This species is distinguished from its congeners by the following set of characters: elongated body with greatest depth more evenly distributed over its length and with more gradual posterior taper beyond this point; long, filamentous second ocular-side pectoral-fin ray is longer than, or equal to its greatest body depth; head relatively narrow; scales on blind sides of dorsal- and anal-fin rays (at sizes ? 70 mm SL); with higher and mostly non-overlapping meristic values, total vertebrae ? 40, D 98-116, A 62-72, lateral-line pores 82-106,supracranial pterygiophores 25-31, usually 10–15 ; gill rakers on first gill arch usually 10-5; scales between mid-eye and dorsal margin of head usually 8-10; scales between anteroventral margin of lower (non-migrated) eye and dorsal margin of rostral hood above mouth usually 4-6; relatively small, thin gill rakers on upper limb of first gill arch. not reaching dorsalmost gill rakers on lower limb; with 1-5 fleshy, finger-like filaments on inner anteroventral margin of fleshy skinfold on ocular-side lower jaw; IO space relatively wide; and morphometric features including shorter postorbital length, narrower upper and lower head lobes, narrower caudal peduncle, smaller ratio of HW/HL, longer snout, and smaller eye. Colouration: ocular side with several faint longitudinal lines and sometimes with up to three dark blotches along lateral line; dorsal- and anal-fin rays and roof of mouth are uniformly pigmented; inner lining of ocular-side opercle dusky (not black) (Ref. 123823).