AS Qoot wins Sheikh Mansour Cup, double delight for Mullen and Al Asayl

Gulf Today, Staff Reporter

Sunday’s Sharjah meeting featured the Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Cup, a conditions race with Prestige status over the straight 1200m, and Pat Dobbs oozed class in the saddle, producing AS Qoot, who was seemingly outpaced at halfway, suggesting the early protagonists went plenty fast enough, to lead in the final 75m for Khalifa Al Neyadi in the colours of Sheikh Hamed Bin Khadim Bin Butti.

As a 5yo mare she was receiving weight from all bar 4yo filly Wadheha among her five rivals and was winning for the third consecutive time this season having won her previous two starts, over 1000m on this course and again over the minimum trip at Al Ain.

The fixture commenced with a 1000m handicap which proved to be a pre-Xmas cracker with five of the 15 runners locked in battle entering the final 100m.

As it transpired, Abdul Aziz Al Balushi timed his late challenge to perfection aboard Majed El Meqirat in the colours of Ahmed Alneibi for trainer Ali Al Ameri, a first ever trip to the winner’s enclosure for the last named.

The victor, a homebred 6yo entire, was doubling his career tally, adding this success to a 1200m maiden he landed on the Abu Dhabi turf almost exactly two years ago when trained by Ahmed Al Shehhi.

For horses foaled in the UAE, a 2000m handicap attracted a select field of seven with Richard Mullen delivering Al Asayl’s Taajer to lead in the final 200m to win well for trainer Salem Al Ketbi.

Mullen always appeared confident aboard the homebred 6yo gelding who had won just once in 25 previous starts, a 1700m handicap, here at Sharjah, in February 2021.

The Al Asayl team really appeared to be hitting form and were celebrating a double just an hour later after seasonal debutant Makhtar, having just a fourth career start, ran out a relatively comfortable winner of a 1700m maiden.

A lesser quality 2000m handicap for horses born locally than that won earlier by Taajer was then won by AF Al Motamen, Tadhg O’Shea soon dictating matters in the saddle for Khalid Khalifa Al Nabooda and Ernst Oertel, the winner never really appearing in any great danger of defeat.

It was a third career success for the homebred 7yo entire and second consecutively having also won his previous outing, over 2000m, at Al Ain.

The final and only Thoroughbred contest on the card, a 2000m handicap, was grabbed late on by Obeyaan, produced to grab the spoils in the final 75m by Sam Hitchcott for Doug Watson and Sultan Ismail Ahmad Abdulla Albalooshi.