CRACK French miler Domedriver (3.00) will be a tough nut to crack in this afternoon's top race at Newbury, the £200,000 Group 1 Lockinge Stakes.

It's a glittering prize full of star-studded performers including northern powerhouse Desert Deer from Mark Johnston's yard. But Domedriver showed by beating Rock Of Gibraltar in last year's Breeders Cup Mile at Belmont that he could take on the world's best at the distance and beat them all fair and square.

Domedriver has since tasted a narrow defeat at the hands of Dandoun at Saint-Cloud 16 days ago, however there was little disgrace in that loss because the latter is a top-class performer in his own right.

Potentially the greatest threat to Domedriver's superiority may emerge from Aidan O'Brien's Hawk Wing.

Touted as a "wonder horse" throughout 2002, Hawk Wing had to suffer successive reverses from stable companions Rock Of Gibraltar in the 2000 Guineas, and then High Chaparral in the Epsom Derby. He finally claimed a major pot when clinching the Coral Eclipse at Sandown, although there was further anguish to come when touched off in the Irish Champion Stakes, plus defeat by Where Or When at Ascot in September.

Where Or When re-opposes once again and he's no forlorn hope, having proved he can slug it out pound-for-pound with Europe's leading eight-furlong horses.

However, I believe Hawk Wing ideally needs a bit further, Where Or When might not be quite at his peak fitness-wise, leaving Domedriver to complete a well-deserved smash-and-grab raid and take the money back across to channel to his native France.

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