by Myra Lewyn

Trainer Aidan O’Brien’s Mikhail Glinka is the only stakes winner among the field of nine entered for Saturday’s $373,050 Criterium de Saint-Cloud (Fr-G1), France’s final Group 1 race of 2009.

The two-year-old Galileo (Ire) colt and two stablemates will bid for a repeat victory for O’Brien, whose Fame And Glory capped last season with a triumph in the 2,000-meter (9.94-furong) race. Fame And Glory went on to win the 2009 Dubai Duty Free Irish Derby (Ire-G1) following a runner-up finish to Sea The Stars in the Investec Epsom Derby (Eng-G1).

Mikhail Glinka has two wins and one second in four starts this season and scored a four-length victory on heavy ground in the 1 1/8-mile Eyrefield Stakes at Leopardstown on November 5 in his most recent start. He won his debut in August at Galway but was outshone in his stakes debut in the Juddmonte Royal Lodge Stakes (Eng-G2) on September 26 at Ascot by stablemate Joshua Tree. Mikhail Glinka was slightly hampered just over a furlong out in the Royal Lodge and finished sixth. The third-place finisher in the race, Vale of York (Ire), won the Grey Goose Breeders’ Cup Juvenile (G1) on November 7 at Santa Anita Park.

Joshua Tree was under consideration for the Criterium de Saint-Cloud but was withdrawn from consideration on Thursday, Racing Post reported.

Mikhail Glinka, who will be ridden by Seamus Heffernan, will be joined in the race by maiden winners Don Carlos and Banyan Tree. Don Carlos, a Galileo colt, will be ridden by O’Brien’s first-call riderl, Johnny Murtagh, and Banyan Tree, a Danehill Dancer colt who was fourth behind Mikhail Glinka in the Eyrefield, will be guided by Colm O’Donoghue.

Other entrants include Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid al Maktoum’s Layali Al Andalus, a Halling colt who was a close runner-up to St Nicholas Abbey in the Juddmonte Beresford Stakes (Eng-G2) on September 27 at the Curragh; and third-place finisher Passion for Gold, a Kentucky-bred Medaglia d’Oro colt owned by Godolphin.

Myra Lewyn is a Thoroughbred Times TODAY editor