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Ralph Beckett, who has had a stellar season including an Irish Derby winner with Westover, was in the self-deprecating mode that is his default position. He declared: ‘She caught me out at home originally. I told the owners she would win a novice and that would be it. It just shows how wrong you can be.’ After four quick runs, he explained: ‘We had to pull up. I wasn’t sure that she was quite back on her game. She did just one piece of work on grass last week and that was it. She’s obviously very, very good. She was just flicking across the grass, she’s such a professional.’ But could she stay a mile? ‘I’ve never felt it. It’s very unlikely.’
What Ralph does resent is that Lezoo’s record now shows five runs, four wins and one second. He believes it should have been five victories, but the stewards let Mawj, who is the only filly to defeat her and was well beaten in third on Saturday, keep that previous race although she had carted Lezoo halfway across the course in winning. In contrast, Lezoo’s proud trainer pointed out, his Haskoy was demoted from second to fourth by the stewards in the St Leger, a decision he is appealing. ‘The one case was a hundred yards out and we didn’t get it. The other was two furlongs out and we got thrown out. There’s nothing wrong with the rulebook, it’s the consistency of the decision-making that is the problem.’
Aidan O’Brien had no doubts about Blackbeard’s future after he had come home two lengths clear of his stable companion The Antarctic to win the Middle Park. ‘He’s fast. He’s a five- or six-furlong horse.’ It will be the Commonwealth Cup rather than the Guineas for him. And how about his unruly antics before the start? ‘Oh, there’s no badness in him,’ said Blackbeard’s trainer. ‘At home you don’t be asking him to wait too long. He’s telling us: “I’m ready. Come on!” and we don’t disagree with him.’ Interestingly, Aidan said he was happy when Ryan Moore went to the front on Blackbeard: ‘Usually they don’t go fast enough to give him a lead and he has to make the running. It’s always best in these big races to get to the lead.’
The Cambridgeshire went to the 25-1 Mick Channon-trained Majestic, who only four months ago was an unraced four-year- old. Ridden by 5lb claimer Aidan Keeley, who was having his first-ever ride at Newmarket, he came out of the clouds at the finish. His cool young rider claimed to be incapable of framing the words to describe the experience, but he did. Former trainer and former fellow footballer Mick Quinn had been deputed by an isolating Channon to pick up the prize for him. Quinn confessed to having had a fiver each way at 40-1 – ‘8st 2lb and a claimer up; it had to make sense’ – and then dragged his fellow veteran David Elsworth up to the rostrum to share the receiving duties. How many times had he won the race, I asked ‘Elsie’. Once in 1998 with Lear Spear at 20-1 and once in 2004 with Spanish Don at 100-1 – and he can still describe both finishes. On the phone he told Channon: ‘You’re a lucky boy. It was about time you won it.’
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