Goliath faces giant task in keeping Japan’s challenge at bay in Sha Tin's showpiece QEII Cup

The storylines featured on FWD Champions Day at Sha Tin would do justice to any showcase meeting anywhere in the world, all spiced with an international flavour the Hong Kong Jockey Club has long been seeking. 

This year there is no Golden Sixty – he was retired after finishing fourth in the Champions Mile 12 months ago – and no Romantic Warrior, who is resting following his globetrotting heroics in the Middle East.

Instead, we celebrate a new champion, Ka Ying Rising, officially the world’s best sprinter, who attempts his 12th consecutive win and his eighth for the season when lining up in the Chairman’s Sprint Prize.

Ka Ying Rising is prepared by David Hayes, who welcomes his sons Ben, Will and JD Hayes back to Hong Kong with the star they train in Australia, the seven-year-old Mr Brightside, who bids for a tenth Group 1 in an astonishing 44-start career, in the FWD Champions Mile.

His clash with Voyage Bubble, a Derby winner, who has taken over the mantle of best local miler from Golden Sixty, has the potential to be a cracker.

And then there is the FWD QEII Cup, worth £2.8m, the biggest prize of the three feature races, with Francis Graffard shipping in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes winner Goliath for the first start of his 2025 campaign, up against a formidable Japanese trio, headed by multiple Classic winner Liberty Island.

It would be disrespectful in the extreme to say we won’t miss Golden Sixty and Romantic Warrior – but the void left is not quite as big as many had feared. The new stars will serve up plenty to digest.

Japanese trio have the form to dominate

Goliath, the King George winner at Ascot last year, is the highest-rated horse (126) at the FWD Champions meeting. However, that may not be enough to master the opposition in the treasured FWD QEII Cup that owes its place in the calendar to a visit to Happy Valley by the late Queen in 1975.

It has evolved from a race on the inner sand track (since removed) to a race on turf of higher status and huge prize-money, with £1.68m being offered as the winner’s purse for this running.

Christophe Soumillon celebrates as Goliath lands the King George VI And Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Ascot in JulyCredit: Alan Crowhurst/Getty

Goliath looks in fine fettle for his first outing of the campaign, his first start since the Japan Cup last November.  He finished sixth there but it was an unusual running of the flagship race as there was no pace, which didn’t suit him nor many others.

This year, the Japanese are back and strongly tipped to dominate. They have won three of the last ten runnings of the QEII – with Neorealism (2017), Win Bright (2019) and Loves Only You (2021) – and they can supply the Trifecta with Tastiera, Liberty Island and Prognosis.

Joao Moreira partners Hong Kong outsider Moments In Time for Danny Shum but he made a pertinent observation about Tastiera, who he rode into second in the Japanese St Leger and is a colt he knows well.

“I thought he looked stunning,” was his candid report after spotting the five-year-old on the training track at Sha Tin this week.

Tastiera, trained by Noriyuki Hori, was a very good three-year-old, winning the Japanese Derby and reaching the minor places in the 2,000 Guineas and St Leger. 

Significantly, he finished third to Romantic Warrior and Liberty Island in the Hong Kong Cup at Sha Tin in December.

This time, he can reverse the placings with Liberty Island, a top-class mare who may have had an excuse when trapped wide and consequently finished eighth in the Dubai Turf this month. Both Tastiera (stall ten) and Liberty Island (11) have drawn wide here.

Prognosis has twice been placed second in the QEII, both times behind Romantic Warrior, and he finished a distant second to the mighty Via Sistina in the Cox Plate in October.

His trait of missing the start has been costly. James McDonald has been given the task of getting him away more quickly and, if he does, he can be placed.

Craig Williams maintains his partnership with Hong Kong Derby winner Cap Ferrat but may not have the luxury of a run up the inside rail this time as he has drawn eight of 11.

Read more on HKR Champions Day:

Little hope for rivals planning a tactical defeat of Ka Ying Rising in Chairman's Sprint Prize 

David Hayes: 'Now I know what Henry Cecil, Peter Moody and Chris Waller went through with their champions' 

Mr Brightside can burst Voyage Bubble’s sequence in Sha Tin's Champions Mile 

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