The John O'Shea stable is confident Wagga Town Plate favourite Southern Lad is primed for his assault on Thursday's $160,000 feature sprint.
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Southern Lad is the $4.00 favourite for the Wagga Town Plate (1200m) as O'Shea looks to add the feature sprint to the Wagga Gold Cup he won in 2007 with Fooram.
The stable is confident that the prospect of a rain-affected track won't be an issue for Southern Lad, who they believe has returned an improved racehorse this preparation.
"There's a lot in favour for him," O'Shea's racing manager, Tom Charlton, said.
"Obviously a lot of horses are out of the weights, so that coupled with the fact the two top weights drew 18 and 20, and we slotted into five, obviously we couldn't be happier with that draw.
"A soft to heavy track is not a problem. And his two trials were excellent. It all seems as though he's improved again this preparation. He's grown up and he's a really professional old boy now so everything points to having a good run."
Southern Lad has won first-up twice before but the stable concedes that could be the only query.
"If there was one concern, sometimes he just improves from the run first up but he's had two solid trials so we're delighted with where he's at," Charlton said.
"We're hoping for a big run."
Southern Lad's connections had been eyeing off the Wagga Town Plate for some time.
"He raced through the summer carnival a bit and rather than keeping him up through the autumn we thought we'd give him a short break and target the likes of these races and potentially go to Queensland but obviously a lot of that has now changed," Charlton said.
"We just thought that this looked a nice race, great prizemoney and a big bunch of owners that I'm sure would love a Wagga Plate by their name."
Shaun Guymer has the ride on Southern Lad, who is raced by Champion Thoroughbreds.
Exactly how the Wagga Town Plate field finalises is in the lap of the gods.
The Joe Pride-trained Chauffeur was scratched on Wednesday, giving Up Trumpz a run, while the second and third favourites, News Girl and Lord Von Costa, won't go around if it is a heavy track.
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