances an original catalogue that also contains large drafts from Godolphin and Shadwell Stud, a clutch of highly rated Flat performers - among them multiple scorers Book Of Dreams (355) and Brandon Castle (374) - and a recent winning juvenile in The Cotswold Wasp (181).

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