Samcro champion dreams fail to take off

THERE was the sound of hissing in the air at Leopardstown yesterday … not from disgruntled punters but from the further deflation of Samcro’s reputation after he finished fifth in the Ryanair Hurdle.

Samcro, owned by Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary, was reckoned to be a flying machine when he won at the Cheltenham Festival in March and then aimed at this season’s Champion Hurdle rather than novice chasing. However, those ambitions crashed with a third successive defeat.

Samcro, the 6- 4 favourite, cruised alongside his pacemaker Tombstone and everything looked to be going to plan for his jockey, Jack Kennedy, jumping the second-last flight. But Samcro was already floundering before the last as Sharjah passed the leaders to win by three-and-three-quarter lengths for champion amateur rider Patrick Mullins.

“The ground is crucial to him. It made all the difference. Patrick said he’s so good on the ground,” Mullins said.

Mullins had looked a whiter shade of pale following Faugheen’s crashing fall in the Christmas Hurdle on Friday but reported the horse to be “sore but fine”.

Calling a horse Champ – as JP McManus did to honour Sir Anthony McCoy – could have been a hostage to fortune, but Champ lived up to his name to win the Betway Challow Novices’ Hurdle at Newbury.

“I love the turn of foot he had at the end of the day, given the fact he pulled pretty hard the whole way,” said Champ’s trainer, Nicky Henderson.

Scottish trainers ended the year in style, winning all six races on the card at Kelso.

Sandy Thomson’s Shades of Midnight still does not look the finished article over fences and blundered through the open ditch on the first circuit but showed his potential as he beat Castletown by 10 lengths.

Thomson completed a double when Dimple won the amateur riders’ handicap hurdle.

Cameron Wadge, who suffered a heavy fall in the race, was described as “conscious and talking” before being taken to Borders General Hospital for further examination.