Rabada, winner of the Premiers Champion and Daily News for Mike Azzie, has changed stables and is now trained by Brett Crawford. The four-year-old is temporarily with Mike de Kock in Gauteng and is being prepared for the first part of the Johannesburg season.

Rabada (Nkosi Hlophe)

Crawford said: “Rabada came to me in the middle of July and he runs first in the Joburg Spring Challenge at Turffontein on October 8. He is in the Sansui Summer Cup but his mission is the Peermont Emperors Palace Charity Mile on November 5.”

The Philippi trainer will run last year’s Horse Chestnut winner Captain America in the Kuda Matchem Stakes at Durbanville on October 9. The six-year-old is the highest rated horse in the 1 400m Grade 3 and was third in last season’s J & B Met after finishing fourth in the L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate and beating Futura in the Green Point.

Crawford said: “The programme is again the Green Point, Queen’s Plate and Met if all goes well.”

Crawford has never won the Matchem or the fillies equivalent on the same card, the Diana Stakes, but this time he also has the top-rated in that –Alexis, winner of last season’s Tibouchina. The five-year-old will start her campaign in this and then head towards the Klawervlei Majorca on Met day.

Joey Ramsden won last year’s Matchem with Act Of War and the 2011 running with Variety Club. He is responsible for all five three-year-olds among the 22 entries and his quintet includes Langerman winner Table Bay as well as the third and fourth, Newlands and Attenborough. The last-named reappears at Durbanville on Wednesday.

Ramsden also has four of the five three-year-olds entered in the Diana including Irridescence scorer Captain Gambler.

Michael Clower