Forever Now can strike for Gosden in Bahrain Trophy

In-form trainer John Gosden has won the last three runnings of the Bahrain Trophy, and Forever Now has major claims of making it a four on the bounce in today’s renewal at Newmarket (1.40).

The colt shaped with bags of promise when chasing home Wonderstruck on seasonal reappearance at headquarters in what looked a decent maiden, and then duly went one better when scoring in facile style at Doncaster.

The beautifully bred son of Galileo made all to win easing down by eight lengths from Altaayil, and the third home Asteroidea has come out and won since.

Although that form may not amount to much, the runner-up is no slouch and there was plenty to like about the way Forever Now quickened and put the race to bed with the minimum of fuss.

The fact that Forever Now is being pitched straight into Group 3 company also looks significant given that the stable have an extremely strong team of three-year-olds, and with further improvement to come he looks looks the one to beat.

The two main danger to Forever Now look to be Hartnell and Windshear.

The former is trained by the in-form Mark Johnston and has some very useful form as a juvenile, winning three times and finishing an excellent third in the Group 1 Criterium de Saint-Cloud.

The son of Athorised disappointed when only fifth on seasonal reappearance at Epsom, but has since gone on to finish second in the Lingfield Derby Trial before getting back to winning ways in the Queen’s Vase at Royal Ascot.

That race was over 2m, but Hartnall is not devoid of pace and has major claims on the pick of his form if coping with the drop back to 1m 5f.

Windshear has shown progressive form in handicaps this season, finishing runner-up to the very useful Cannock Chase in the valuable London Gold Cup at Newbury before being beat just 3/4 of a length last time out in the King George V Stakes at Royal Ascot.

The Richard Hannon trained colt may still have more to offer, and with champion jockey Richard Hughes in the saddle a big run looks assured.