Nearly there at Valley, Fownes offers Qatar ride to Bowman after Moreira mix-up

Caspar Fownes, the trainer widely known as the King of the Valley, is odds on to join Danny Shum Chap-shing as the most frequent DBS x Manulife Million Challenge-winning handler on Wednesday night.

Happy Valley specialist Fownes – no one has trained more winners at the city circuit this season than the four-time champion handler – will equal Shum’s tally of three Million Challenge titles if neither Street Scream nor Excellent Peers replaces Nearly Fine at the top of the leader board during the finale.

With five Million Challenge points-scoring races left and the winner of those races scoring 15 points, only Fownes-prepared Nearly Fine (53 points), Tony Cruz-trained Street Scream (45 points) and Frankie Lor Fu-chuen’s Excellent Peers (42 points) remain in the running for the HK$650,000 first prize and trophy.

Anything less than a win for either Street Scream or Excellent Peers in the Class Three Sing Woo Handicap (1,200m) will result in Nearly Fine competing in the subsequent event, the Class One Shan Kwong Handicap (1,650m), as the Million Challenge champion.

But a Sing Woo Handicap success for Street Scream will leave Nearly Fine needing a Shan Kwong Handicap victory to clinch the Million Challenge title, while a Sing Woo Handicap success for Excellent Peers will leave Silvestre de Sousa’s mount needing a Shan Kwong Handicap top-two finish to prevail in the series.

That is because if Nearly Fine and Excellent Peers end the Million Challenge on 57 points apiece – this will occur if, on Wednesday night, the former places third and the latter finishes first – Lor’s charge will triumph on countback because of his two runner-up results to the zero seconds of Fownes’ galloper.

According to Fownes, whose Ocean Wide took out the 2008-09 Million Challenge and whose Twin Delight was the 2014-15 competition winner, Street Scream poses the greatest threat to Nearly Fine.

“Obviously, Street Scream is the one you’d respect the most because he gets into a nice race. He gets into an 85-60, whereas we have to go the other way. I’ve stuck Nearly Fine in the deep end,” Fownes said.

Seventh in this season’s trainers’ premiership on 26 wins from 278 starters, Fownes will saddle five runners across Wednesday night’s programme, with Amazing News, Ace Talent, Kurpany and Viva Chaleur accompanying Nearly Fine to Happy Valley.

Hugh Bowman will ride Classic Mile flop Viva Chaleur for Fownes in the Class Three Tsui Man Handicap (1,650m) on Wednesday night, and he may ride Group Three Centenary Vase (1,800m) champion Senor Toba for the handler in Qatar later this month.

Fownes thought he had secured the services of four-time Hong Kong champion jockey Joao Moreira for Senor Toba’s H.H. The Amir Trophy (2,400m) assignment at Al Rayyan Racecourse on February 18, but the Brazilian rider got his dates and countries mixed up when he agreed to reunite with the globe-trotting grey.

Moreira to ride Senor Toba in Qatar after Fownes’ grey impresses in Centenary Vase

“Joao made a silly mistake thinking they [Riyadh and Doha] were in the same country,” Fownes said about Moreira, who has committed to compete in the Saudi International Jockeys Challenge on February 24 and ride at the Saudi Cup meeting 24 hours later.

Fownes offered the H.H. The Amir Trophy ride aboard Senor Toba to Bowman on Monday, and the trainer expects to know the jockey’s decision on Tuesday.

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