Bettor Cover Lover, winner of Victoria Oaks final on Friday night, is in a critical condition at a Melbourne veterinary clinic after being injured.
"It is 50-50 whether she will survive after getting her leg caught when being loaded on the plane on Saturday morning to come back to New Zealand," Brent Mangos, her Pukekohe trainer, said last night.
"She was cut through to the coffin bone and she has been operated on at the Werribee clinic."
Her owner, Perth veterinarian Trevor Lindsay, assisted in the operation.
Mangos, who returned home last night, said the next few days would be crucial to her recovery.
"If infection gets into the bone [right hind leg] she will have to be put down. If she recovers, I very much doubt she would race again," Mangos said.
Bettor Cover Lover had won a heat and $A100,000 final of the Victoria Oaks, advancing her record to 11 wins, three seconds and a third in 15 starts. The daughter of Bettor's Delight and Front Cover Lover amassed some $550,000 in stakes.
She won the Harness Jewels and Sires' Stakes Fillies Championship at group one level as a 2yr-old. She won the Oaks by a length and a-quarter in a 1.58.2 mile rate for the 2240m (mobile) in the hands of Mangos.
The Mark Purdon-trained and driven Fly Like An Eagle won his heat of the Pacing Gold series for 2yr-old colts and geldings at Melton on Friday night in a 1.58.8 mile rate for the 1720m (mobile).
Soho Valencia (1.57.3 ) and Teniamo (2.00.1) were the other heat winners.
Sunnivue Caesar won a $A15,000 race, his third win in eight starts since he was sold out of the Portobello stable of Steve Ashton in January.
• Hot Danish, the winner of 16 races and $A2.3 million, was put down in Sydney yesterday after her condition deteriorated from a leg infection.
