Magnifique! Meeting the mighty Mishriff at his new home in Normandy

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Here, he talks about his visit to Haras de Montfort et Préaux to meet the team's new recruit Mishriff. Subscribers can get more great insight from Martin every Monday to Friday.

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I already thought I was lucky to be invited to Haras de Montfort et Préaux in Normandy at the weekend to be one of the first people to see the megastar Mishriff in his new home, but then when I got there stud manager Tony Fry also gave me two pains au chocolat to chomp on while viewing him and the other stallions.

If they were intended as a buttery, flaky, chocolatey inducement to write nice things about Mishriff and the other horses who stand under the Sumbé banner, they were unnecessary, as they sold themselves. (Although, nota bene, that shouldn’t put off anyone else trying to bribe me with baked goods in future.)

Joking apart, the three-time Group 1 winner and near £12 million earner Mishriff is seriously good-looking; quite a rangy but very strong and well balanced individual who stands over a lot of ground, with a beautiful, intelligent head and a rich, dark bay coat.

He behaved impeccably well, displaying no sign of the territorial nature that his trainer John Gosden said he sometimes showed in his box at Clarehaven earlier in the year. That’s testament to Tony and his team settling him into his new role so well.

Sumbé owner Nurlan Bizakov told me later that day that he’d been following Mishriff since he won the Prix du Jockey Club, and had taken a shine to him when he saw him in his stables as a youngster. He had inquired about standing him around that time, but did not wish to pay what Japanese and Irish studs were then offering.

Mishriff: top-class performer on the track for Prince FaisalCredit: John Grossick (racingpost.com/photos)

Fortunately, though, the horse’s owner and breeder Prince Faisal chose to keep him in training this year at five, presumably with the main objective of winning a second Saudi Cup, but that didn’t work out and he didn’t win another race – although he only just failed to do so when second in the Eclipse, and also ran with credit in the King George, Juddmonte International, Irish Champion Stakes and Breeders’ Cup Turf.

Many thought that Mishriff was the rightful winner of the Eclipse, as he flew home to be beaten only a neck by Vadeni after having to sit and suffer with no clear run, but if he had won at Sandown his price as a stallion prospect would likely have soared again; as it was, it came down to Nurlan’s valuation, which left him to remark, tongue firmly in cheek, that he perhaps had David Egan to thank for getting him.

Now that he does have him, he is throwing his weight behind him, and has pledged to send him around 25 mares in his first season next year. They include his homebred black-type winners Altyn Orda, Nausha and Rasima, plus Nausha’s dam Nazym and other proven producers Ollie Olga and Tamarind.

His book will also contain some of Sumbé’s gleaming new purchases, such as Vertiginous, the Harry Rosebery Stakes winner by Oasis Dream who cost 280,000gns at the Tattersalls December Mares Sale, and Luzia, the dam of this season’s Sun Chariot Stakes winner Fonteyn who was bought for 250,000gns at the same auction.

He is also expected to receive around six mares from Prince Faisal, including the ultra-tough Oscula, bought by Ted Voute for the Saudi owner’s Nawara Stud for €1 million at Arqana on Saturday, and Group 2 scorer Bounce The Blues, a 450,000gns purchase by the team at Tattersalls earlier in the month.

The Sumbé team has no qualms about placing so many eggs in the Mishriff basket.

“If you wrote down all the things you wanted in a horse, you’d put that they’ve got to be sound, be top-class, have a turn of foot, have a nice pedigree and have the looks; well, open his stable door and voilà,” says Tony, showing off his new-found flair for the French language since moving across the Channel to run Sumbé from its HQ at Haras du Mezeray.

“Especially soundness,” he adds. “People knock two-year-olds retiring to stud; well, here’s a horse who ran 21 times over four seasons. He’s the model of soundness.”

Mishriff stands at Montfort et Préaux alongside Commonwealth Cup hero Golden Horde, whose first crop of foals arrived this year. He’s all power, low to the ground and with a great forearm. If his stock takes after him, he should get lots of fast horses.

It’s easy to tell that Nurlan has a real soft spot for Golden Horde. He said he was extremely happy with the son of Lethal Force’s first foals, and that he was stamping his stock, leaving him to remark with a chuckle that he’d never had so many chestnuts, before adding hastily that they’re nice, rich chestnuts.

He acknowledged that the double whammy of Brexit and Covid meant that he’d covered perhaps 15 to 20 fewer mares from Britain and Ireland than a horse with his commercial profile might have received five or ten years ago, and that he’ll have to upgrade his mares to be successful in a way that Mishriff might not so much.

That said, though, Nurlan will send another 12 of his own quality mares in his third season in 2023, including Ezine, a winning Showcasing half-sister to Bee Queen, the dam of Sumbé’s homebred Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere winner Belbek who was bought at the Tattersalls December Mares Sale for 260,000gns.

The fact that Golden Horde is by Lethal Force might not be to everyone’s taste, even if the sire is by Dark Angel and therefore a member of the prepotent Acclamation line, but mention that to Nurlan and Tony and you’ll quickly be reminded that the best stallion to have occupied a box at Montfort et Préaux, Le Havre, was by the unfashionable Noverre.

Golden Horde: Commonwealth Cup winner stands alongside Mishriff, Recorder and De TrevilleCredit: Mark Cranham (Racingpost.com/photos)

It’s also the case, of course, that if Golden Horde had been by something more sexy, say a Kodiac or a Showcasing, he likely wouldn’t be in Normandy at all, he’d be covering books of 200-plus mares in Britain or Ireland instead. So he represents a good opportunity for French breeders.

It was also a real treat to see the late Queen’s, and now the King’s, gorgeous Galileo stallion Recorder at the stud, as well as Sumbé client Rashit Shaykhutdinov’s intriguing sire De Treville, a Group 3-placed Oasis Dream half-brother to Too Darn Hot who has supplied a conspicuously high rate of talented horses from tiny crops.

It would be no surprise to see the Sumbé stallion roster grow further still in the coming years, as Nurlan had a rather good season with his two-year-olds, and has entered the winter with dreams of having a runner in each of the three main Guineas races.

Andre Fabre reportedly has the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket earmarked for Belbek (by Showcasing), while the Roger Varian-trained pair of Charyn (by Dark Angel), who won the Criterium de Maisons-Laffitte, and Kolsai (by Oasis Dream), who scored in a Newmarket maiden, hold entries in the Irish 2,000 Guineas at the Curragh with the option to contest the Poule d’Essai des Poulains at Longchamp.

Another highly exciting two-year-old for Sumbé is Padishakh, a son of Wootton Bassett who was sent out by Jean-Claude Rouget to win a Longchamp maiden and a Chantilly conditions race by wide margins on both his starts to date.

That good season has meant that Nurlan lies tenth in the table of leading owners in France this year, with just 15 horses to have raced compared to first-placed the Aga Khan’s 76 and third-placed Wertheimer et Frere’s 97.

The ambition, he told me, is to be competing for the top spot in two or three years. Going by what I saw this weekend, it could very well be Mishriff and Golden Horde’s progeny that propel him there.

Nurlan asked me to make it clear in my article how grateful he is for the assistance of Tony, who has been with him for 12 years now and manages no fewer than three studs in two countries for Sumbé – not just Mezeray and Montfort et Préaux, but also Hesmonds Stud in Sussex – and furthermore got the deal done for Mishriff.

As Tony is the only stud manager ever to have gone to the local boulangerie in preparation for my visit, I have no problem at all in passing on that praise.?

What do you think?

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“A package of short-term measures have already been announced for 2023, but more substantial and radical changes are being explored as a priority for 2024 and beyond,” says a BHA spokesman as calls grow for action to be taken on small field sizes.

Pedigree pick

The six-furlong maiden at Wolverhampton tonight (5.20) doesn’t look the strongest heat, so it might not take a lot of winning, and one newcomer’s pedigree stands out to me.

The Alice Haynes-trained Two Desserts is by two-year-old sire extraordinaire Kodiac out of Nasimi, who beat subsequent Sweet Solera Stakes winner Nations Alexander when hosing up by three lengths on debut. The dam is a half-sister to Listed scorer Sovereign Prince out of Cherry Hinton winner Gamilati.

One word of caution, though, is that the colt cost only £14,000 at the Goffs UK Breeze-Up Sale; a fair way below what you would expect a lot with that page to make. Still, perhaps blood will out.

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Good Morning Bloodstock is our latest email newsletter. Martin Stevens, a doyen among bloodstock journalists, provides his take and insight on the biggest stories every morning from Monday to Friday