ANOTHER BRISBANE TARGET FOR MATCHA LATTE

WYONG trainer Sara Ryan has changed tack in Queensland with her Provincial-Midway Championships Final winner Matcha Latte.

Whilst he will run at the Stradbroke Handicap meeting at Eagle Farm on Saturday week, it won’t be in the $3m Group 1 feature over 1400m.

Rather Matcha Latte will line up in the Listed Wayne Wilson Handicap at 1600m, and Newcastle jockey Ash Morgan will be reunited with him.

Ryan had hoped to get the talented five-year-old into the Stradbroke field, but a wide barrier in the Group 3 BTC Sprint (1350m) at Doomben on May 24 put paid to those plans.

Matcha Latte (Kyle Wilson-Taylor) started near the outside in a capacity field of 16 and finished eighth to Stradbroke favorite War Machine.

“Unfortunately he is too far down the order of entry to make the Stradbroke field,” Ryan said this morning from the Gold Coast, where her winter carnival team is based.

“We pulled apart the sectionals and Matcha Latte ran the second fastest last 200m of the Doomben race.

“Whilst he would not have beaten the winner, I feel certain he would have been placed from a decent barrier.

“Ash (Morgan) will be back on Matcha Latte in the Wayne Wilson.”

Morgan has ridden the gelding three times for wins in a Newcastle PMC Qualifier (1400m) on March 20 and Final over the same distance at Royal Randwick on April 12, and then fourth on a heavy track in the Group 3 Hawkesbury Gold Cup (1600m) on May 3.

Meanwhile, Ryan is “sweating” on another withdrawal to be able to run her promising filly Piperita in the Group 3 Fred Best Classic (1350m) at Doomben tomorrow.

The Fred Best was to have been run over 1400m at Eagle Farm last Saturday, but was one of the casualties when the last four races were called off.

Piperita is second emergency (Merchant Gold has already been scratched), and Ryan is yet to finalise a rider until she knows the filly secures a berth in the field.

“I really wanted to run her last Saturday as I had planned that as a lead-up to the Group 3 Gunsynd Classic (1600m), also for three-year-olds, at the Stradbroke meeting on Saturday week,” Ryan said.

“Everything is up in the air now.”

Ryan intends running her 2023 Big Dance winner Attractable in Saturday’s Spear Chief Handicap (1500m) at Eagle Farm, and hopefully backing him up a week later to join Matcha Latte in the Wayne Wilson.

Attractable resumed in the BTC Sprint on May 24, but found the 1350m too short at his first start in just over 12 months.

He had won 1200m trials on the Beaumont track on May 7 and at Warwick Farm six days later.

Attractable’s stablemate I Am Carrott is a likely runner in the Listed The Show A Heart (1500m) for two-year-olds at Eagle Farm.

The Castelvecchio colt has raced only twice, and was placed on a heavy Kensington track over 1400m at his latest appearance on May 14.

Story John Curtis, June 3, 2025 - Pics Bradley Photos