Northerly Set for Memsie Magic
- Friday, 30 August 2002 00:00
Champion gelding Northerly looks set to bounce
back into the winner's stall in tomorrow's Group Two Memsie Stakes at Caulfield.The reigning Cox Plate winner has pleased connections in the past week and his trainer Fred Kersley is sure he will run well in the feature event.
"He's much better than he was first up," Kersley said on radio this morning. "I'm sure he is going to run well tomorrow."
Northerly resumed with a close up fifth in the recent listed Goodwood Sprint in Perth and the son of Serheed worked in good style before leaving Perth earlier this week.
"He had a good hit out at Belmont on Tuesday morning before we flew over," Kersley added. "We did a bit better than evens before letting him stride home over the final 800 metres."
Champion Melbourne jockey Damien Oliver, fresh
from winning his fourth Scobie Breasley Medal last week, exercised Northerly yesterday.
"Damien said he felt pretty fresh, which is expected," Kersley said. "But he said he felt good."
Kersley's confidence for tomorrow's race is lengths better than this time two weeks ago. In the lead up to his first up effort at home Kersley played down the expectations of the gelding winning.
Tomorrow Northerly will race without blinkers for the second consecutive time and for the first time outside of Western Australia.
While Northerly was beaten in Perth a fortnight ago, Kersley is still in form. Last Saturday at Belmont he prepared two winners - Heavy Nova and Cento.
PICS - Quentin Lang.