Jokers Grin competed in his debut Group 1 on Saturday in the Winterbottom Stakes, yet the five-year-old slightly missed the start and finished fifth.

The sprinter is a proven winner, claiming victory in nine races from 13 starts, but things didn’t go his way on Saturday.

Many Western Australian pundits touted the Bernie Miller-trained gelding as the horse which should most likely win the Winterbottom, yet he failed to live up to his enormous expectations.

After slightly missing the start, the bay over-raced through the middle stages of the sprint, then wasn’t able to capitalise on his opportunity when a gap down the inside opened up, which was quickly snatched by Rey Magnerio.

SENTrack’s Cam Luke was surprised by the performance and is interested in what the future holds for the gelding, especially if he is to travel across to Victoria or Sydney.

“I’m interested in Jokers Grin, I’m not a Western Australian racing guy, and by that, I mean I don’t do form, I don’t tip, I don’t watch a huge amount of Western Australian racing,” Luke said on SENTrack’s Sunday Trackside.

“But I am always interested because they have had horses for generations who have been able to come to Victoria and run well.

“I’m not 100% sold on the recent batch of Western Australian’s, and not to suggest that they haven’t been really good, like, Amelia’s Jewel was a very good horse, but just didn’t get to the level that was spruiked by some people.

“That doesn’t take away from how talented she was, it just means that when people were saying she was the best horse in Australia, it was probably a little dramatic.

“But I am interested with Jokers Grin.

“They went slow, he was all out of whack, he was keen as all mustard, but he did have an opportunity, and he just didn’t (take it).

“Rey Magnerio was able to go up the inside and take the spot to run third and Jokers Grin couldn’t quite do it, which surprised me a little bit, considering how it has been told how good this horse was over the last couple of weeks.

“So, I’m interested to see what the plan of attack is with him because I think the idea was at some point to head over to Melbourne and Sydney and have a crack at a big race or two.”

Former jockey Sam Hyland joined in on the conversation, reminding Luke that the five-year-old is still very immature in his racing intelligence.

“Yeah, I think there’s a big race in him,” Hyland said.

“You’ve got to remember he’s still only a pretty young horse the way he races.

“He’s still got to season up. He’s going to keep improving, don’t worry about that.

“I have no doubt he will come over (to Sydney) or Victoria and be able to feature in good races.

“He’s a good horse, no doubt about that.”

“That’s a good call,” Luke agreed.