Australia’s Tashbeeh in Dubai challenge for Sheikh Hamdan

Mike De Kock, centre, may have a say as to who rides Tashbeeh as he will have first choice of retained riders Paul Hanagan and Dane O'Neill. Francois Nel / Getty

Maftool and Mubtaahij may well have an iron grip on the UAE Derby picture following their thrilling head-to-head in the UAE 2000 Guineas on Thursday, but Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid is set to spice up the Classic melting pot with the imminent arrival of Tashbeeh.

The three-year-old colt, trained by David Hayes and Tom Dabernig in Australia, will ship to Dubai on Sunday with the intention of running in the Meydan Classic this month. Tashbeeh has won three of his 11 races in Australia.

He won a barrier trial over 1,100 metres on Tuesday in one minute, 07.60 seconds against Rosewall, Berisha and Liming as his preparations stepped up for Dubai.

“I was very impressed with him in the trial,” Hayes told Sky Racing Australia. “He was sat third or fourth, and then won by a length and a half.

“I‘m sending an in-form horse to Dubai and I’m very happy with him. It is very important to Sheikh Hamdan to have runners in his own back yard and I think Tashbeeh will do the job.

“If he wins, he will run in the Derby.”

Mike de Kock may well have a say who is to ride Tashbeeh, as the South African trainer will have first choice of retained riders Paul Hanagan and Dane O’Neill.

Should neither be available Hayes will adopt a next-best-available policy.

Hayes could well have another runner in Dubai as Tawteen, also owned by Sheikh Hamdan, has been pencilled in for the Group 1 Black Caviar Lightning Stakes at Flemington Racecourse next Saturday.

Should the three-year-old filly finish in the top three in that 1,000m contest, the Al Quoz Sprint on Dubai World Cup night could be on the agenda.

“When I was in Dubai last year talking to him I said that I’d try to get a couple of these promising young horses to Dubai this year and Tashbeeh and Tawteen have come to the fore,” Hayes said. Elsewhere, the International Federation of Horse Racing Academies was registered in Abu Dhabi on Thursday by Khalid Hussain from the UAE’s General Authority for Youth and Sports Welfare.

It is the first international racing body to be headquartered in Abu Dhabi and the inaugural meeting in the capital was attended by 20 from representatives around the world.

The next meeting will be held in Warsaw, Poland, on the sidelines of the HH Sheikh Mansoor bin Zayed Al Nahyan Global Arabian Horse Flat Racing Festival’s World Arabian Horse Racing Conference in May.

Follow us on twitter at @NatSportlUAE