The progressive Sevenna’s Knight was a comfortable winner of the Listed Prix Michel Houyvet at Deauville on Saturday and could be a future Melbourne Cup horse for new Australian owners OTI Management.

Trained by Andre Fabre, the son of Camelot has progressed with each of his five career starts, scoring over 1m6f at Compiegne by six-and-a-half lengths prior to the Deauville Listed victory. Bred by Gestut Ammerland, the colt was bought privately at the start of the week by the Australian-based OTI Management. Sevenna's Knight will be targeted at the Group 2 Prix Chaudenay on 'Arc' weekend at Longchamp, which is the main end-of-season race for three-year-old stayers in France.

OTI achieved the same staying double (Prix Michel Houyvet/Prix Chaudenay) in 2009 with Manighar, who was subsequently transferred to Australia and won three Group 1s – Australian Cup, Ranvet Stakes and the BMW.

Two of OTI's leading members were present on the racetrack on Saturday and spoke to French publication Jour de Galop after the race. Peter Bartholomew said: "It's a great victory. André Fabre rates the horse. We were able to find him thanks to the help of Terry Henderson and bought from Gestüt Ammerland, which was reducing the amount of horses they had. With him, we are dreaming of the Melbourne Cup, maybe next year. It's really hard to buy this type of horse from a big breeding operation and without Terry Henderson, we wouldn't have been able to. It was a hell of a negotiation, and we reached an agreement with his owner-breeder".

Fellow owner Frank Dhooge, based in Belgium, added: "He's a real hold-up horse, like he showed it at Compiègne. We would like to run it during

Arc weekend, in the race for 3-year-old stayers, the Prix Chaudeny. He settles and he is able to accelerate. All of this is very promising."