History favours Sinndar to capture double

There are so many angles to tomorrow's Budweiser Irish Derby that it is easy to forget that Sinndar is likely to cause the bookmakers to be cut to shreds.

Ireland's first Epsom Derby winner in 16 years this time has less than a mile to travel from John Oxx's local stables in order to win this country's richest race and enter the record books as just the 13th colt to complete the English-Irish Derby double.

The last was Commander In Chief in 1993 and the rest constitute a list that is like a who's who of European equine greats which includes Nijinsky (1970), Shergar (1981) and Generous in 1991.

This time however a $1 million bonus awaits a double Derby winner.

That has been a huge incentive in the £85,000 splashed out by the connections of the French Derby winner Holding Court to supplement him to the race.

He too is eligible to pick up the $1 million but as Oxx emphasised yesterday this is a Classic that everyone wants to win, bonus or no bonus.

"The bonus hasn't been on my mind or on the mind of the Aga Khan. The race is enough in itself. We were going to run here anyway but I suppose it might have influenced Holding Court running and it has probably ensured a very competitive race," Oxx said yesterday.

Competitive enough to produce a field of 11 although Oxx and Aidan O'Brien, desperate to retrieve a so far hollow Classic season, both run four horses each, a hark back to the 1969 Derby when Vincent O'Brien ran a whopping five!

Oxx and rider John Murtagh have found themselves in the middle of a hype storm in the run up to the Derby but typically have remained unfazed by it.

Certainly the Curragh record of clashes between the winners at Epsom and Chantilly certainly favours Sinndar as on the four occasions there has been a meeting the winner of the French race has yet to score.

But there is more to Oxx's quiet confidence than that. The ground at the Curragh was officially "good to firm" yesterday, a surface on which Sinndar is proved and Holding Court isn't. And there is also the growing belief that the biggest threat of all to Sinndar will come from the 2,000 Guineas winner King's Best, a late non-runner at Epsom due to a muscle injury.

"It's the same as it was at Epsom," Oxx judged yesterday. "If King's Best stays the trip he'll win. If he stays he'll be one of those very good horses that can win a Guineas and a Derby. But those sort of horses are rare."

The last such champion to win the Irish Derby was El Gran Senor in 1984 and although brilliant at Newmarket, King's Best did show obvious signs of temperament.

His trainer Michael Stoute is looking for a fourth Irish Derby, and rider Pat Eddery a fifth, but with Holding Court sure to be up with the pace and a battery of other pace-setters available from the Oxx yard, King's Best will genuinely have to stay.

Stamina is not an issue with Sinndar and there are not many others one can raise a quibble with the Aga Khan-owned horse.

"He is in very good form and is looking better and better as the season goes on. He seems to be thriving.

Only the racecourse will give us the answer to whether he is still improving, though," Oxx said.