THERE might not be any Australian raiders in tomorrow’s NZ Cup, but there’s certainly a strong Aussie flavour to the great race.

Two of the biggest guns in the race, the two favourites Self Assured and Copy That, are owned in Victoria.

Defending champ Self Assured is the latest superstar raced by Jean Feiss, while leviathan owners Merv and Meg Butterworth race Copy That.

It shapes as a Cup of redemption for Copy That, who was beaten as favourite last year, but largely because of a shambolic standing start.

Copy That looks to get his chance from a wide front row draw where, if he steps well, he can push forward and try for the front.

Self Assured and the other big, South Coast Arden, both have to come from wide back row draws and negotiate plenty of traffic.

It will be an emotion-charged Cup for Feiss, who lost her husband, Bill, suddenly in September.

From an Inter Dominion perspective, Bad To The Bone looks the only key horse likely to head to Sydney after the Cup.

Self Assured won’t be seen in Australia until Del-Re National A. G. Hunter Cup or maybe even Miracle Mile time, while Copy That is being set for a possible Perth raid in January for the big Fremantle and WA pacing cups double.

In the trotting feature, the Group 1 NZ Trotting FFA, Majestic Man and Bolt For Brilliance are still big chances of crossing the Tasman for the Inter Dominion.

Pleasingly, those who want to watch full coverage of the NZ Cup raceday can do so with Sky Racing Active taking NZ’s Trackside’s premium coverage for the entire day.

THIS stellar crop of three-year-old fillies got me thinking.

When was the last time we had such a lavish array of talent in a crop?

Let’s wind the clock back to the 1987-88 season where the best three-year-old fillies included Provocative, The Private Dancer, Carome Julie, Jodie’s Babe, Handibank, Key Lee and Love To Spare.

Provocative won 19 races, including the NSW Oaks and ran second in the Victoria Oaks.

Stablemate Carome Julie also snared 19 wins, including the Victoria Oaks, while Handibank won 15 races, including the Group 1 Vicbred 3YO final.

Possibly the best of the lot of them, The Private Dancer won 12 of her 14 starts before injury cruelly ended her career prematurely.

Jodie’s Babe was a “bit” player at three, but won the Group 1 Ladyship as a early four-year-old and then, of course, the Perth Inter Dominion final a few months after that.

Love To Spare was a talented three-year-old, but developed into a mighty mare with 31 wins, while Key Lee won 14 races and ran third in the Vicbred final at three.

Let’s hope this group races on the greatness of the class of 1987/88.

The signs are great with Ladies In Red leading the way, but Kiwi raider Bettor Twist, Tough Tilly, Beach Music and even another Kiwi, Lifes A Beach, are also outstanding talents.

They were all on show last Friday night in the Breeders Crown heats and will lock horns again in the semis at Melton on Saturday night.

And don’t forget, there’s another star filly Anntonia, having a break in Sydney after smashing the Australasian mile record for a three-year-old with her 1:49.8 win in the NSW Breeders Challenge final last Saturday week.

Back to those battling it out in the Breeders Crown and, despite her surprise defeat in a Crown heat behind improving stablemate Joanna, I’m still with Ladies In Red to win the final.

What the defeat showed was she’s not invincible and Joanna, who was stunningly well driven by Jackie Barker, has gone to another level.

Beach Music made it two wins in a row over Bettor Twist in their heat, but the Kiwi’s performance was outstanding. She looks to be building beautifully towards the final for Nathan Purdon and Anthony Butt.

Then there’s the much-loved star Tough Tilly, who returned from very minor throat surgery to stroll home, albeit in slow time and without any pressure in her heat.

Before Joanna’s upset win last Friday, Tough Tilly was the only filly to have beaten Ladies In Red, so she has to be respected when the final comes around.

EXPENSIVE Ego’s return to form is just what the Inter Dominion needed.

It was starting to look like his stablemate, King Of Swing, had a mortgage on the series, which starts at Menangle on November 27.

But the best version of Expensive Ego is something special and we got a serious glimpse of that with his Menangle win last Saturday night.

To watch his work three-wide without cover for the first 800 metres – which he ran in a sizzling 53.9 seconds – then roll to the front and power through a 26.7-second third quarter was mesmerising.

Expensive Ego still finished it off in 28.1 seconds to win seemingly with something in the tank by 11.8 metres.

It was only a 10th of a second outside his personal best time and 0.5 faster than he ran when second to King Of Swing in March’s Miracle Mile.

Importantly, it came in a race co-trainer and driver Luke McCarthy described as D-Day for his Inter Dominion campaign.

“He was below par in the Len Smith the week before, but I don’t think it suited him sitting off the pace so I wanted to drive him a lot more aggressively this time to find out where he was at,” McCarthy said.

“That’s the horse we know he is … he felt amazing. He’s a beast when he goes like that.

“The owners were keen on the Inter Dominion, but we wanted him to show us he was where he needed to be.”

McCarthy confirmed King Of Swing would go into the Inter Dominion first-up.

“He won’t need a run, just a really strong hitout at Menangle the week leading into the heats,” he said.

The series starts at Menangle on November 27, heads to Bathurst on December 1, then Newcastle on December 5 before the grand finals back at Menangle on December 11.

The opinions expressed in The Forum are those of the author and may not be attributed to or represent policies of Harness Racing Victoria, which is the state authority and owner of thetrots.com.au.