Trainer Matthew Smith’s star Heading towards return

As the traditional spring carnivals in Melbourne and Sydney come to an end, Warwick Farm trainer Matthew Smith is already setting his sights on the next wave of big-race opportunities.

Smith is eager to get stable favourite Headwall back to full fitness, with the gelding now approaching the final stages of recovery from the injury that ended his spring campaign almost as soon as it began.

The six-year-old kicked off his preparation with a superb win over Lady Shenandoah in the $1 million Group 3 Concorde Stakes, but a subsequent pastern issue halted his progress.

The untimely injury forced him to miss the richest sprint races of the season, including the $20 million The Everest. Smith summed up the disappointment with a sporting comparison.

“It’s like when you’ve got ‘Buddy’ Franklin kicking goals and he does a knee, that’s what it’s like for us,” Smith lamented.

“You lose your best player on the team, your best earner, it’s tricky.

He is still spelling for another month then he’ll come in and away we’ll go.”

Smith stressed he won’t rush the star sprinter and noted that attractive opportunities remain well into the latter stages of the autumn carnival.

Headwall’s early-year form was strong, beginning with an unlucky fourth in the Oakleigh Plate, followed by a second placing behind Joliestar in the Newmarket Handicap.

He then finished third in the T J Smith Stakes, before another major placing when runner-up in the $5 million The Quokka in Perth—an event Smith is strongly considering for his autumn campaign.

“It would probably be late autumn, he might head to The Quokka again,” Smith said.

“(We might) go back and try to get that on the board…but we will be happy just to get him back sound, get a couple of runs into him and see what happens.

He’s a gun, the horse, if we can get him back.”

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