International buyers will now have to dig a deeper into their pockets if they want to buy Flemington debut winner Most Wanted.
The John Sadler-trained three-year-old was last month scratched twice as connections negotiated a sale to Hong Kong.
That deal fell through and Most Wanted made his debut in the Elizabeth Dunkley & Jason Lee Handicap (1400m) on Saturday, scoring a three-quarter length win for jockey Damien Oliver.
Sadler revealed the sale didn’t go ahead because Most Wanted had some issues.
“I haven’t sold horses to Hong Kong for a long time but there’s categories A, B and fail and he fell into B,” Sadler said.
“There were a few little issues that they had to tell the guy about and for that reason that put him in the B and the guy said he wanted a horse in the A category.”
Sadler said he wasn’t sorry Most Wanted didn’t go to Hong Kong. He rates the horse an autumn prospect.
“He’s done it on raw ability today plus the guy on top of him (Oliver) made a lot of difference,” Sadler said.
Oliver said Most Wanted was going places after overcoming a slow start.
“Any horse that can come to town and win over 1400 metres at their first start certainly has a future,” he said.
