The Charlie Appleby-trained Pinatubo will face 14 rivals when he goes for glory in the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket on Saturday.
The unbeaten son of Shamardal is the odds-on favourite with most bookmakers to win the first English Classic of the new season having produced one of the most impressive debut campaigns for quite some time.
Having started in the unassuming surroundings of Wolverhampton last May, Pinatubo went on to record victories at Royal Ascot and Glorious Goodwood before ending 2019 with victory at Newmarket.
He beat Arizona by two lengths on his last outing on the Rowley Mile and will be reopposed by Aidan O’Brien‘s charge once again, one of four entries for the Ballydoyle handler.
Arizona will be the ride of Ryan Moore with O’Brien forced to look elsewhere when saddling his contingent with all his Irish jockeys having decided to stay at home due to the threat of quarantine.
Frankie Dettori will be on board Wichita, with O’Brien also sending New World Tapestry and Royal Dornoch to the starting stalls.
Champion jockey Oisin Murphy has been paired with Andrew Balding‘s well-fancied Kameko, while Harry Bentley has high hopes about his mount Kinross, despite his loss when upped to Group One company at Newcastle last time out.
“We’ve put him in the deep end once before as we don’t doubt that the ability is there. We think there is a lot of potential there,” he told the Yorkshire Post.
