Royal Ascot next for Haydock winner King's Lynn

King’s Lynn will bid to provide the Queen with a Royal Ascot success next month after opening his account for the campaign in the Betway Achilles Stakes at Haydock.

Andrew Balding’s four-year-old had been beaten less than a length on his first two starts of the season — most recently pushing the reopposing El Astronaute close at Chester three weeks ago.

Back on a straight track, it was a very different story, with El Astronaute under pressure from the halfway stage and ultimately well beaten, while in contrast 3-1 favourite King’s Lynn travelled smoothly in the hands of Oisin Murphy.

The Cable Bay gelding picked up well to grab the lead and had enough in reserve to get the better of Moss Gill by a neck.

Balding said: “He’s done very little wrong in all his starts and he’s still reasonably lightly raced for a horse of his age.

“He’s entitled to keep on improving, I hope. I’m very pleased with him.

“He’s still in the King’s Stand and the Wokingham (at Royal Ascot). He’ll have a penalty in the Wokingham, but those are the two objectives — it will be one or the other.

“It’s impossible to say which one he’ll go for at this stage. We’ll have to see what his official rating does.”