Absolutely Yes wins the Langerman and will be out to emulate the great Variety Club by adding the Matchem (Picture: Wayne Marks)
The Gr 3 Race Coast Matchem Stakes is one of the early season open Graded races where the three-year-olds can give an inkling of how strong their crop is.
The last three-year-old to win the Matchem Stakes was the great Variety Club way back in 2011, which shows just how difficult a race it is to win for a sophomore. Variety Club’s crop was one of the best at the top end this millennium considering it also included Gimmethegreenlight, who subsequently became the first three-year-old to win the L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate for 39 years and he beat Variety Club to do it.
The last three-year-old to actually run in the Matchem was the Dean Kannemeyer-trained Cosmic Highway in 2021.
The Gimmethegreenlight colt finished a 2,30 length third.
Kannemeyer has one of the only two three-year-olds in the race this year.
He has entered Aristocratic, while Justin Snaith has entered Absolutely Yes.
Both of these three-year-olds are by the Japanese-bred Deep Impact sire Danon Platina.
It has to be said Danon Platina’s progeny have disapponted when turning three, because a number of them have looked promising as two-year-olds and the way this stallion was first read was that his progeny would improve with age and he was expected by more than a few to become a Champion Sire.
However, that hope has not materialised to date.
So Perhaps trainers are now realising the Danon Platinas must get going early and hence two three-year-old entries in this toughest of races.
Aristocratic is a bay out of the Silvano mare Simply Royal, whose four wins included the Gr 3 Acacia Handicap over 1600m.
Simply Royal is from the family of Triple Tiara heroines Cherry On The Top and Summer Pudding.
Both of those horses packed strong finishing runs and that is what Aristocratic has displayed to date. He has a fine turn of foot and from draw five on Saturday under Serino Moodley it will be interesting to see how much he has matured and whether he can produce a late charge.
If he wins he will stamp himself as a Gr 1 Hollywoodbets Cape Guineas hopeful, a race Kannemeyer has won six times himself, while the yard has won it nine times in all.
Kannemeyer’s biggest miss in the Cape Guineas has been with the great Fieldspring Racing-owned Dynasty, who started at 1/5 odds in January 2003, but was beaten into second by the Mike de Kock-trained Domino Man.
However, Kannemeyer made amends for Fieldspring by winning it with Rabiya in January 2005.
Fieldspring also had a share in the Kannemeyer-trained December 2008 Cape Guineas winner Le Drakkar.
Fieldspring part-own Aristocratic and he races in their colours, so Saturday’s race will tell whether they have a hope of making more Hollywoodbets Cape Guineas history.
Justin Snaith also has a good record in the Cape Guineas, winning it with Solo Traveller in 2010, Double Superlative in 2021 and Snow Pilot in 2023.
On Saturday in the Matchem he runs the Gr 3 Langerman winner Absolutely Yes.
It is interesting to note that Variety Club won the Langerman, so Absolutely Yes will be out to repeat some history.
Absolutely Yes, who is out of Gr 2 KZN Fillies Guineas winner Maybe Yes (Tiger Ridge), is an impressive looking grey and he led from start to finish in the Langerman over 1500m under Muzi Yeni and showed tremendous resolve as well as a nice big action late in the race.
Yeni is aboard on Saturday and will have little option but to go to the front from a wide draw of nine.
Greg Bortz owns Absolutely Yes together with Gina Goldsmith and Leon Ellman.
Bortz will be out to win the race for the second year in a row as he won it last year with the Vaughan Marshall-trained Questioning, who lines up in defence of his title on Saturday.
Aristocratic is officially 5,5kg under sufferance with the best weighted horse, Cafe Culture, and Absolutely Yes is officially 8kg under sufferance.
They have hard tasks, but it would be no surprise if they proved up to it.
