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English trainer Luca Cumani's latest quest to win the Melbourne Cup is in danger of failing before the starting stalls burst open after Basaltico flopped in the Geelong Cup.

Basaltico needed to win the 2,406m warm-up event to Australia's richest race to be assured of a start in the £3.2 million Melbourne Cup on November 3 but could only finish seventh behind the locally-trained Leica Ding.

The horse's dismal showing came just five days after Cumani's main Melbourne Cup hopeful Cima De Triomphe finished 13th in the Caulfield Cup, when he only needed to finish in the top eight to be assured of a start at Flemington next month.

Both horses are now well down the entry list and need to win next week to have a chance of making the final 22-runner field.

An English-trained horse has never won the Melbourne Cup although Cumani came agonisingly close in each of the past two years, finishing second with Purple Moon in 2007 and then runner-up again with Bauer 12 months later.

The Godolphin-owned Crime Scene also finished out of the placings in Geelong on Wednesday, coming home sixth, but is already high enough on the order of entry to get a start in the race, which was first run in 1861.

In the past two decades, overseas trainers have spent a fortune flying their horses all the way to Australia in the hope of winning the gruelling 3,200m handicap but only three outside of Australia or New Zealand have succeeded.

Irish trainer Dermot Weld won with Vintage Crop in 1993 then again with Media Puzzle in 2002 while the Japanese-trained Delta Blues won in 2006.

Reuters