'Outstanding bunch' for foal sale but selective trade forecast

All eyes are on Goffs this week as weanlings by elite sires such as Galileo, Frankel, Sea The Stars and Lope De Vega, along with debut offerings by Classic winners Awtaad, Harzand, New Bay and The Gurkha go under the hammer at the company's November Sale.

Some 775 lots have been scheduled to sell in Part 1 of the foal sale from Monday to Wednesday, before mares take centre stage on Thursday and Friday. Then it is back to the future on Saturday, with a 318-strong catalogue for Part 2 of the foal sale.

“We think we've got a very good foal catalogue and are very much looking forward to it,” said Goffs group chief executive Henry Beeby. “Part 1 is particularly strong – I was looking at foals all Saturday and they're an outstanding bunch – and we've got a big crowd of people coming. So we're very hopeful.”

View the Goffs November Foal Sale catalogue

Beeby is aware, though, that the market polarisation witnessed at nearly all sales this year will likely be evident again in the coming days.

“I suspect the market will be very selective, just as the yearling sales have been,” he said. “The ones that are most desirable should sell particularly well and others might struggle to an extent.”

Beeby pulled no punches in his assessment of the present state of trade at the conclusion of this month's less select Goffs Autumn Yearling Sale, which registered steep declines in turnover and the average and median prices. The clearance rate stood at around only 60 per cent.

“All of us involved in the bloodstock business must accept that the market is the ultimate arbiter of each offering and it is speaking with increasing volume that the sums do not add up at a certain level,” he said at the time.

Reflecting on that a fortnight later, Beeby added: “That's the way the market is, everyone has to face up to it. Trade for this week's auction should peak midweek but, by the same token, the research shows there were a fair few pinhooking successes out of Part 2 of the foal sale.

"So we suggest people come and look at those foals – which they will; the pinhookers make sure they see everything. They don't let any opportunities pass.”

A new dimension to this year's Goffs Foal Sale is the unveiling of 96 extra stables in the recently built X, Y and Z barns, which eliminate the problem of 'double standings', a bugbear for vendors in the past.

“We've had a wonderful reception to the boxes,” Beeby said. “The consignors are very happy and very complimentary. Ger Hennessy, who heads up our facilities team, has done an amazing job getting them ready in time.”

Among the likely headline acts this week are four foals by Galileo being offered by The Castlebridge Consignment – a filly out of a daughter of Banks Hill (lot 570), a half-sister to Harzand (709) and half-brothers to Australian sire sensation Zoustar (637) and Group 2-winning two-year-old Besharah (680).

The Castlebridge Consignment offers this Galileo half-sister to HarzandCredit: Goffs

Also of significant interest are the Frankel half-brother to stakes winners Curtain Call, Launched and Nature Spirits (647) from Norelands Stud and a No Nay Never half-sister to the classy Chicas Amigas (618) presented by the Irish National Stud.

Cloth Of Cloud (964), the champion two-year-old filly in South Africa in 2015-16 and offered in foal to Galileo, should fetch a sky-high sum during the mares' section.

Read the Racing Post Bloodstock Pocket Preview guide to this month's breeding-stock sales at Goffs and Tattersalls