John Moore has waxed lyrical for months about the prospects of Not Listenin'tome, and early on few - including jockey Joao Moreira - were willing to listen, but plenty are paying attention now after the sprinter's dashing win in the Sha Tin Vase (1,200m).
Not Listenin'tome was sent out 3.4 favourite in the Group Three sprint with only 115 pounds to carry, coming on the back of two strong thirds over the straight 1,000m, and he did not disappoint, breaking through for his first local win after receiving a perfect ride from Moreira.
The Brazilian rider positioned the horse in the box seat before dashing up the rail early in the straight to steal a march on his rivals, with stablemate Charles The Great leading the chasers but in vain, giving Moore his ninth win in the race and his fifth in six years. But Moreira admitted he thought Moore's opinion of the horse may have been too high after his early work showed little glimpse of his Australian form.
"You know what? John had a lot of faith in him, and I'd seen him in Australia, but when he arrived I didn't have a good impression of him at all," he said. "I trialled him in March and didn't think much. But the last six or seven weeks, he's improved out of sight - you could see it physically and you could feel it when you rode him. And to be honest, that's normal for a horse acclimatising to Hong Kong, but I think now he's settled in and he's close to 100 per cent."
Moore owned the four-year-old in Australia, where he built up a reputation as a star sprinter on the rise with a win in the Group Three Zeditave Stakes and Group One placings in the Coolmore Stud Stakes and the Canterbury Stakes, but a throat infection saw him lose form during the Melbourne spring carnival last year and he arrived with a number of question marks hanging over his head.
"To be honest I kept him in Australia for too long, because I wanted to have fun with him," he said. "He was an incredibly promising three-year-old and we almost brought him up here this time last year. But we took him to Melbourne and it all went wrong, so of course there were some slight worries. But I knew if he found his best he could match it with the best sprinters up here, and it looks like he's getting back to that old form."
Now racing in the ownership of Matthew Wong Leung-pak, a Royal Ascot trip was originally on the cards, but Moore said it had been shelved - not that international ambitions are completely off the table.
"I didn't want to take him to England and risk the horse going awry again," Moore said. "We will look to travel him in time, and the KrisFlyer Sprint in Singapore next year looks a target, but first we will aim him at the Hong Kong Sprint. That was the reason he was brought here, to run in the big international races."
Not Listenin'tome will be out to repeat the efforts of Aerovelocity, who won the Sha Tin Vase last year before going on to win both the Hong Kong Sprint and the KrisFlyer Sprint.
Before then, there is one target left this season for the son of Dylan Thomas, who will be given his first test at 1,400m in the final Group race of the term, the Premier Cup on June 14.
“I don’t see the 1,400m as a problem,” Moreira said. “He has the gate speed to put himself close and he travels so kindly that he should handle it with no issues at all.”
