Kentucky-based breeder employing the international approach

Two standout lots bred by Mt Brilliant Farm in Kentucky at this week's Keeneland September Yearling Sale demonstrate the stud's international approach: one is a Frankel half-brother to the former Mark Johnston-trained Hartnell, a wide-margin winner of the Group 2 Chelmsford Stakes in Australia earlier in the month, and the other is a Street Cry half-brother to this season's Belmont Stakes hero Creator out of Peruvian champion Morena.

Mt Brilliant owner Greg Goodman doesn't pay too much attention to suffixes, though. For him, a good horse is a good horse.

Asked why he has delved into European bloodlines to purchase Debonnaire, an 11-year-old winning daughter of Anabaa, along with a number of other well-bred mares, he says: “Forever and ever, Europeans have been coming to Kentucky and buying horses, and some of our great farms here have gone to Europe and bought horses.