Matterhorn in ‘phenomenal order’

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Connections are confident Matterhorn will be able to impress on turf ahead of the Homeserve Huxley Stakes at Chester.

Matterhorn has starred in this year’s All-Weather Championships and has a chance to make a statement on turf on Friday.

The Mark Johnston-trained four-year old has seven wins in his last 10 races but only one of those appearances came on turf, a third-place finish at Pontefract in October.

Assistant trainer Charlie Johnston believes Matterhorn will be able to make the transition to turf but he does have some concerns regarding potentially soft ground at Chester.

‘I’m confident that he’ll act on turf, but whether he’ll act on what we’ll get on Friday is a completely different kettle of fish,’ he said, as reported by Sky Sports.

‘Hopefully we’ll have a bit of fresh ground, which would be beneficial, but it doesn’t take a lot of rain to get quite testing at Chester.

‘Given he’s shown such a high level of ability on the all-weather, translating that form to turf doesn’t worry me too much but translating it to testing ground after three busy days is not what we wanted.

‘This was the obvious race after the all-weather campaign, though, as a stepping stone to the big summer targets. It was this or the Brigadier Gerard and this is worth much more money.

‘The horse is in phenomenal order and we’re just looking forward to getting him out again.’

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