McEvoys’ stakes start to carnival

Trainers Tony & Calvin McEvoy had a perfect start to Caulfield Cup week with a stakes win by the talented English Riviera.

The three-year-old filly showed great courage to score a short half head win in the $200,000 Group 3 Manhari Metals Thoroughbred Club Stakes (1200m) at Caulfield.

English Riviera was beautifully ridden by Blake Shinn to beat Mumbai Jewel ($21) with La Danseuse Rouge ($31) a neck away third.

After jumping well, Shinn was able to settle the filly in the running line behind the speed.

He produced English Riviera turning for home and the filly took the lead, then had to show great fortitude to hold off the challengers.

The daughter of Deep Field has always shown talent and was placed in as Blue Diamond Prelude as a two-year-old.

She kicked off her three-year-old season with a scintillating 10-length victory on the Ballarat synthetic in August.

At her prior run to Caulfield, English Riviera had run third in the Group 3 Champagne Stakes at Moonee Valley.

Trainer Tony McEvoy was delighted with English Riviera’s victory.

“She is a really good quality filly and not much was going right for her and to win this stakes race today really was so pleasing,” McEvoy said.

“The victory was very rewarding for me and the team.

“I was surprised she was beaten for speed, I thought she might control, but Blake (Shinn) has got beautiful hands and gave her a beautiful run.

“She presented and just had to hold on.”

McEvoy said the Listed Crockett Stakes (1200m) at Moonee Valley on October 22 or the Group 1 Coolmore Stud Stakes (1200m) at Flemington the following week, a race McEvoy won with Sunlightin 2018, could be on the agenda for English Riviera.

“She goes well down the straight and I’ve had a bit of luck with fillies in the Coolmore, so, I’ll talking to the ownership group. That was a big tick today.”

Winning jockey Blake Shinn was very complimentary.

“It was nice to win on this filly for Tony and some of his long-time clients, I was very impressed by her” Shinn said.

“They indicated to me that she was a real high-speed filly but from the get-go all she wanted to do was put her head on her chest,” Shinn said.

“I allowed the other horses to go and just rode her as I felt.

“Even though I was wide, but she got into a nice rhythm coming to the turn. When the second horse challenged, she responded, and it was a courageous effort.”