Can Ascot success for Al Wukair or Brametot put spring in Gallic step?

Sitting outside the Arqana Sales pavillion watching tomorrow's stars being inspected, it is impossible not to feel a sense of renewal in Deauville this week.

Across the road the best racing is for two-year-olds while here the international powerhouses are fighting it out over regally-bred future prospects, while a good proportion of the new intake for trainers across for France will be decided in these four days.

Racing is of course a sport built on almost boundless optimism but, as a nation, France does sullen introspection better than anywhere.

The near whitewash suffered over Arc weekend has not been an isolated case in terms of foreign trainers plundering many of the big prizes, while in terms of Group or Grade 1 success abroad in 2017, Didier Guillemin's victory in the Al Quoz Sprint with The Right Man stands in splendid isolation.

All of which has caused plenty of French racing journalists to question whether there are any deeper causes for this apparent slump, while their anglophone brethren were not the only ones to conjur the spirit of Waterloo in the wake of the Arc meeting at Chantilly.

Throw in debates swirling around the €25 million haircut to rewards for owners and breeders announced in recent days, and it makes for a pretty unhappy ship at present.

I have argued in the Racing Post before that the presence of many of the top owner/breeders in two or more of Europe's leading racing nations renders the scoreboard at big meetings a little more complex than first appears: Al Shaqab, Godolphin, Juddmonte and the Aga Khan all spread their homebred and auction-bought talent around.

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And there are plenty of good news stories about in French racing – including the prospect of the new ParisLongchamp coming on line next April and the announcement that a glut of Group 1 winners are being retired to Normandy farms – but neither will "rescue" 2017.

Yet in Al Wukair and Brametot, France has genuine contenders for the two biggest prizes on Qipco British Champions Day and it would not be too much of a stretch to see either one as Champion European Three-Year-old Colt when Cartier give out their racing awards next month, should one or both put in a top notch performance at Ascot.

Champion three-year-old colt: a wide open question

Harry Angel (blue): stronger and more mature this seasonCredit: Alan Crowhurst

Championship honours are still wide open at this stage and five of the six top colts are likely to be in action at Ascot on Saturday.

Barney Roy leads the Cartier points race at this late stage in the season and will line up against Brametot in the Champion Stakes, while his nearest pursuer, Churchill could also take that option or else drop back to a mile for the QE2, where Al Wukair lies in wait.

Cracksman has yet to win above Group 2 level and is well adrift in the points race, though he could fare well in the voting among both the public – including readers of the Racing Post – as well as the expert judging panel come early November.

The potential party-pooper to all of the above is Harry Angel, who will be bidding to win his third Group 1 on Saturday and who would be the first sprinter to win a second Cartier award in the same season since Lochsong was named Horse of the Year in 1993.

Brametot: the case for and against

Brametot (third from right, gold cap) was in good company in having no answer to Enable in the ArcCredit: Edward Whitaker

Pros: Brametot ran a fine race in the Arc, breaking much more smartly than on previous occasions and taking a prominent position close to the rail under Cristian Demuro.

He didn't get the cleanest of runs in the straight, which might have arguably cost him fourth or, at a stretch, third.

Should he follow former stablemate Almanzor onto the roll of honour in the Champions Stakes – a race his trainer Jean-Claude Rouget also won in its Newmarket incarnation with Literato in 2007 – then he would have extremely strong claims to be champion, having already won Classic over a mile and an extended mile and a quarter earlier in the year.

Cons: Despite Le Brivido advertising the form of the Poule d'Essai des Poulains by winning the Jersey Stakes at Ascot, some in Britain and Ireland will remain unconvinced unless he can beat Barney Roy and company convincingly.

Al Wukair: the case for and against

Churchill gets to the winning post in front of Barney Roy, Al Wukair and Lancaster BomberCredit: Mark Cranham

Pros: How different might things have been for Al Wukair had Ryan Moore not bagged the rail and the cutaway in the 2,000 Guineas? A fast-finishing third under Gregory Benoist at Newmarket, Al Shaqab's son of Dream Ahead was then due to step up in trip for the Prix du Jockey Club against his companion-in-colours, Brametot.

A small setback put the plan on hold and, with his retirement to the Haras de Bouquetot already confirmed for the end of the season, we will never know whether he could have been effective or even improve over the intermediate trip.

What is in the book in black and white is his thrilling defeat of Inns Of Court and Thunder Snow in the Prix Jacques le Marois.

Depending on which way Aidan O'Brien jumps, Andre Fabre may get the chance of avenging his Guineas defeat to Churchill in the QE2, while Ribchester remains the miler par excellence in Europe until proved otherwise.

Cons: While the Marois is always one of the highest-quality mile races in Europe there will be those that argue that the 2017 running lacked a standout older horse (Taareef was the only four-year-old in a lineup which undoubtedly suffered from falling just 11 days after the Sussex).

Charm Spirit performed a similar ascent of the ranks in 2014, winning the QE2 after only finishing fifth in a top-class Guineas. But by that stage Khalid Abdullah and John Gosden had already sewn up the race to the Cartier with the exceptional Kingman.

Conclusion

Brametot: wins the Prix Du Jockey Club from Waldgeist at Chantilly on SundayCredit: Alan Crowhurst

Neither Barney Roy nor Churchill have done enough to secure the title of three-year-old colt in Europe should they suffer defeat on Saturday while Cracksman will need to be impressive if he is to tip the scale at this late stage.

That means the two French challengers have every chance to push their own claims on the track.

Ultimately the key factor is which trainer still has a horse at or near peak form at this late stage of the season, since all four were trained hard in the early part of the year for their May targets.

And of course it is perfectly possible that all will suffer defeat, in which case the award might have something of an academic flavour to it in comparison with the exploits of Enable and the older brigade, led by Ulysses and Ribchester.

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