Matt Welsh: Spring's rising stars

Point Barrow (3yo filly)

I made no secret of my opinion on this filly during the Spring Carnival. She was arguably unlucky on debut in the 2024 Merson Cooper, a hot form race, before being put away for nine months.

She resumed at Bendigo and defied the pattern of the day (on pace and inside), narrowly beating a handy field. The win was better than it looked. She then went to Sandown and put away a strong field of emerging sprinters, doing so by 2L without coming off the bridle. It was a serious performance.

Her run in the Champagne at The Valley was enormous. She simply got too far back with the pattern against her, but only a good horse gets as close as she did, rattling off the best last 400m split of the meeting. She again produced the meeting’s best late splits in winning a 3YO Fillies race at Caulfield on Guineas Day, coming from 12th on the corner while wanting to lay in up the straight.

Her final run of the campaign was a popular win in the Red Roses on Oaks Day. Stone last at halfway, she unleashed that trademark change up speed to reel in subsequent winner Inkaruna.

She is a weapon. The most exciting part is that she is still green and still improving. She rose through the grades beautifully this prep, but she has bigger things ahead.

Napoleonic (3yo colt)

A lovely son of Wootton Basset, who was sadly lost during the spring. This colt worked his way through the grades early in the campaign before earning a crack at Stakes grade in the Roman Consul, where he acquitted himself well up in grade.

A trip to Melbourne then saw him go to another level. He settled off speed in the Red Anchor Stakes on Cox Plate day before putting his rivals to the sword, winning by 4L and doing it eased down. His turn of foot was electric and he defied the prevailing pattern of the day, looping the field out wide.

He did not beat a star laden field at The Valley, but the way he did it was what mattered. He will need to rise again to match the top three-year-olds in the autumn, yet he shapes as a colt on the improve who can take that next step.

Sheza Alibi

She brought the right form through the Queensland winter, having run second to Autumn Boy in the Tattersall's Stakes. Handy in hindsight. This was her first campaign for Peter Moody and Katherine Coleman and the blinkers may well be the making of her.

She was solid against the boys, including Tentyris, in the Gothic Stakes, but she probably went to another level when the blinkers went on and she stepped to 1400m in The Vanity. Held up for much of the straight, she only needed a small gap to burst through and win with authority, much to the delight of punters.

What she produced in the Sandown Guineas last Saturday was impossible to miss. Sent out a prohibitive 1.50 favourite against the boys, she was expected to win, but she demolished them by a widening 5.75L. The caveat is that it was a slowly run Sandown Guineas, but she still reeled off the day’s best last 400m and 200m splits on a card that featured some sharp sprint races.

On the strength of this preparation, she is the best middle distance filly we saw through the spring.