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Appleby: updates on Rebel’s Romance, Opera Ballo and Notable Speech
By Racing TV
Last Updated: Sun 21 Jun 2026
Rebel’s Romance will bid to give Charlie Appleby back-to-back victories in the Princess of Wales’s Stakes during Newmarket’s July Festival having swerved an intended engagement at Royal Ascot.
It had been thought the globetrotting superstar would defend his Hardwicke Stakes crown at the Royal meeting, but with the Moulton Paddocks handler minded to carefully choose his assignments, the eight-year-old will divert to the July course before a possible run at Saratoga later in the summer.
The Godolphin trainer won the race last year with El Cordobes.
Appleby said: “He’s going to go to the Princess of Wales’s Stakes at Newmarket.
“I was following the entries for the Hardwicke Stakes and like us all, he’s getting a bit older and I just want to pick his route out for him and make sure he comes out as a live shot.
“I felt Ascot could be a tough gig for him, so we’ll go to Newmarket. I’d like to still take him to America for the Sword Dancer (now the Christophe Clement Stakes) but we’ll take it race by race.
“He’s in good order though, he galloped during the week and is on target for Newmarket.”
Ascot proved a somewhat frustrating week for Appleby and some of his big names, with Opera Ballo hunted down late when attempting to make all in the opening Queen Anne Stakes and big-race favourite Notable Speech again failing to fire in Berkshire.
Notable Speech will seek to get back on track in the Prix Jacques le Marois in which he was a head second in last year, while his younger stablemate will tackle the likes of Bow Echo and possibly Gstaad in the Sussex Stakes at the end of next month.
Appleby said: “Notable Speech will head to France and Opera Ballo will go to Goodwood.
“If you step out of it and look at it, you have to be positive about what Opera Ballo achieved, as well as Talk Of New York (third in St James’s Palace Stakes).
“They have all pulled out of it well and the only one who licked his bowl was Notable Speech which is funny because he would be the one who I don’t think puts a great deal in at Ascot, but we put a line through him.”
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