Cromwell and Carroll chase Group One glory in France with Quick Suzy

Trainer Gavin Cromwell and jockey Gary Carroll will try to secure a landmark first Group One success when teaming up for Quick Suzy in Sunday's Darley Prix Morny at Deauville.

The flying two-year-old filly supplied both men with a maiden Royal Ascot victory in June when blitzing her opposition in the Queen Mary Stakes.

Now Quick Suzy takes on some of Europe’s top juvenile colts and fillies in the €350,000 feature, due off at 2.50 Irish time, which is live on Sky Sports Racing.

Also in the 14-strong line-up is Joseph O'Brien's unbeaten filly Velocidad who has an initial start in the colours of her new owners, the Coolmore partnership. Ryan Moore partners Velocidad for the first time.

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The Morny is a rare blank on Moore’s Group One CV but it represents a rare opportunity for Carroll and Cromwell to score in the top flight.

The latter is a proven operator at Grade One level over jumps with Espoir D’Allen’s 2019 Champion Hurdle one of half a dozen career successes for Cromwell at the top level.

The Co Meath trainer also memorably landed the Group Two Prix du Royallieu – now a Group One – in 2018 with Princess Yaiza.

It would be a breakthrough success for Carroll should Quick Suzy live up to her name once more.

She powered up the stands rail at Ascot to beat Twilight Gleaming and had previously won over six furlongs at the Curragh.

“Everything went according to script. She was brilliant and didn’t put a foot wrong,” Cromwell recalled before pointing to the good record of Queen Mary winners in the Morny.

That includes Campanelle, who did the double last year as did Lady Aurelia in 2016.

Quick Suzy will break from stall one in a field that also includes Richard Fahey’s Norfolk winner Perfect Power as well as both Asymmetric and Armor, who both landed Group races at Goodwood.

No Irish-trained horse has won the Morny since David Wachman’s Bushranger in 2008.

No horse from Ireland has ever landed the Prix Jean Romanet since it moved to Group One status in 2009 but a trio of fillies will try to put that right in Sunday's other Group One at Deauville.

Joseph O’Brien also sends his Pretty Polly winner Thundering Nights to France for the eight-runner €250,000 race over 10 furlongs, which is off at 3.25.

She is joined by Jessica Harrington’s Cayenne Pepper and Willie McCreery’s Insinuendo, third and fourth respectively behind Thundering Nights at the Curragh in June.

They face a stiff task, however, against both last year’s winner Audarya and the Nassau Stakes heroine Lady Bowthorpe.

Harrington and jockey Shane Foley will also be represented on Sunday by Silence Please in the Group Two Prix de Pomone (4.0).

In the early hours prior to that Harrington has a shot at landing a first top-flight win of 2021 when Soaring Sky lines up for the $300,000 Grade One Del Mar Oaks.

A Limerick handicap winner in April, Soaring Sky has been sent to southern California by Harrington for the nine-furlong turf event where she will ridden by Frenchman Florent Gerouox.

The Irish filly is 12-1 in local betting for a race due off at 2am Irish time.

Harrington has yet to secure Group One success this year having scored twice at the top level in both 2020 and 2019.

She also enjoyed a memorable 2018 when Alpha Centauri earned ‘Horse of the Year’ honours with four Group victories to her credit.

So there would be no more apt winner of the Group Alpha Centauri Debutante Stakes at the Curragh on Saturday evening than the star filly’s full sister Discoveries.

She is one of eight fillies lining up for a contest with a superb recent roll of honour that includes another Harrington star, Alpine Star, two years ago.

Discoveries broke her maiden at the second time of asking over this course and distance on Derby weekend and the third that day, Mise Le Meas, has won since. She also takes her chance back at HQ.

The Cromwell-Carroll team take their chance in the Debutante too with the maiden Sunset Shiraz ahead of their big Group One date at Deauville on Sunday.