DON’T write off English King is the warning cry from trainer Ed Walker.
His stable star was turned over as the 5-4 favourite in the Gordon Stakes at Glorious Goodwood under Frankie Dettori.
But the Lambourn trainer still has high hopes of a Group 1 success for his stable star.
After shooting into the limelight with an easy win in the Lingfield Derby Trial, English King finished fifth in the Derby itself.
But he caught the eye of many punters at Epsom and most expected him to triumph in what was billed as a ‘mini-Derby’ won by Mogul at Goodwood.
He could only finish fourth in a muddling race and the St Leger and Grand Prix de Paris will enter calculations.
Walker said: “I’m not disheartened at all with what we saw though, we’re still learning and we know there is more to come.
“We’re frustrated he hasn’t put it all together, but not disheartened, far from it.
“He’s come out of Goodwood great. We were disappointed but it was a funny old race again, and he just didn’t come down the hill well at all.
“I just think that we got racing down the hill and he had a lot of ground to make up and he became unbalanced.
“In fairness, he was arguably going to make up the ground but he ran into the back of Highland Chief.
“He didn’t travel down the hill with the fluency he has done before, whereas at Goodwood they were rattling down and I think we’ll see a different horse next time.”
Bjorn Nielsen’s colt is as short as 10-1 for the St Leger, but could head to France for the Group 1 Prix de Paris over a mile-and-a-half, won last year by Japan.
Both remain live players with the availability of Dettori also likely to be a factor.
Walker explained: “We want to get him back on a flatter track again and we’ve not yet decided whether it’ll be the St Leger or the Grand Prix de Paris at Deauville.
“He’ll go straight to one of those.
Trip wise I still think he’s versatile. We know he’s quick enough for ten furlongs and that will prove useful when and if he does step up in trip.”
Walker expects his star to be back for more next year as a four-year-old and it’s then he thinks we’ll see the best from his horse.
He added: “Next year he’ll be a much more mature horse.
“He’s very lightly-raced because of everything that’s got on with COVID. I think he is filing out all the time and will undoubtedly get better with time.
“It remains in the air and we’ll see which horses may be heading where. The ground may be another factor, and we’ll play it by ear for now, we have time on our side.”
