Lees, who leads the Broadmeadow trainers’ premiership, had just two horses at Broadmeadow and both were well-fancied and sent out at red-figure quotes.

The first race of the afternoon, named the Mike Rabbitt Plate in honour of the retiring sports broadcaster, saw Lees’ Zelitist ($1.75F) suffer a third-straight narrow defeat, going down by 1.3 lengths to the Jim and Greg Lee-trained Wild Eyes.

In race three the Lees-trained Malachite ($1.90F) held on to win by half a length for jockey Andrew Gibbons and make it three wins from as many starts at the Newcastle track.

It was a disappointing day out for the Chris Waller-trained Sashay in race five, a maiden over 1500 metres.

Owned by Australian cricket captain Steve Smith and NSW all-rounder Moises Henriques, the mare was sent out a $2.50 favourite but could only manage fifth.

The meeting wrapped up with The Rabbs Cup over 1200 metres, won by Peter Snowden’s Lofty’s Menu ($1.75F).

Meanwhile at Randwick on Saturday, Lees’ promising filly Marple Miss scored by two lengths over 1400m.

The half-sister to Cox Plate winner Shamus Award  was sent out at $7 and had no trouble accounting for the field, claiming a fourth win from seven starts.

Lees said the horse would eventually be targeted at Warwick Farm’s group 2 Surround Stakes.