While one can appreciate that when it comes to interpretation of what will, is, or has happened during a race, there are libelous shackles on that deter comments about, for example, the intentions of a rider during a race where he appeared to find unnecessary trouble, the connection with the said animal drifting in the betting market beforehand, and orders which may have been given to the jockey beforehand by the trainer and owner.
But when the issue at heart is whether or not the sport is in a good place, and if not why not, then many tiptoe around what is arguably the pivotal issue, namely the domination of the sport by a smaller number of cliques than ever before.
This has never been more apparent than by what occurred on the ITV racing show on Saturday morning. The anchor for the programme, Rishi Pershad, brought up for discussion views expressed by the forthright in opinion Sir Mark Prescot, when giving a recent interview to the written press.
Prescott was mirroring how many feel from racing professionals to humble fans, when declaring that the power held by the Coolmore empire, with the majority of the best hand picked eggs stacked in Ballydoyle, makes the sport less enthralling as an entertainment spectacle than it once was.
The more mature followers of the sport will have a true feel for his sentiment. Glancing through the pre-season ante post markets for the 1979 Epsom classics, Ballydoyle had four listed in the Derby betting with the Tote, the Graustark colt Gregorian (who would never see a racecourse) the shortest at 25/1, the other three all priced up at 33/1; the unraced Daniel Schwartz owned Secretariat colt Foreign Secretary, the Tattersall's 1977 yearling sales topper Link, a son of Lyphard, and Robert Sangster's Accomplice, another son of Graustark, who would make the line up but who's biggest claim to fame was that his rider, the venerable Yves St Martin, finished the final couple of furlongs with a toilet roll streaming from him.
The eventual winner Troy was listed at 25/1 at this time - Dick Hern having what then would look to be a strong pre season presence in the Derby market with the Dewhurst runner up More Light the 12/1 second favourite, and the Queen's Mill Reef colt Milford showing at 50/1 - three listed pre season at 12's, 25's and 50's, christ, that was considered holding a reasonably strong hand back then!
In the Oaks betting Ballydoyle had two listed, both daughters of Sir Ivor, Godetia and Ivorina priced up at 20/1 and 33/1 respectively. Henry Cecil looked to have what in the day was an exceptionally strong hand with One In A Million heading the market at 16/1, Formulate at 20/1 and Odeon at 25/1. The eventual winner, the Jeremy Tree trained Scintillate, was showing at 33/1.
So, as you think it would be their duty to do so, what did the ITV team make of Prescott's take on things ?The response was predictable - the other three on the team ducking the issue, to twist, and part ignore the question, with one even thinking it would be wiser to complimenting Ballydoyle and coming out with the 'success is all due to hard work' line as though they were speaking of David Evans, Ian Williams or Roger Teal, without the relevant fact that Ballydoyle have Galileo's, 'on tap'.
In fact, for this season, Horses In Training lists the Ballydoyle team with 112 three year olds, out of which no less than 50 are by Galileo. Compare with the equine team representing that establishment in 1979 - 26 three year olds and lucky enough to have 3 of them sired by Northern Dancer. Son's of the mighty Canadian animal did not come 'on tap', with sensibly sized stallions books being the norm and it's now hard to fathom that the Ballydoyle of then invariably had the biggest quota, even though the numbers seem laughably small. Three!
Of course hard work is involved, of course they operate under considerable pressure with continued big race successes an expectation rather than a hope; but one can argue that pressures are at least equal further down the ladder to obtain results with a Bungle Inthejungle bought for six grand, chasing owners who have fallen behind paying their training fees, plus the permanent worry that a decrease in orders for the Autumn yearling sales would make make your own rent a struggle to meet.
What was most surprising about the poor, kop out offerings, from those on the programme was that it was Pershad himself who reiterated what Prescott had been stating and reminded the team that was what they had been expected to discuss. This from a presenter who has lately been giving support to his bud Apiafi who last week called for it to be brought to attention that the UK horse racing community did nothing to mark the first anniversary of a an ex criminal, who had previously served a jail sentence, being unlawfully killed by a police officer in the United States, who will likely spend the rest of his days in prison.
The ITV team ended the topic by attempting to make us believe that this year's renewal of the Blue Riband was shaping into an open affair with those with serious chances widely dispersed - well, there are likely to be as many as eight contenders from Ballydoyle doing their usual tactical spread of racing near the front, mid- division and hold up, to ensure they have something to take advantage of the race being run unevenly, though at the end of the day, deep down, most know that the front two in the market will likely fill the first two places. It's almost inevitable, it really is.
image from personal scrapbook
Even those of those who are not disco music fans cannot surely have failed to being at least a bit smitten by this track that seemed to be playing everywhere during Troy's Summer of 1979.
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