Murtagh to ride Septimus

Johnny Murtagh has been confirmed as the partner for Septimus in the Emirates Melbourne Cup on November 4.

Ballydoyle will keep faith in their stable jockeys for all three contenders with Colm O'Donoghue on Honolulu and Wayne Lordan on Alessandro Volta.

"I think what Aidan (O'Brien) is planning at the moment is for Johnny to ride Septimus and the plan is bring Colm O'Donoghue to ride Honolulu," Tom Magnier, racing manager for Coolmore's Australian operation, told At The Races.

"Colm rode for the (Lee) Freedman camp a couple of years ago and he knows the place.

"Wayne Lordan, I think, will ride Alessandro Volta because of the light weight, he's a good pilot."

Meanwhile, Luca Cumani is hopeful of going one better than last year after Mad Rush finished fourth in Saturday's Caulfield Cup.

"It was a hell of a good prep race for the horse," said the Newmarket handler, who saddled Purple Moon 12 months ago.

"The plan wasn't to be so far back but he slightly missed the break because the horse next door to him was messing around and distracted him.

"Throughout the race he got further and further back so that he was last coming into the straight which meant we had traffic problems, but we finished with great resolve.

"I hope he'll be ridden more positively and be closer to the pace. It looks like being a strongly-run race because Aidan O'Brien has two pacemakers so we certainly wouldn't want to be that far back."