The muscleman: an invaluable asset for manipulating bad backs and other disorders

It was like a serious car-crash scene, a huge and anxious crowd gathered around the pitch of Michael and Marie Field, all eyes trained on the action in the centre, murmurs of concern, of sympathy.

Focus of all the attention was Kyle Ranger, who had just won his Derby semi-final course in fine style but who had then taken a terrible fall, spectacular and brutal. He had been carried from the field in a buggy, Elaine and Sinead – his catchers, adult daughters of Michael and Marie – in tears, and now he was being examined, inch by inch.

A miracle would be required to get him to run in the final in just over an hour’s time; a major miracle to get him back to full fitness. “I’d be hopeful,” said vet Tom Kearney, from Abbeyfeale, “He got back up very quickly (from the tumble). It’s definitely not a muscle anyway — we’ll let him lie down for ten minutes, see how he is when he gets up. At that stage, we’ll know.”