The Melbourne Cup takes place in Australia in the early hours of the morning and there is a strong irish bid to retain the Cup won last year by Twilight Payment, trained by Joseph O’Brien.
Vintage crop made history in 1993 becoming the first European raider to win the prestigious ‘race that stops a nation’. Trainer dermot Weld repeated the feat with media Puzzle in 2002 and Joseph O’Brien has also won twice with twilight Payment last year and in 2017 with Rekindling.
It is one of the few top prizes in the sport that his father Aidan has yet to land.
Joseph is travelling out to Australia to watch the race. His horse is to carry top weight, six pounds more than last year but he has been well prepared, coming second in his prep race the irish St Leger at The Curragh in September.
He is currently a 12/1 chance with the local pari-mutuel. Hot favourite Incentivise and Spanish Mission trained in England by Andrew Balding are the only two shorter than him in the betting.
Local tipsters cannot see past the favourite who has been drawn in stall 16. Twilight Payment will have his work cut out coming from Stall 2 in the two mile race.
Then again, he led from pillar to post last year and would become only the third horse in fifty years to retain his crown were he to win tonight.
The race will be shown live on Sky Sports tonight, with the stalls bursting open at 4 am Irish time.
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