Betfred Oaks winner Ezeliya retired after suffering setback

The daughter of Dubawi won at Epsom on just her fourth racecourse start and she didn’t get the chance to add to that number before retiring to join the Aga Khan Stud broodmare band.

The filly won over £350,000 in prizemoney after winning three of her four starts, her fourth in a Leopardstown maiden on debut the only defeat of her career.

Weld commented on the Aga Khan Stud website: “She was a beautiful filly to train. She wasn’t very big but she had a lot of quality and winning the Oaks with her is very special.

“She is certainly one of the best fillies I have trained and she has the potential to be a highly successful broodmare.”

Pat Downes, manager of the Aga Khan Studs in Ireland, also said: “It is a pity to have to retire such a talented filly so early in her career but it would have been a challenge to prepare her for another race in the Autumn.

“Her wellbeing is the paramount concern for His Highness and Princess Zahra and she will make a wonderful addition to the broodmare band. She is by Dubawi and out of a Group winning mare who herself is out of a sister to Group 1 winners Enzeli, Estimate, Ebadiyla and Edabiya.

“This has been a prolific family for the operation for many years now and we look forward to seeing what Ezaliya can achieve as a broodmare in the years to come.”

Timeform report on Ezeliya’s Oaks & free video replay

On paper this was not the strongest of line-ups for the Oaks, and even though the winners of most of the main trials were in the field, a couple of the more impressive – Diamond Rain and Friendly Soul, who admittedly had flopped in the Musidora – were missing, along with the eye-catching Guineas fourth Tamfana, the Guineas fifth Ylang Ylang the form pick and sent off favourite by default as much as anything; the result largely upholds the view that this was a substandard race overall, and plenty failed to fire, but Ezeliya is likely to prove a good winner of the classic, able to hold her own against males later in the campaign, the way she went through the race and put things to bed when asked both very positive signs; the race was truly run, the first 3 all coming from a similar position, in the back third of the field to Tattenham Corner, conditions bringing stamina to the fore.

EZELIYA (FR) showed much improved form, impressing with the way she went through the race and relishing the extra 2f, handling the track well too, not the biggest but with a fantastic pedigree and clearly a filly to be reckoned with at the highest level through the rest of the year, the main question how effective she will be away from softish ground (the Arc, fairly obviously, springs to mind as a race around which to build the rest of her campaign); held up, travelled well, smooth headway entering straight, produced to lead over 2f out, edged left briefly 1f out, kept on well, won readily; likely to progress further and well up to winning more good races.

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