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By Ray Hickson

Around this time each year a horse or two emerges from the provincials and announces themselves as a promising type and trainer Matthew Smith believes that description would fit Astero.

He’s not making any grand statements about the lightly raced three-year-old but on the back of two impressive wins out of town Smith elected to skip the midweek stepping stone and chase the lion’s share of the $125,000 on offer in the Fujitsu General Handicap (1400m) at Rosehill.

“It‘s probably not that much different to the midweeks so we thought if we’re going to run him in a midweek we might as well run on a Saturday,’’ Smith said.

“He’s fairly progressive, I haven’t got to the bottom of him yet. He’s a horse on the way up who deserves his chance especially with him handling wet tracks.

“We thought we’d give him a shot.”

Astero carried 59.5kg to his second-up win over 1400m at Newcastle on May 18, he drops 2.5kg on Saturday and Jay Ford takes the ride. He was $6 with TAB on Thursday in a wide market.

With three wins from his six starts the $18,000 purchase has already proven to be a shrewd buy, banking over $66,000, and Smith is adamant the best is still to come.

Astero wins at Newcastle on May 18

“He was a really immature horse, quite backwards and that’s why we didn’t pay much for him as a yearling,’’ he said.

“But he’s a nice good walking animal, I really liked him as a yearling. Once he has a spell and comes back we’ll have a decent horse on our hands but he’s still a preparation away.”

Next preparation is when Smith expects to see something from his latest import Flambeur who makes his Australian debut alongside stablemates Monreal and Milk Man in the Precise Air Handicap (1800m).

It’s something of a reconnaissance mission with the former French five-year-old who has won four of his 15 starts but hasn’t caught Smith’s eye just yet on what he’s shown at the trials.

“He’s been pretty plain. I would be thinking he’s a preparation away and he hasn’t acclimatised yet,’’ Smith said.

“There’s two races, this one and a race in two weeks, and I thought let’s give him a look around and see what he’s up to.

“Overseas he’s an on pace horse, he had a good finish and kept going. He looked like he was a horse that will run 2400m and that’s why we bought him.”

Flambeur is not surprisingly an outsider at $51 with TAB.

Smith gave Sweet Thomas a pass mark for his first-up effort in the Gosford Cup a month ago and is looking for him to take a step forward in the Listed $150,000 XXXX Winter Cup (2400m).

The nine-year-old hasn’t won since he took out the Stayers Cup over 3200m last year and he’s likely heading towards a defence of that race at Randwick at the end of June.

“He did enough, he’s still on the way up (this prep),’’ Smith said.

All the fields, form and replays for Saturday's meeting at Rosehill