If the Cox Plate, Thousand Guineas and the Moir Stakes are to move they would be like last year’s Wimbledon, which was played for no ranking points. The races would have to depend solely on their name, like The Everest does.

Meanwhile, The Everest remains Australia’s best-rated race, even without group 1 status, recording an international rating of 120.75, which would have ranked it the 17th best race in the world.

England’s champion apprentice having Sydney stint

England’s champion apprentice Benoit De La Sayette will enjoy a couple of months’ stint in Australia before the flat season starts back in the UK.

De La Sayette became master trainer John Gosden’s first champion apprentice last year and has been sent out to Australia to experience a different type of racing. He will be based with John O’Shea at Randwick.

Instead of the freezing conditions at Newmarket, De La Sayette has been riding horses in Botany Bay and will ride at the Randwick barrier trials on Monday before starting to take race rides from next week.

“The boss organised it and I have been here three weeks and I’m learning so much because it’s a different way of things here,” De La Sayette said.

“I love learning and when you look at riders like Tom Marquand and Oisin Murphy, they came out here and it really helped them. I had a chat to Tom before coming, and he said you’ll learn a lot and I’m hoping to take that back home with me.”

De La Sayette won races at Glorious Goodwood and at Newmarket’s July Cup meeting last year and has ridden 79 winners, which will mean he only has one win to go before he is not able to claim in Sydney.

Marquand is set to return to Sydney next month and will ride here through The Championships in April.

McDonald keeps his clean record

Premier jockey James McDonald has not only become the world’s best jockey in the past couple of years, he has also been one of the cleanest riders, with 18 months having passed since he was suspended for careless riding.

It is an outstanding record for a top-level jockey who has ridden around the world. So, it was a surprise to see him in the stewards’ room under the gun on Saturday, after his mount Narito bumped his way into a run in the last at Randwick.

The chain reaction out to Rocket Tiger and Po Kare Kare looked ugly, but stewards accepted the evidence of McDonald and Kerrin McEvoy, who rode Classy Jaybee and said his horse was tiring and over-reacted to the contact.

McDonald will ride Golden Slipper favourite King’s Gambit at Rosehill on Saturday, before heading to Hong Kong next Sunday to ride Beautyverse, which won last year’s South Australian Derby when known as Jungle Magnate, in the Classic Mile on Sunday.

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Canonbury to decide King’s Gambit’s Slipper path

Peter Snowden is still to decide if Golden Slipper favourite King’s Gambit will use the Blue Diamond as a lead in the world’s richest two-year-old race. The easy Debutant Stakes winner at his only start, King’s Gambit impressed with a Randwick barrier trial win earlier in the month and make his Sydney debut in Saturday’s Canonbury Stakes. “This is an important race to determine whether we go Blue Diamond or the Golden Slipper,” Snowden said. “He has come back really well. He trialled great, he is in really good order and James McDonald will ride him.” He is likely to meet Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott’s debut winner Red Resistance and Chris Waller-trained Shinzo, which will be on debut. The Snowden stable could also have Gimcrack placegetter Divine Glory in the Widden Stakes.

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