Time will tell if City Of Troy’s 2,000 Guineas flop was just an aberration

Learning to live with regular disappointment is an important part of the process of racing and betting on horses but even so, City Of Troy’s dismal failure to justify odds-on favouritism for the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket was a horribly deflating experience. On Saturday morning, we dared to hope that last year’s outstanding champion two- year-old might elevate himself into the ranks of the all-time greats this season. By Saturday evening, some were wondering if we will ever see him on a racecourse again.

It is always possible, of course, that Saturday’s flop was an early-season aberration, and City Of Troy will recapture his juvenile brilliance as the campaign develops.

An underlying issue may come to light, giving Aidan O’Brien the chance to work his magic and get him back to Group One-winning form. Perhaps, as O’Brien’s representative suggested to Newmarket stewards on Saturday, he just became upset in the stalls and completely failed to give his running as a result, although he was the last horse into the gates and broke smartly when they opened three seconds later.

Optimists can also point to his stable companion, Auguste Rodin, as a recent example of a 2,000 Guineas blowout from Ballydoyle who went on to much greater things. Auguste Rodin, though, looked like a stayer who had been run off his feet by the specialist milers in the Guineas. City Of Troy was done for at halfway, as colts that he had beaten pointless last season glided past and off into the distance.

It was also apparent at Newmarket that City Of Troy’s connections were as surprised as the rest of us by their colt’s failure to live up to his pre-race billing as a potential superstar. And though it is much too early to suggest that Justify, City Of Troy’s sire, only gets two-year-olds – not least as Just F Y I, last year’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies’ winner, ran second in the Kentucky Oaks on Friday – where, or if, City Of Troy appears next could have a significant impact on his future earning potential as a Coolmore stallion.

He is an uneasy 8-1 chance for the Derby after Saturday’s failure, a price that no one will be taking until it is more apparent whether he is going to turn up. The reward for victory, of course, would be huge, but Epsom is a difficult and unforgiving place to launch a retrieval mission. With Henry Longfellow, Ballydoyle’s second-best juvenile colt last year, heading to Longchamp this weekend for the French 2,000 Guineas, the Irish 2,000 Guineas later this month looks like the safer route for City Of Troy, with plenty of options over a mile and a mile-and-a-quarter still open if he can get his season back on track.

It is difficult to spin City Of Troy’s blowout on Saturday as anything other than a dispiriting start to the main summer season on the Flat, but it does at least mean that the next two weeks of Classic trials, at Chester, York, Lingfield and Leopardstown, could be highly significant.

O’Brien’s entries over the next fortnight include Diego Velazquez, Los Angeles and Grosvenor Square, who runs in the Chester Vase on Wednesday. All are impeccably bred, were useful at two and are quoted at 20-1 or below for the Derby. Charlie Appleby’s resurgent Godolphin operation has declared Hidden Law, a 25-1 shot for the Derby, for the Vase, while Cadogan Place, who beat Hidden Law by a short-head on his debut in March, is also in the field.

One of 2024’s potential champions fluffed his lines horribly on Saturday, but it is some consolation at least that as the buildup to the Derby Festival begins in earnest, another could appear at any moment.

Frost’s French mission

“I think the public like her more than some trainers do,” Paul Nicholls said last month, when asked to reflect on Bryony Frost’s typically bold, frontrunning success on Sans Bruit at Aintree in April. “She doesn’t seem to get too many rides these days, but she’s still riding as well as ever.”

There is, of course, one obvious reason why Frost might have found herself being steadily frozen out over the last couple of years, and it does not reflect well on jumping as a whole that her bravery in standing up to the bullying of fellow rider Robbie Dunne seems to have led to fewer opportunities on the track.

But it promises to be a different story in France this summer, when Frost will not only be riding as the retained jockey to the powerful Simon Munir/Isaac Souede partnership, but doing so with France’s four-and-a-half pound allowance for female riders.

French jumps racing is a very niche interest for most British punters, but the opportunity to back one of our best senior riders as if she were still a claiming conditional could prove very difficult to resist.