Trainer Desmond Koh was beaming with delight after he brought up his first winner a lot earlier than at his last season courtesy of a narrow win by City Lad on Sunday.

That's one of two competitive Opens on the Kranji card for this Sunday, with this one being over 1800m and both on the polytrack.

This was a new trip for Better Than Ever who was coming back from a spell, but his class was too much for the competition in the Merlion Trophy.

But that is on Sunday night, and Friday we have an Open Benchmark 89 over 1700m in the AWT.

The only surprise in the run of Rocket Man in Sunday's Kranji A was there were no surprises.