With many of the stars of Group racing trialling last Tuesday at Sha Tin it was easy to overlook some of the lesser heats, but Tony Cruz's new American import No More Green should not be ignored when he steps out on raceday.
The Cape Town gelding arrived with a rating of 70 after wins on both the turf and dirt tracks from distances of 1,200m to 1,600m.
He burned up his first 1,000m turf trial (fourth batch) in a time of 58.67 seconds, only fractionally slower than the 58.60 seconds run by Able One in the prior heat.
No More Green travelled easily on the speed and responded well when shaken up by Matthew Chadwick in the run to the line, and had he been allowed to run with the top grade horses in the previous heat, would have finished alongside the likes of Green Birdie, Happy Zero and Sacred Kingdom.
It is a more than encouraging start to his Hong Kong career, and No More Green will be shooting up the ratings if he can string similar efforts together on raceday.
The John Moore-trained One World also showed his class in a 1,050m all-weather track trial win over lower-rated Fearless, who was ridden out along the rails by Zac Purton to try and reel in the multiple Group placegetter.