Last year's Melbourne Cup placegetters Purple Moon and Mahler are unlikely to be back for this year's race, a leading Racing Victoria official revealed on Wednesday.
The owner of Purple Moon, runner-up to Efficient last November, is set to bypass this year's Cup in favour of a tilt at races such as the Japan Cup and the Hong Kong Vase, Racing Victoria's operations manager Leigh Jordon told Sportal on Wednesday.
While Purple Moon's name could be among the list of Cup entrants when nominations close next month, Mahler's will almost certainly not.
"He was in work this year and he just hasn't come up," Jordon said. "He won't be coming. He wouldn't even be an entrant."
The news was only a mild dampener to Jordon's scouting mission to England where he met with some of Europe's leading trainers with the view of luring the continent's best stayers and sprinters to Melbourne's spring carnival.
The Age Classic, Melbourne's spring leg of the Global Sprint Challenge, could also have an international flavour.
Jordon said the James Eustace-trained War Artist, placed recently in England's big two sprints the Golden Jubilee Stakes and the July Cup, and Hong Kong sprinter Sanziro were big chances to tackle the 1200m weight-for-age sprint.
War Artist features prominently in standings for the Global Sprint Challenge after four races.
Jordon, who returned on Saturday, said he 'couldn't be happier' with the interest shown by trainers such as Luca Cumani, O'Brien, Sir Michael Stoute and the Godolphin stable for this year's spring carnival.
"A lot of them are very astute people. I know they're going to come but what they actually bring they're a little bit cagey, which is fair enough," Jordon said.
"They're all competing against each other and they don't want to release their hand."
Jordon was confident the number of international entrants for this year's Melbourne Cup would at least match last year's total of 49.
Upcoming major staying races such as the Ebor Handicap, Europe's richest handicap, and the Irish St Leger would impact Cup numbers, he said.
"At this stage you get a lot of people saying 'yes they want to come' but previous experience is in the end you usually get anywhere between three to six international runners for the Melbourne Cup," Jordon said.
"You can get all sort of interest now and get carried away thinking you'll get a lot of horses. It's a big thing to travel from that side of the world over here and we don't pay any incentives, it's purely the prizemoney."
"(But it's a) very good response and Australia, especially the Melbourne spring carnival, is high profile and most of the trainers know all about it. It's just finding the ones with the right horses."
However, attracting an American-trained Melbourne Cup starter was likely to remain elusive.
Australia's stricter drug regulations, quarantine and travel were all factors against Racing Victoria.
"There's a lot of barriers there at the moment," Jordon said.