Photo: Peter Rubery (Race Images)
Rugged stayer Crouch (Tarzino) may well have earned the right to put an Australian stamp in his passport with a typically dogged effort to claim the headline event on the Otaki card on Saturday, the Listed NZ Punter Of The Year @ HB Spring Carnival Hawke’s Bay Cup (2200m).
The Mike Breslin prepared six-year-old gelding went into Saturday’s contest as one of the favoured candidates following his late-closing effort for third in the Gr.2 Awapuni Gold Cup (2100m) at Trentham when last produced on raceday.
Breslin was keen to see his charge perform to his best as he eyes a possible tilt at the Listed Sandown Cup (3200m) at Caulfield on May 31 and got just that as Crouch burst away from his rivals in the final stages of the contest in the hands of rider Chris Dell.
Dell was having his first raceday ride on the son of Westbury Stud-based stallion Tarzino and made the contest a true staying test by attacking pacemakers Opawa Jack and Sunset Boulevard three-wide at the 600m, taking the front as the trio rounded the home bend.
Crouch found plenty under a vigorous ride and never looked like flinching as he held out Cambridge raider Sinhaman by just on two lengths at the finish line, with Pacifico gamely clinging to third after setting the early pace in the contest.
Breslin is mulling his Australian options for a one-off raid in Victoria but has been leaning in favour of the Sandown Cup after Crouch showed the 3200m journey would be no issues with his back-to-back runner-up finishes in the Gr.3 Wellington Cup (3200m).
“He is just coming of age if you look at his Wellington Cup run earlier and the Awapuni Cup run last time,” Breslin said.
“Today there was a bit more cut in the track and I said to Chris, who hadn’t ridden him before, that the horse would maintain a gallop and that’s what he did.
“I’ve pencilled in the Sandown Cup, which is a two-mile race in Aussie in late May, for him.
“He may be a touch below the top guns as there is also a two mile race at Flemington around the same time but you normally get all the imports in that as it is a qualifying event for the Melbourne Cup (Gr.1, 3200m), so I think we will take him over for the Sandown Cup instead.”
A $20,000 purchase by Breslin out of the Book 2 Westbury Stud draft at Karaka in 2021, Crouch is named after former Liverpool and English international footballer Peter Crouch.
Raced by Breslin and Roy Potter, Crouch has now won seven of his 34 starts and $421,155 in prizemoney.
