KEY POINTS:
MELBOURNE - Andrew Murphy doesn't look the shy retiring type.
But Aiden O'Brien's assistant trainer got a touch of almost speechlessness at the international media press conference at Sandown yesterday morning.
With O'Brien making the decision not to come to Australia for tomorrow's A$5 million Melbourne Cup, Murphy is in sole charge of equal favourite Yeats.
But you'd be excused for thinking the Irishman was guarding the crown jewels instead with his reluctance to offer up any info on the Yeats approach to one of the world's leading races.
He probably slept with a sock in his mouth last night in case he talked in his sleep.
Murphy is a very agreeable bloke, he just doesn't see the need to share his knowledge of Yeats with the rest of the world.
Others close to the Yeats team have declared that the outstanding Irish stayer has had noticeable movement in his coat in the last few weeks.
Yeats looked healthy as he brushed past at a brisk walk, tail swishing as usual, at Sandown yesterday, but the coat is getting a touch long as his body struggles with the acclimatisation problems of switching hemispheres.
Much has been made of there being two Yeats - one regarded as the world's best distance stayer and the less effective Yeats, who showed in finishing second in the Irish St Leger last start that he was far from invincible.
His best form has been when he's been fresh.
"He's had just three races this year," Murphy offered.
Asked if in the past he has been given any indication of how Yeats was going to perform by judging his trackwork, regular rider Kieren Fallon at Flemington on Saturday said: "No."
There was one vital bit of information coming out of yesterday's conference.
For weeks the Japanese team around high profile stablemates Pop Rock and Delta Blues have said they are happy with both horses and they couldn't pick one ahead of the other.
Yesterday, trainer Katsuhiko Sumii, through interpreter Keita Tanaka, said that Pop Rock was now clearly the stable elect.
Pop Rock finished only seventh, but turned in one of the best Caulfield Cup runs as a Melbourne Cup guide.
Damien Oliver, who has a wonderful Melbourne Cup record, is growing in confidence he can win the Cup on Pop Rock.
"He hasn't run 3200m yet, but his Caufield Cup effort told me he almost certainly will," said Oliver.
English trainer Jamie Poulton, an ex disc jockey and looking still very much like one, will produce roughie Land'N' Stars into tomorrow's Cup, but is tipping Pop Rock.
"I saw him work yesterday and I thought he went terrifically well."
Ex jumps jockey Jamie Osborne, a natural comedian, is very bullish about the prospects of Geordieland.
Osborne is not alone in believing that of the European brigade, Geordieland is the one that has got under the handicapper's guard at 54kg.
"Based on that weight equation, I can come up with science to say my horse will win the Cup."
Glistening's trainer Luca Cumani wasn't keen to declare his tip for the Cup but, pressed, came up with joint favourite Tawqeet. Glistening finished second to Tawqeet in a race in England last year but has won only one race and is an outsider.
