PAT HEALY: Brand Ambassador Pat Healy chats to us this week about the impressive chase debut of Envoi Allen, and calls out Australian commentators’ handling of Joseph O’Brien’s Melbourne Cup victory.
Gordon Elliott
It was a fantastic couple of days for Gordon Elliott at Down Royal and it’s clear the hunger and “want” for a first trainers’ title is as strong again this year. He won eight of the 14 races in The North and he looks sure to give Willie [Mullins] another proper battle this season. We know that Willie doesn’t really get going till the Clonmel Oil Chase meeting in mid-November, but Gordon has nearly twice as many winners already as well as being nearly £250k ahead in prize money, so it’s going to be a really close-run thing. Mind you Gordon has had nearly 400 more runners then Willie so far and I’m sure he will keep up a relentless gallop. Of course there is plenty of time till the end of April but the Elliott machine is getting bigger and better each year and for all of us it’s fascinating to watch these two powerhouses of the jumping game taking each other on.
Envoi Allen
It was hard not to be incredibly impressed by Envoi Allen’s chase debut at Down Royal. He pretty much did everything you could have wanted on your first start over fences and Gordon would have been over the moon. There will obviously be much bigger tests ahead and he’ll have to improve again, but as I said last week, he’s the one most people would want to own if they could pick any horse this season. He looks a superstar in the making and it looks as if it’s going to take a pretty good one to take his unbeaten status away from him.
Colin Keane
Colin Keane or ‘Baby Mick’, as he’s known, wrapped up his second Irish jockey’s championship on Monday after riding his 100th winner of the season at the Curragh. It was a really interesting title race with Seamie Heffernan starting off so well, but then getting banned for three weeks, before Shane Foley stormed clear. He was 14 or 15 clear of Colin at one stage and many thought it was in the bag for Shane after Colin had to do two weeks isolation after riding Siskin at Goodwood. However, Colin has been in superb form since and to win the title having had those two weeks off, is an incredible achievement.
If Colin stays healthy and can continue to improve, he will be the next Pat Smullen, Mick Kinane or Johnny Murtagh. He’s that good and he’s just got to keep doing what he’s doing and he can go right to the top.
He’s obviously off to America to ride Siskin in the Breeders’ Cup this weekend and if he were to get the win on him, it would show the world just what a top-class jockey Colin is.
Melbourne Cup
You couldn’t make it up that Joseph O’Brien would win two Melbourne Cups at the age of 27. A lot of credit must go to Joseph for both sourcing and getting Twilight Payment to peak for the big day, but likewise to his team out in Australia, both Mark Power and Sean Corby. They’ve been out there for five or six weeks and have obviously done a fantastic job for Joseph which just shows how important a good team is to the success of a trainer.
Twilight Payment just pipped Tiger Moth which means Aidan O’Brien is still yet to win the race, but you really feel it’s only a matter of time till he does. Both him and Joseph show the position training in Ireland is in at the moment and I’m sure it won’t be long till we’re celebrating another Irish-trained Melbourne Cup winner.
I was watching the race on At The Races on Tuesday morning and the one thing that struck me was that in the six minutes after the race had been run, Channel 10 only mentioned Joseph O’Brien’s name twice! It sounded to me they were quite disappointed that Joseph won the race and the Cup was going overseas again. The commentators came across pretty poorly in my eyes. To win the race twice at Joseph’s age is a fantastic achievement and I don’t think they gave him nearly enough credit for that. Matt Chapman noticed what had happened and he got on the phone to O’Brien to discuss the victory soon after, so fair play to Chapman for that. Why couldn’t Channel 10 have rang Joseph ? Maybe they were convinced they were in for a home victory? Bad form I thought.
