Panther set for Yorkshire Cup on Friday Brown Panther heads a tidy field of six bidding for Group Two honours in Friday's Betway Yorkshire Cup on the Knavesmire. Connections of Michael Owen's globetrotting seven-year-old are using this mile-and-three-quarter test at York as a stepping stone to the Gold Cup at Royal Ascot, in which he finished fourth past the post last summer. Winner of the Dubai Gold Cup at Meydan in March, the Tom Dascombe-trained Brown Panther is burdened with a 4lb penalty for his Irish St Leger victory at the Curragh last September. He will face stiff opposition from John Gosden's Romsdal and the Sir Michael Stoute-trained Snow Sky. They were second and third respectively in last season's Ladbrokes St Leger, in which Brown Panther was runner-up in 2011. Andrew Balding saddles Havana Beat, who was fourth to Brown Panther in Dubai, while Ed Dunlop's two runners, Times Up and Island Remede, complete the sextet. David Lanigan opted not to declare Biographer, who will instead run in the Vintage Crop Stakes at Navan on Sunday. The other withdrawals at the 48-hour final declaration stage were last week's Ormonde Stakes scorer Clever Cookie, Odeon and the German-trained Salut.
