DARK Angel has ruled the roost at the O’Callaghan’s Yeomanstown Stud since he retired there in 2008. Now sire of 14 Group/Grade 1 winners, he was himself a ‘Donny Rocket’, numbering the Group 1 Middle Park Stakes among his four juvenile successes.

This week Yeomanstown sold the best-priced filly of the week, a daughter of Dark Angel out of the stakes-winning juvenile Sacred Aspect to Sumbe for £175,000, and the following day received £170,000 from Oliver St Lawrence for a Dark Angel full-brother to the Group 2 Rockfel Stakes winner Juliet Capulet. Nine of the 10 Dark Angel yearlings on offer sold, for a median of £80,000.

Sacred Angel was bought from Yeomanstown for £52,000 at last year’s Doncaster Premier Yearling Sale, and this year, and since the catalogue was printed, she won the Group 3 Princess Margaret Stakes and finished fourth in the Group 1 Prix Morny. Nurlan Bizakov’s Sumbe bought Charlie Johnston’s filly before her Group 3 success, and the owner and trainer combined to buy her full-sister for £175,000.

“There are similarities between the fillies, said Johnston. “I think she’s a little more backward than Sacred Angel was at the same time last year, but she’ll be broken in fairly quickly and then get turned away again. She certainly has the same athleticism that her sister has.”

Harry Angel, Easton Angel, Sacred Angel, Bronze Angel, Wings Of War and Yafta are a selection of some of the sons and daughters of Dark Angel who have been purchased at this sale. Bloodstock agent Oliver St Lawrence will be hoping for more of the same after he signed for a son of the stallion for £170,000.

“The page says it all,” said St Lawrence. “The mare has done well with Dark Angel covers time and time again. This looks a ready-made two-year-old and is hopefully one for Royal Ascot.”

Yeomanstown sold 10 yearlings for £772,000, and their third six-figure lot came with the private sale of a filly by Australia to Avenue Bloodstock and others for £100,000.