Park’s thrilling triumph fires Festival warning

PAISLEY PARK fired a warning that he is still a leading player for the Stayers’ Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival with a stirring win in the Cleeve Hurdle that raised the roof at the track’s Festival Trials Day.

A three-and-a-quarter-length win from odds-on favourite Champ prompted three cheers around the winner’s enclosure and his Stayers’ Hurdle odds to shorten from 33-1 to 8-1.

Plenty has happened since the Emma Lavelle-trained 10-year-old won the 2019 Stayers’ Hurdle and after finishing seventh in 2020 to Lisnagar Oscar — yesterday’s third — and third behind Flooring Porter last year, his hopes of landing the Festival prize run on March 17 again looked slim.

A five-race losing run stretching back to December 2020 appeared another indicator that Aidan Coleman’s mount’s best day were behind him. But after gifting his opponents 20 lengths at the start,

Paisley Park delivered a trademark performance — and showed the reason he has such a big fan club — when he rescued what looked an impossible task with a glorious victory.

An emotional Lavelle said: ‘That was proper Paisley today. We haven’t seen that in a while. Aidan came into the paddock and said this is the track which works for him. They always get racing from quite a long way out and you have to stay. That is his absolute forte.

‘He just kept galloping and that was vintage Paisley.’

Yesterday’s win was a third in the Cleeve Hurdle for Paisley Park, whose owner Andrew Gemmell is recuperating from heart surgery.

The Cleeve Hurdle was abandoned last season when the track was waterlogged and Lavelle believes missing his prep race was a factor in the 2021 defeat.

Flooring Porter is now 3-1 favourite in a fluid market which had seen previous market leader Klassical Dream run disappointingly last week. Champ is 5-1 and Nicky Henderson’s hope should not be written off. He looked the winner a furlong out and less taxing ground in March will suit better.

Henderson had earlier given owner JP McManus his 4,000th winner when Chantry House, ridden by Nico De Boinville, dug deep to win the Cotswold Chase by two-anda-half lengths from Santini.