The fact that Appleby in particular, and now Bin Suroor, have really begun to understand the sort of horses they need to bring here is a key factor in the way Godolphin is having a bigger impact.

When Bin Suroor first came here to try to win the Melbourne Cup, he, along with most European trainers with the same goal, brought doughty stayers who needed every yard of the 3200-metre Cup trip, and probably more, to be seen at their best.

But Australian racing is very different to European racing. The horses tend to jump out of the barriers and get running quicker here than they do in England, France or Ireland, where they often begin slowly and build into the rhythm of the race.

Races here, particularly over a distance, are run at a different tempo and are often stop-start affairs where a quick beginning is followed by a slow middle section before the contest becomes a rapid dash for home in the straight.

In Europe such races are run with the pace usually increasing gradually and the race winding up to a crescendo in the final furlongs.

So for a European horse to run well and succeed in Australia he needs characteristics that are different to those he may normally be called on to display, the chief of which is tactical speed and the ability to quicken off a slower pace at any stage of the race.

That is also why many horses thought to be at their optimum over 2400 metres in Europe can perform so well over the 3200 metres of the Melbourne Cup distance, as it is often a tactical affair that is not as searching a test of stamina as a 3200-metre race run in Europe might be.

Appleby made a huge impression a couple of years ago when he first arrived but he has yet to win a major.

Bin Suroor already has one Caulfield Cup on his CV, courtesy of outsider All The Good in 2008, and he will look to repeat that success next week with Best Solution and then dethrone Winx with Benbatl when she goes for her fourth Cox Plate.

Appleby has his eyes on the Melbourne Cup with Cross Counter, while Godolphin also has a strong home-grown contender in James Cummings' Avilius, who won his way into the field in the Bart Cummings at Flemington on Turnbull Stakes day.

The French import is, along with his teammates, high up on betting charts and could run in the Cox Plate on the way to the Melbourne Cup.

But for every day of glory with racehorses there is always the danger that something could go wrong, and Godolphin has endured both sides of the racing coin in recent days.

It's Caulfield Cup hope Emotionless (Appleby) is under a cloud and will undergo a bone scan at the University of Melbourne Equine Centre on Monday to determine why the horse was lame in its right hind leg following a track gallop at the Werribee International Horse Centre on October 7.

And in worse news for the stable, a horse whom Appleby had described as one of the most exciting prospects he had brought to Australia, Hamada, had to be euthanised after suffering an injury during trackwork at Werribee.

''Sadly, Hamada has been put down after fracturing his near-hind leg during routine gallop at Werribee,"  the global giant said in a tweet issued at the weekend.

"Charlie Appleby said it was a freak accident. "On vet's advice, the nature of the injury left us no alternative. The kindest course of action was to euthanise the horse."