Racing: Little Mother ready to complete her CV

The flying Little Mother should be too good in the NZ Cup. Photo / APN

Champion greyhound Little Mother has swept all before her during her scintillating racing career; however she has one glaring omission from her CV - a New Zealand Cup victory.

Tonight, the Lisa Ahern-trained 27kg ball of muscle will start as the warmest favourite ever seen in a New Zealand Cup.

She was being offered at $1.50 yesterday on the TAB Final Field market for the $100,000 Buy Sell & Exchange New Zealand Cup at group one level.

Little Mother has been the dominant chaser in this year's series, having delivered emphatic heat and semifinal wins. She is required to jump from the tricky five-trap tonight.

However, only bad luck will deny the winner of 69 races and a record-setting $271,126 in stake earnings in the feature.

"Everything has [been] going okay for her so far. There's nothing we can do about her draw. I feel she has improved during the series.

I don't believe anything else in this field can live with her if she pings away and that is the key to the whole race," said Ahern.

So who can at least make this NZ Cup a competitive affair?

Another Dollar has the runs on the board to do so, after being a brilliant winner of the recent Sister Cities Challenge Cup on the track. His best winning option is to ping away smartly from the seven trap.

"He has struck a bit of trouble in his latest races and that hasn't been a bad thing as it would have taught him a few things about open-class racing. What he has won has been on sheer raw ability.

"His draw won't worry him and we are expecting a bold effort from him," said trainer John McInerney.

If Another Dollar does begin quickly, then he can provide the talented, but erratic, Sideshow Bob a nice drag into the race. He jumps from the eight-trap, which is likely to suit him. His mentors Dave and Jean Fahey are NZ Cup training specialists.

So, on that basis, his kennelmate Freddy John may figure in the placings. He has caught the eye in the manner he has contested both of his races so far in this series, after receiving checkered passages, yet still mounting sustained finishing bursts.

"To be honest with you, I really don't know what he will do here. He's capable of leading and if he can cross that early speed inside him, then he can feature at the finish.

"He is smart on his day, but he can also do a lot of things wrong," said co-trainer Dave Fahey. "Freddy John, tends to be slow from the traps, but he knows how to come home okay - he's as good as we can get him."

* Tonight's other group race feature is the $25,000 Borat at Stud Galaxy Sprint over the 295m dash.

The Foxton, Paul Freeman and Angela Turnwald-trained Big Gift has been the favourite from the start of this series.

She can make a flyer from the traps and there's no doubt she can lead throughout by doing just that. "She's capable of delivering a 17sec sprint and that should be good enough to win it by doing so," said Freeman.

The locally Gary Cleeve-trained Know Joy has done everything right in both of her sprints in this series.

"She has developed a real good record sprinting on this track and she has run a fast first sectional from this trap before. She can win this by repeating that," said Cleeve.

The Fahey-trained Pretty Good is ideally boxed away in the eight trap here. "This is a good draw if he decides to use it. He will need to get handier early on, but if he does his strong run home ability could test most of the others here," said Fahey.

The only northern-trained sprinter remaining in this series is the Mike Lozell, Tokoroa trained My Jack Attack, who beat Big Gift in last week's semifinal when out-finishing her.

"If he jumps with them I feel he's strong enough to give them a bit of a shake here. He has improved after having a couple of races down there, now," said Lozell.