Clearly Innocent does it again in Luskin

Clearly Innocent has been given a hero’s welcome home to Scone where he has claimed the Luskin Star Stakes for the second year running.

Formerly trained on the track by Greg Bennett who has taken up a position with Aquis Farm in Queensland, Clearly Innocent is now prepared at Newcastle by Kris Lees.

He returned to familiar surroundings on Saturday to start both the crowd favourite and punters favourite at $3.50 in the 1300m sprint.

His 2-1/4 length win over Snoopy ($7) has set him up for a tilt at the Group One Kingsford Smith Cup (1350m) at Doomben.

“He has a great affinity with the track,” Lees said.

“He is a lovely horse and turned up in such lovely condition from Greg. It’s very pleasing to be able to produce him today.

“He’s a very popular horse.

“We’ll assess the race and have a look at the Brisbane race in a couple of weeks.”

Clearly Innocent’s jockey Hugh Bowman said the horse had shown him the way.

“He knows the track better than I do,” he said.

“They went hard which suited me and he showed his quality.”