Five two-year-olds set to make big impression on debut

With Royal Ascot firmly on the horizon, Matt Brocklebank highlights a handful of exciting two-year-olds set to make their first starts this week.

Charlie Johnston’s recent plea for six-furlong juvenile races to begin before May 15 probably ought to be given serious consideration before next spring as there must be so many owners and trainers up and down the country desperate to get a look at their Coventry Stakes prospects in action before Ascot next month. I’d agree that it just seems far too tight at present.

The six-furlong programme for youngsters does currently start a little earlier in Ireland and Aidan O’Brien was able to give the choicely-bred Albert Einstein his first taste of racecourse competition at Naas on May 10. The son of Wootton Bassett came through that with flying colours and was immediately made favourite for the Coventry on June 17, since then the wheels have started to turn in Britain, starting with First Legion who was successful on day two of the Dante Festival.

That same York novice event didn’t quite work out as well as expected 12 months ago, the subsequently injury-hit Andesite having beaten Coventry also-ran Yah Mo Be There last May, but this year’s winner First Legion did go for 500,000 guineas at the Craven Breeze-Up sale and is evidently in the right hands with Richard Hannon.

He probably saw off a pretty smart colt in runner-up Side Deal (Raphael Freire), who was also making his debut, and the penalised pair of Jan Steen (Karl Burke) and Wise Approach (Charlie Appleby) behind in third and fourth.

The latter went off favourite on the Knavesmire, although hindsight would indicate Appleby saved his bigger bullet for Newmarket on Sunday following the blistering debut success of Treanmor, a €2million Goffs Orby Book 1 son of Frankel.

He was immediately installed as second-favourite behind Albert Einstein in the early betting for the Coventry and, with that, the two major powerhouses appear to have parked their tanks.

However, there is still just about enough time for a few more top prospects to be unearthed during this small window of opportunity before the Royal meeting, and the next few days could be as revealing as any. Here are five newcomers to watch who could measure up against the best we’ve seen so far.

UNDERWRITER (Archie Watson/Wathnan Racing)

Not many people had even heard of the ‘boutique outfit’ Wathnan heading into Royal Ascot two years ago but that all changed after Gregory won the Queen’s Vase and Courage Mon Ami took the Gold Cup the following afternoon.

Last year, the blue, gold and red silks were carried to victory on the stage they appear to crave above all others courtesy of Leovanni, Shareholder and Haatem, who was snapped up just before his Jersey triumph.

It would be safe to assume that buying-power will be on show again in a month’s time but Wathnan already have some fascinating two-year-old talent on their books and there are a couple of colts due out over six furlongs this week.

First up, Underwriter, who is declared for Ayr’s maiden on Wednesday. The son of Mehmas was a recent £200,000 purchase at the Goffs UK Breeze-Up and his dam is from the family of multiple Group 1 sprint winner Sole Power.

Trained by Archie Watson, who has a very tidy strike-rate (4-12) with Wathnan juveniles, you’d expect he’ll know his job.

POSTMODERN (Hamad Al Jehani/Wathnan Racing)

Entered over six furlongs at Haydock (Thursday), Yarmouth (Thursday) and Goodwood (Friday), Postmodern is presumably another ready to get rocking and rolling for Wathnan and their private Newmarket trainer Hamad Al Jehani would match Watson’s juvenile record for the owners should this son of Too Darn Hot do the business first time up this week.

He was a Tattersalls October Book 1 buy (270,000 guineas) and is a half-brother to the mare Be Your Best, who recently won a Grade 2 over the extended mile at Gulfstream Park.

Al Jehani has only had one previous two-year-old runner at Haydock – Defence Minster winning under a penalty in a novice event there last September. For balance, he’s 0-1 with juveniles at Goodwood and has yet to saddle one at Yarmouth, but my money would be on this one dipping his toe in Thursday’s red-hot race at Haydock which leads us on nicely to the next horse under the spotlight.

AMORIM (George Boughey/Sheikh Mohammed Obaid Al Maktoum)

Amorim, a son of Havana Grey, also has entries in the same Haydock and Yarmouth races as Postmodern and it will be interesting to see which way his connections turn.

George Boughey hasn’t made much of an impact with early two-year-old types this year, just one winner from eight starters during April and May compared to seven winners among the same category and time period the previous season.

However, the Classic-winning trainer has no doubt shifted his focus slightly and unleashing exciting longer-term prospects for the big-spending Sheikh Obaid is probably what he dreams about these days.

This colt cost 250,000 guineas as a foal and that price had doubled by the time the hammer came down at Tattersalls October Book 1 last autumn, since then his half-brother Rumstar has provided a timely boost by winning the Group 3 Palace House Stakes at Newmarket.

“I think he will be a nice colt one day,” Boughey told Dan Briden recently as part of his Two-Year-Old Guide on these pages. Perhaps expectations shouldn’t be quite so high on the back of that sort of comment, but that’s precisely what I’d want if I was training him.

BLUE ORBIT (Dr Richard Newland & Jamie Insole/Thurloe Thoroughbreds)

“He could turn up in something like the Norfolk or Coventry.”

Now we’re talking. Jamie Insole was quite bullish with his recent assessment of the homework being produced by Blue Orbit, who has had a racecourse gallop at Southwell and is signed up to start off over six furlongs at Chepstow on Wednesday.

His price tag is a relatively paltry sum in this sort of company but Insole and Dr Richard Newland are a perfect 2-2 with their juveniles this year, fillies Angel Numbers (five furlongs) and Spinning Lizzie (six) both scoring in the past week.

That’s two years in succession that the yard has won with their first two-year-old runner of the year (Ruby’s Profit delivered at Kempton 12 months ago) and one would assume Blue Orbit must be towards the top of the pecking order when it comes to the colts.

SILENT APPLAUSE (Charlie Appleby/Godolphin)

Regardless of whether Underwriter or Amorim show up for the Yarmouth race on Thursday, there must be a chance that the odds-compilers make Silent Applause the one to beat.

He’s an Acclamation colt out of a half-sister to a Group 3 winner but it’s not so much how he looks on paper, and more to do with the fact he cost 1.4million guineas after strutting his stuff at the Craven Breeze-Up last month.

As touched upon by John Ingles at the time, that remarkable sum paid for the bay colt was a new Breeze-Up record, although it lasted a mere 24 hours after a son of Havana Grey went to Amo Racing – the underbidders on the horse now known as Silent Applause – for 1.75 million guineas.

If there’s even the slightest rumour that he’s been showing up well with Treanmor, we could be looking at a very prohibitive price for a newcomer.

Published at 1618 BST on 19/05/25

Five two-year-olds set to make big impression on debut

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