King of Kings is now as low as 6 to 1 joint favourite for next year's English 2,000 Guineas despite a winning performance at the Curragh on Saturday that seemed to raise as many questions as it answered. The bare evidence of King Of Kings' length and a half defeat of the English colt Sharp Play in the Flame Of Tara Tyros Stakes indicates a comfortable success but there are still question marks surrounding the colt that are likely to persist until he engages in a possible clash with Ladbrokes' other Guineas favourite, the Henry Cecil-trained Daggers Drawn, in the Laurent Perrier Champagne Stakes at Doncaster next month.
Those question marks arose only in the closing stages of the Tyros. Up to then, the 2 to 9 favourite did what he was entitled to do by cruising in behind until Christy Roche asked him to join Sharp Play over a furlong out. King Of Kings did that at his leisure but when asked to quicken, the colt's head carriage became noticeably high, he also momentarily drifted right and he didn't pull away from Sharp Play as some might have hoped. It left many distinctly underwhelmed.
"If that's the Guineas favourite, then I've got a whole handful to have a go at him," declared Mark Johnston. "I knew Sharp Play was in the first division of my two-year-olds and while I'm not saying I've got better, I wouldn't take King Of Kings on again with either Sharp Play or Princely Hush."
Johnston may get his wish sooner rather than later should Aidan O'Brien dismiss the Doncaster option in favour of the Futurity Stakes back at the Curragh in a fortnight.
Yesterday a stable spokesperson said: "King Of Kings is in great shape and Aidan will talk to the owners sometime over the next few days about where he will run next."
However, there is a real confidence behind King Of Kings from his connections. When asked about a Champagne clash with the brilliant Richmond Stakes winner Daggers Drawn, O'Brien mischievously grinned: "Who's Daggers Drawn?" Roche dismissed concerns about King Of Kings' high head carriage with the impressive statement: "He's a serious horse, the best I've ever ridden."
O'Brien later added: "I'm very happy with that but at the moment when he gets to the front he thinks he's done enough and starts looking around him. We've got to teach him to go on and run to the line but that will come in time."
After last year's Tyros Stakes, the racing future of the winner, Swift Gulliver, looked like an unopened oyster and the subsequent efforts of the second Desert King have only emphasised that impression. Unfortunately for Swift Gulliver his career over the last 12 months has been plagued with misfortune but he proved he is on the way back with a gutsy success in the Ridgewood Pearl Desmond Stakes.
After Swift Gulliver had held off Dangerous Diva by three parts of a length in the strongly run Group Three contest, Jim Bolger said: "The main thing is that he's back. He wasn't right for a long time. He was very sick after his last race last season and then in the spring he pulled a muscle which kept him out for three months. He is now what he appeared to be last season."
Swift Gulliver could be allowed improve even further on that impression in the Digifone Irish Champion Stakes at Leopardstown on September 9th, a race that is also on the agenda for Rayouni, just pipped on the line by the English raider King Alex in the Royal Whip Stakes. Afterwards, John Oxx described Rayouni as "a very talented colt."
