Marhaba Ghaiyyath

The signs of potential have been there from early on. When jockey Billy Loughnane won on him at Wolverhampton, he was candid that the horse was "quite raw" and had to do it the hard way, running on the wrong lead for much of the race. That kind of win — untidy but still getting the job done — can actually tell you more about a horse than a smooth victory, because it shows a willingness to fight even when things aren't going to plan. He then followed up at Lingfield in December 2024, and the team were quietly excited: the owner's racing manager described him as "a nice type" with plenty of options ahead.

His best surface is straightforward to identify — on normal ground, he has won 2 of 3 races (67%), which is a remarkable conversion rate. The problem is that when the yard has stepped him up to Class 2, one of the top tiers of British racing, he's gone 0 from 4. That's the honest reality of his record right now: he's a horse who wins at a lower level but hasn't yet translated that into the bigger contests. Johnston mentions the Cambridgeshire as a race where the timing wasn't right — the horse had recently had a minor operation and wasn't at his best — which partly explains why that stretch of results looks rougher than it might otherwise.

His last win came at Redcar in June 2025, nearly eleven months ago now, and his recent form reads 12-5-6-19-8-2 — that 19th place finish sticks out as a low point, but there have been glimpses since, including a second place. Johnston is optimistic heading into the summer, talking about the ten-furlong races at the big summer festivals and even a possible step up into Listed company. He raced just yesterday, so the story is very much still being written. Whether he can finally convert at the top level is the question that makes him genuinely worth following.