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Favorite Moon will head for Newmarket this week with trainer William Durkan praying for rain in the Club Godolphin Cesarewitch on Saturday.
Ireland have a terrific record of late in the 2m 2f race with three of the last four winners coming from Willie Mullins' stable and a softening of the ground at HQ would give five-year-old gelding a fighting chance.
His last trip to England came 12 months ago when Willie Haggas had the horse and he was beaten almost two lengths at Doncaster over a 1m 6f. Favorite Moon went off as the 11/10 favourite and tracked the winner Postileo four furlongs out, but inside the final two furlongs he weakened and finished third on soft ground.
Since then the son of Sea The Moon has run four times for Durkan and hacked up nicely last time out.
After a 53-day lay-off, he landed the spoils over 2m 3f at Downpatrick with a comfortable eight-length success over No Trouble. The ground that day was good to yielding but he seems to handle the softer ground.
He won two Haydock handicaps on soft ground when trained by Haggas and also picked up a Group Three win in Australia in March 2021 on soft ground.
"The horse will run, but he wouldn't like top of the ground," said Durkan.
"They've had some rain, but I hope they have more rain. If it's on the soft side we would be thinking he has a real good chance, he's in good form.
"We've been thinking about this race for a while, we thought it might suit him."
A maximum of 34 will go to post on Saturday with £103,080 prize money up for grabs for the winner.
Favorite Moon is currently a 20/1 chance, but if the rain comes, albeit against the local weather forecast, then expect that to tumble.
Aidan O'Brien's Waterville is the ante-post favourite after winning the Irish equivalent of this race last month. The three-year-old has picked up a four-pound penalty and that will not worry connections, but they could choose to aim for the British Champions Long Distance Cup the week after.
The stamina test at Ascot could be the preferred target though with 22 remaining entries for the Group Two race.
