Two Group One wins in her homeland and a possible first in Australia may not be enough to convince New Zealand trainer Lisa Latta to follow in the footsteps of Ethereal's trainer Sheila Laxon.Latta is on her first trip across the Tasman and is hopeful her filly Can't Keeper Down can win Saturday's Group One Queensland Oaks (2400m) at Eagle Farm.Laxon, who now trains in Victoria with her partner John Symons, burst into prominence in 2001 when she brought a then-unknown Ethereal to Brisbane for th

Two Group One wins in her homeland and a possible first in Australia may not be enough to convince New Zealand trainer Lisa Latta to follow in the footsteps of Ethereal's trainer Sheila Laxon.

Latta is on her first trip across the Tasman and is hopeful her filly Can't Keeper Down can win Saturday's Group One Queensland Oaks (2400m) at Eagle Farm.

Laxon, who now trains in Victoria with her partner John Symons, burst into prominence in 2001 when she brought a then-unknown Ethereal to Brisbane for the Queensland Oaks.

Ethereal won the Group Three Doomben Roses at her Australian debut then scored a brilliant victory in the Queensland Oaks before Laxon sent her to Victoria in the spring to win the Caulfield and Melbourne Cups double.

Latta's two Group One victories in New Zealand were with Wharite Princess in the New Zealand Oaks at Trentham in 2004 and Mikki Street in the Zabeel Classic at Ellerslie in 2006.

The trainer planned to run Wharite Princess in the 2004 Queensland Oaks but the filly died of a heart attack following her New Zealand Oaks triumph while Mikki Street broke a leg following his Zabeel Classic victory.

She said there were no similarities between her New Zealand Oaks winner and Can't Keeper Down who won at her last start over 1550 metres at Te Aroha on May 2.

"There's no comparison between Wharite Princess and this filly," Latta said.

"Wharite Princess was big, strong and aggressive whereas Can't Keeper Down is only small.

"I know what Sheila (Laxon) did with Ethereal but I'm not looking that far ahead with my filly.

"At this stage I haven't even thought about the Melbourne spring but there's a chance she might run in the Kelt Capital Stakes at home.

"Unfortunately they've just reduced the prizemoney for the Kelt to $NZ1.2 million but I'd probably look at that first before thinking about Melbourne."

Latta, who has been training for nine years, has already decided Can't Keeper Down won't run in the Group One Queensland Derby (2400m) at Eagle Farm on Saturday week.

"She's only having one run here and then she's off to the paddock," she said.

Latta is not overly concerned with the track condition for Eagle Farm and has named fellow Kiwi Ekstreme as the main threat to Can't Keeper Down.

Can't Keeper Down is a daughter of Keeper and was runner-up to Jungle Rocket in the New Zealand Oaks at Trentham in mid-March.

"She had every chance against Jungle Rocket. She hit the front in the straight but was left a sitting duck for Jungle Rocket," she said.

Can't Keeper Down finished a close fifth at her previous start in the Group Three Lowland Stakes at Trentham in February and wasn't outclassed behind the winner Ekstreme.

"There's not a lot between the New Zealand fillies in this race," she said.

"My filly raced against Ekstreme on a testing track in the Lowland Stakes and did a good job to run fifth.

"Daffodil ran second in the race and went on to win the AJC Oaks and and Awesome Planet ran third in the Lowland."

Queensland Oaks contender Awesome Planet was a last-start winner of the Doomben Roses (2020m) on May 16.