DEMAND for fillies was strong at April’s Goffs UK Breeze Up Sale, with a trio of that sex selling for more than £300,000, all consigned by different Irish vendors.

Shane Power’s Tradewinds Stud sold a filly by Twilight Son for £360,000 to Blandford Bloodstock, the second-highest price at the sale. Power bought the filly, who clocked a very fast breeze, for just £30,000 at the Tattersalls Somerville Yearling Sale last September.

Blandford Bloodstock’s Richard Brown revealed that she was purchased for Sheikh Rashid, and he also races Bright Diamond who was sourced at Goresbridge from Power. Last year she was placed in the Group 1 Fillies’ Mile after slamming a field of maidens by nine lengths, and on her most recent outing was fifth in the Oaks.

Well, could lightning strike twice for Sheikh Rashid? The Twilight Son filly is named Beautiful Diamond, and on Wednesday she was an impressive three and a half length winner of a five-furling maidan on her debut at Nottingham. The manner of her win suggests there is better to come from her.

Bred by Rosyground Stud, Beautiful Diamond is a half-sister to Brazen Idol (Brazen Beau), a four-time winner last year. They are the first two foals out of Babylon Lane (Lethal Force), and she was well-beaten on her only start at two. Babylon Lane is a half-sister to eight winners, two of which were stakes-placed at two. The best of that pair was Sabre (Mayson) who won on his debut, was beaten a neck in the Listed National Stakes at Sandown, and then was runner-up to Soldier’s Call in the Listed Windsor Castle Stakes at Royal Ascot.

Near-misses

They are all sons and daughters of the unraced Crinkle (Distant Relative). She had five wining siblings, one of which, the UAE-foaled Cedarberg (Cape Cross), was placed in the Group 2 Richmond Stakes at two. All of these near-misses in juvenile stakes races are continuing a pattern, even with that of the best horse in the first four generations of Beautiful Diamond’s pedigree.

Desert Style (Green Desert) is out of the stakes-placed Organza (High Top), Beautiful Diamond’s fourth dam, and he was trained by Jim Bolger for Hamdan Al Maktoum. Successful on his first two starts as a juvenile, he was then placed twice at Group 1 level, in the Phoenix Stakes and narrowly beaten when third to Definite Article in the National Stakes.

In his second season racing, Desert Style won three times at Group 3 level and was rated the best sprinter of his age in Europe that year. He stood for many years at Gay O’Callaghan’s Morristown Lattin Stud, but ended his time at stud in France. He was a consistent sire of winners, and his best included Paco Boy, Bachir, Cape Town, Caradak, Maneesha and Next Desert.

Fourth crop

Beautiful Diamond is from the fourth crop of Twilight Son (Kyllachy), and he has done well at stud, without getting a big-name winner so far. His first crop included a pair of Group 3 winners and an Australian listed winner, and his second crop was headed by the Group 3 Cornwallis Stakes winner Twilight Jet, and three other stakes winners. A feature of many of his best runners is that he has upgraded his mares.

Last year his son, Twilight Calls, had 14 smart performers in arrears when he was runner-up to the Australian challenger Nature Strip in the Group 1 King’s Stand Stakes at Royal Ascot, while another son, Khunan, was denied a Group 2 win in the Richmond Stakes by just half a length.

With 14 stakes performers in his first three crops, a big-race winner is surely just around the corner for the Cheveley Park Stud resident.

Godolphin cast-off is Watson’s delight

A WOLVERHAMPTON maiden over seven-furlongs on the all-weather is not one of racing’s most alluring prizes, but you won’t hear members of The Keg Partnership complain.

After this year’s Tattersalls February Sale, they took ownership of a three-year-old filly, Creative Style, who was purchased there by Blandford Bloodstock for 14,000gns. Possessing a smart pedigree, she was missed by some as she had been unplaced on two starts last year. First time out she was last of 10 at Newmarket behind the 1000 Guineas winner Mawj, and next time up she improved to finish fourth of nine at Kempton.

Nonetheless, Charlie Appleby and the Godolphin team did not see a future for her on their books, and she was sold.

Making her debut early this week for trainer Archie Watson, the daughter of Kodiac (Danehill) won an 11-runner maiden by a neck, and hopefully she could win again. Perhaps getting blacktype may be a farfetched notion, but it would again increase her resale value considerably.

One man delighted with the win is Eamonn Phelan in Derryluskin Stud. Last December he paid only 4,500gns for the dam of Creative Style, New Style, barren after being covered by Persian King (Kingman). The fact that New Style was being covered by high-quality sires is no surprise, given that she was a placed daughter of Street Cry (Machiavellian), and a half-sister to a champion sprinter, and to the dam of a dual Group 1 winner.

In foal

Eamonn tells me that New Style is now safely in foal to Yeomanstown Stud’s Group 1-winning juvenile Supremacy (Mehmas), and the mare has a couple of young stock to look forward to racing. Creative Style is her second winner from her first three foals, and Godolphin have retained her two-year-old colt, Neofilo (Teofilo). New Style also has a yearling full-sister to Creative Style.

We all know how good Street Cry was as a sire, his winners including the remarkable racemares Winx and Zenyatta, and as a broodmare sire his most recent stars are Romantic Warrior and Godolphin’s Rebels Romance.

New Style has a pedigree deep in blacktype. Her dam was the ultra-smart Land Of Dreams (Cadeaux Genereux), and at two she won the Group 2 Flying Childers Stakes at Doncaster, and added a Group 3 at Goodwood the following season. She bred six winners later, headed by Dream Ahead (Diktat), and his five Group 1 wins started with a pair at the age of two, the Middle Park Stakes and the Prix Morny.

The following year, he was crowned champion of Europe and won a Cartier Award after his victories in the July Cup, Haydock Sprint Cup and the Prix de la Foret. He retired to stud at Ballylinch, and moved to France for four seasons before relocating last year to Bearstone Stud. He has sired four Group 1 winners.

Second star

An unraced daughter of Land Of Dreams is a second star in the family, and much cherished at Tally-Ho Stud. Queenofthefairies (Pivotal) did not run and was purchased by Tony O’Callaghan for 32,000gns as a three-year-old. She has two winners of particular note, the Australian Group 2 winner and Group 1 Irish 1000 Guineas-placed Now Or Never (Bushranger), and Fairyland (Kodiac). The latter filly raced in the silks of Tony O’Callaghan’s late mother-in-law, Evie Stockwell, and she won a Group 1 race at two and at three, the Cheveley Park Stakes and the Derrinstown Flying Five at the Curragh.

There is no shortage of precocity in this family, as Land Of Dreams was the best of seven winners out of the Group 3 Molecomb Stakes winner Sahara Star (Green Desert). The latter mare is also the grandam of Group 3 winner and Group 1 Cheveley Park Stakes runner-up Princess Noor (Holy Roman Emperor), and third dam of last year’s Group 3 Eyrefield Stakes winner Speirling Beag (Mastercraftsman).