Star stayer Kyprios can make up for lost time to bag Irish Leger

Any card with four Group Ones in succession is a rarity anywhere in the world and the second day of Irish Champions Festival is brimming full of quality, with Kyprios the headline act at the Curragh.

Aidan O’Brien’s star stayer has been sidelined so far this season due to injury, but all eyes will be on his seasonal reappearance in the Comer Group International Irish St Leger (4.35).

Unbeaten in six starts last season – including four successive victories at the highest level – Aidan O’Brien’s five-year-old is back to defend his crown and quickly make up for lost time.

If back to even some way close to his best, Ryan Moore’s mount will take all the beating, and there are few better than O’Brien to have one readied for such a task off a decent lay-off.

Stablemate Emily Dickinson is not a bad back-up, but she is some way off the favourite if he is back to himself, while British raider Eldar Eldarov has not been firing so far this season.

Kyprios should get the job done before moving onto bigger and better things, while there’s a fascinating three-way clash in the Goffs Vincent O’Brien National Stakes (4.0).

Adrian Murray can scarcely believe that he is duking it out with the likes of O’Brien in Group One contests given his humble beginnings, but Bucanero Fuerte is taking him places that he never dreamt about.

The Wootton Bassett colt handed the Westmeath trainer his first Group One win last month when running away with the Phoenix Stakes at the Kildare track, and he is back for more.

The opposition could hardly be any more formidable for Kevin Stott’s mount, though, with O’Brien’s City Of Troy laughing at a Group Two field in the Superlative Stakes at Newmarket in July and already the general 2/1 favourite for next year’s English 2,000 Guineas.

The Justify colt has done all of the right things in his two starts thus far and Moore has opted for him over Henry Longfellow, a fine winner of the Group Two Futurity Stakes over course and distance last month.

Henry Longfellow is already towards the summit of next year’s Epsom Derby betting but stamina may be more to his liking, so seven furlongs in a cracking field may just prove insurmountable.

Bucanero Fuerte will really throw it down to the O’Brien pair, but getting the best of City Of Troy may prove a bridge too far also and he can be next best to a potential superstar with Henry Longfellow back in third.

With €4.5million on offer in prize money over two days, the action is thick and fast and the Al Basti Equiworld Dubai Flying Five Stakes (2.55) is dominated by an impressive raiding party.

Last year’s winner Highfield Princess and Tim Easterby’s Art Power are old hands in the sprinting game, while the Archie Watson-trained Bradsell is the new kid on the block having denied the former when taking the King’s Stand Stakes at Royal Ascot.

The Irish sprinters look to be behind their British counterparts, but Moss Tucker is on the upgrade having produced a career-best to take the Group Three Phoenix Sprint Stakes here last month.

Ken Condon’s five-year-old is the each-way play at a big price under Billy Lee in an ultra-competitive renewal, while the closing Northfields Handicap (5.45) can go the way of the improving Take Heart.

Johnny Murtagh won the same race with subsequent Classic hero Sonnyboyliston in 2020 and the recent Naas winner, partnered by Ben Coen, looks to have plenty more improvement up his sleeve on just his fifth start.

O’Brien’s eyes will also be on Longchamp, where Yorkshire Oaks heroine Warm Heart tackles the Group One Prix Vermeille (2.50) along with the Joseph O’Brien-trained Above The Curve.