He was one of the more ambitious entries for this year's Emirates Melbourne Cup, but Night's Watch at least did the right thing by connections at Sandown on Wednesday.
The Darren Weir-trained, OTI-raced Kiwi recruit - who carried the lowest-rating of all Australian-trained Melbourne Cup entries - made it two wins from as many starts in Australia when he overcame difficulty to win the A$40,000 The Cove Hotel Handicap.
The 1400-metre Benchmark 70 seemed a world away from the A$6 million Melbourne Cup (3200m), which will be run on November 7, but OTI's Shane Driscoll is happy for connections to live the dream.
"He was a sneaky nom for the Melbourne Cup, which might be a touch ambitious, but he's going to give his owners a good ride and we'll see how far he can get," Driscoll said.
"I don't think it's completely unrealistic that he strings together a picket fence and races through his grades."
The Redwood four-year-old, who won a Bendigo Benchmark 64 at his Australian debut, was crunched in to start $1.75 favourite and was ridden to his third victory from six starts by Mark Zahra. -racing.com