LONDON: Legendary trainer Michael Stoute won a record sixth King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes on Saturday with Poet’s Word on the same track where a month ago he became the most successful ever trainer at Royal Ascot.
The 72-year-old Barbados-born handler — whose first winner of the race was the tragic Shergar in 1981 — was spoilt for choice as James Doyle, on Poet’s Word, battled past his other runner, the 6/4 favorite Crystal Ocean, for a superb 1-2.
“Two wonderful brave athletes,” said Stoute.
“My first reaction is sorry for the one that got beat.”
In typical humble fashion Stoute — who had said when he broke the Royal Ascot record that his great friend the late Henry Cecil had had less five-day meetings to set his original mark of 75 — swept aside the import of his new benchmark.
“It took a long time didn’t it!” he said.
Poet’s Word — who landed his owner Saeed Sulalil a winner’s cheque of just over £700,000 ($917,000, 787,000 euros) — gave Stoute his third Group One success of the season and the horse’s second successive top grade victory, having laid low Cracksman in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes at Royal Ascot.
Cracksman had not re-opposed in the King George as trainer John Gosden withdrew him on the morning of the race judging the ground not to have softened sufficiently for his stable ace to run.
Doyle rode a blinder having allowed his mount to hang out toward the back of the seven-runner field, tracking Gosden’s lone runner Coronet whilst William Buick on Crystal Ocean was closer up behind the pacemaking duo of Salouen and Rostropovich.
Doyle, though, then swept round the outside as they hit the straight, and although he took a few seconds to move into full gear, then ate up the ground between him and his stablemate before finally getting the better of him inside the final furlong.
Buick sportingly shook his close friend Doyle’s hand as they pulled up and also handled being wrongly announced as the winning jockey when they entered the unsaddling enclosure in good heart too.
For Doyle there was unconfined joy.
“You’ll be doing well if there is a happier fellow today,” he said.
“He is so versatile, I was a little worried following Coronet and I thought I had left him a bit of a task.
“Everything though about him is really smooth.”
Smooth is not the adjective one would ascribe to the performances of the horses of another record-breaking trainer Aidan O’Brien at the moment.
His favored runner in the King George, Hydrangea — who had seemed to be free of a bug affecting O’Brien’s yard — never moved up a gear and instead went into reverse and finished last of the septet.
Sir Michael Stoute has last word in record King George success with Poet’s Word
Sir Michael Stoute has last word in record King George success with Poet’s Word
Two own goals save Arsenal blushes against Wolves
LONDON: Arsenal avoided a major embarrassment against Premier League bottom club Wolves on Saturday, benefiting from two own goals — one in stoppage time — to win 2-1 and move five points clear of Manchester City.
Manager Mikel Arteta admitted that his team had struggled to create clear chances and that the win should have been much more comfortable.
But he said that the manner of the victory would give the team a major boost.
“That gives you belief that regardless of how the game goes, you can always find a solution to win it,” he told TNT Sports.
“But now we’re going to have a clean week. We need to start to train certain aspects slowly, because if you don’t train them, you start to deteriorate a little bit.”
Arteta’s men were blunt in the first half, failing to muster a single shot on target as Gabriel Martinelli wasted a clutch of chances.
The Arsenal boss made three changes shortly before the hour mark, bringing on Leandro Trossard, Martin Odegaard and Mikel Merino for Martinelli, Eberechi Eze and Martin Zubimendi.
The Gunners mounted wave after wave of attacks, and Declan Rice’s shot midway through the second half — their first on target — was well saved by Sam Johnstone.
But in the 70th minute the sheer weight of pressure told to the enormous relief of an impatient and nervy Emirates crowd.
Johnstone flicked Bukayo Saka’s corner onto a post as he scrambled to reach the ball but it rebounded back onto his arm and into the net for an own goal.
Gabriel Jesus came on for Viktor Gyokores for his first home match after 11 months out injured.
Astonishingly, Wolves pulled level in the 90th minute, when Mateus Mane’s flat cross was headed in by Nigerian striker Tolu Arokodare.
But just as the Arsenal fans contemplated a damaging draw, the Gunners benefited from a second own goal.
Saka delivered a perfect cross which Jesus attacked but the ball was diverted into his own net by Wolves defender Yerson Mosquera.
Winless Wolves, with a ninth league defeat in a row, have mustered just two points from their 16 games so far and are on course for the worst season in Premier League history.
Pep Guardiola’s City travel to in-form Crystal Palace on Sunday seeking to close the gap to Arsenal, who have not won the Premier League since 2004.
