Seagulls Eleven, owned by the Brighton & Hove Albion stars, will attempt to emulate his sire Galileo Gold in Saturday’s Classic at Newmarket on Saturday
Brighton stars James Milner and Danny Welbeck could be celebrating a huge win at the races, 24 hours before the team’s home Premier League match against Newcastle this weekend.
Milner and Welbeck are among the group named Two Plus Three Two Plus Four which own Seagulls Eleven, trained by Hugo Palmer who is based at Michael Owen’s Manor House Stables in Cheshire. The colt, whose 11 owners are either current or ex-Brighton players, won once and was placed in two Group 1 races from six starts last year when he ran in the club’s blue and white-striped silks.
Palmer recorded his only 2,000 Guineas victory in 2011 with Galileo Gold, the sire of Seagulls Eleven who will line up under jockey Tom Marquand in the Betfred 2,000 Guineas where the trainer expects him to run a lot better than his 50-1 odds.
Palmer, speaking to the Nick Luck Daily Podcast, said there are many similarities between Seagulls Eleven and his father.
“He certainly occupies a significant place in my heart,” he said. “I feel about the horse the same way. He was actually a better two-year-old. He was rated 112 and Galileo Gold only 110 for all that he achieved slightly less in than Galileo Gold who was a Group 2 winner and Seagulls Eleven has only been placed.
“We were always hoping with him to go to the Solario but he managed to lacerate his tongue and we had to miss that. We went to the National Stakes instead where he ran a big race.”
He continued: “He goes to Newmarket on Saturday with exactly the same preparation as his father had and it has gone as smoothly. He is a slightly bigger and heavier horse than Galileo Gold but other than that they look very similar.”
Recalling Galileo Gold’s victory under Frankie Dettori, Palmer said: “He worked brilliantly at the Craven meeting. Frankie Dettori rode him and he won his gallop by upwards of a dozen lengths, the same way Seagulls Eleven did two weeks ago.
“I said to Frankie Dettori, ‘Do you think he’d be competitive in the French Guineas?’ and he said, ‘Why go to France? This horse will win any Guineas I’ve ever ridden in’. My knees buckled. George Boughey, my then assistant, had another £1,000 on Galileo Gold at 40-1 and off we went.
“I haven’t had the same confidence-buoying moment as that, but I think whatever beats Joseph O’Brien’s Scorthy Champ will win the race. On that basis we have a length and a half to find and we might have been closer had Henri Matisse not significantly interfered with us in the race.
“I thought our horse slightly underachieved last year. He is a big horse and it might just be he was a touch on the weak side as a two-year-old and my hope is that he has strengthened up this year and will see his races out better.”