A masterpiece of poor timing occurred at Jockey Club headquarters in the release of the Audemars Piguet Queen Elizabeth II Cup nominations last week. Not only released so as to clash with a raceday and the lead-up to the Hong Kong Derby meeting, they were also issued two weeks earlier than last year despite the fact the race is a week later.
The 69 overseas nominations were impressive enough again, though, as always, the more interesting questions will revolve around which ones actually arrive next month.
As good a race as the QEII has become, the World Series first leg itself suffers in the sense of timing. For the best European horses, the end of April is about as far from ideal as possible for a trip around the world. Though numerically strong this year with 22 entries, the North Americans are not so easy to entice from their comfortable home competition and the same is increasingly true of Australia's top horses.
Northerly's connections elected not to even consider the QEII and probably the only pretender to his tag of champion Down Under is Lonhro, who scored a fourth Group One win in Sydney on Saturday.
Lonhro is at least entered for the QEII, a race which could conceivably enhance his value as a stallion, but there has been no indication yet that his nomination is anything more than that. French mare Aquarelliste is among the entries and would be a welcome visitor, but connections are bent on winning in Dubai, assuming that meeting does go ahead now that war in the Middle East is about to become a reality.
The greatest outside interest seems likely to come from Japanese horses again, in particular Eishin Preston, who was unlucky not to retain his unbeaten Sha Tin record in the Hong Kong Cup in December and his connections will doubtless be hungry for revenge.
