Noble Joey Bounces Towards Wyong

By Brad Gray

Wyong hosts the opening qualifier of the Provincial Championship series on Thursday with trainer Robert Price confident that Noble Joey can be the first to book his spot in the final.

“I couldn’t be happier with the horse but the barrier is not much good being a go-forward horse,” Price said of Noble Joey who drew 13 in the field of 15.

“We’ve set him for this race. It’s been his goal for the last four months.

“He had his last bit of evens this morning and his work was good. He’ll have a trot canter in the morning and we’ll throw him on the truck on Thursday.”



The last time we saw Noble Joey was in a Benchmark 84 at Randwick where he was narrowly beaten by Deploy, who has subsequently won again since and extended his winning streak to four.

“Not much separates those two,” said Price.

“He’s a really nice little horse. He is very unassuming. He doesn’t show you anything at home but you take him to the traces, he rolls his sleeves up and has a red hot go. I wish I had a few more like him.”

The four-year-old, who has won five of his 15 starts and ran second in a further four, is yet to be tested beyond 1200m but Price is confident the 1350m won’t pose a problem.

“He is untried but he is one of those horses that you can stoke up and he comes back to you. He is not the sort of horse that will over race. We are not going to know until we try but I’m quite confident he’ll run it out.”

“He has got do that if he is going to run the 1400m at Randwick if he makes the final.”

“If you look past the 59kg and the wide barrier, it’s certainly a winnable race.”
 
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