One Cool Cat is one hot topic of controversy
In the overall scheme of things this was of no importance. But, in the little world in which some of us live - the horseracing world - we shouldn’t let it go unchallenged.
This absolutely made my blood boil. To what am I referring? A quote of Aidan O’Brien’s which the Racing Post used on Monday.
They used it for their own ends, which had no basis in fact and was total bullshit.
This is how the story goes.
After O’Brien’s impressive newcomer, Magritte, had won a maiden at Tipperary on Sunday this scribbler popped a question to the trainer in the winner’s enclosure.
The question: “Aidan, without hyping the horse, have you anything particularly in mind for him.”
The response went like this: “I’m not going to hype him, there are no definite plans, lots of them (Ballydoyle juveniles) have to be slotted in.”
A simple, no-nonsense, honest reply. But the Racing Post, behaving like a true tabloid, decided there was much more to that than met the eye.
If you are a regular reader of the Post you will know they produce various pieces of silliness every day. One of them is the quote of the day which appears in the middle of reports.
The quote of the day from Tipperary was O’Brien’s: “I’m not going to hype this one”, with the following observation alongside.
It said: “Aidan O’Brien on Magritte, clearly stung by James Willoughby’s comments regarding One Cool Cat at the Curragh.”
I have a vague recollection o f Willoughby writing something in the Post about One Cool Cat, regarding what O’Brien said about the horse having the ability to go through the gears.
It was something like that, anyway, of no great interest or relevance to anybody.
For the Post to then insinuate that O’Brien is now in some way afraid to speak openly, or is at least watching his words, about his horses, because this guy Willoughby may be waiting in the long grass, is downright wrong.
I know there’s an old maxim in journalism, never let the facts get in the way of a good story, but this was just plain ridiculous.
There was no tie-up at all between what O’Brien said at Tipperary and Willoughby and for the Post to be giving one of their own staff such an unearned, inflated status stretches credibility far beyond breaking point.
When the Post is hyping Willoughby they describe him in the following hilarious manner: “The man who’s turned the way journalists look at the sport on its head.” Every time I read it, I get a fit of laughing. Does anybody, even within the four walls of the Post, believe that?
Willoughby in no more than a journeyman hack and if I’m ever influenced by him then I’ll know immediately it’s time to start doing something else, like learning to play the spoons.
The blurb the Post, leading to an inside page, had on their front page on Monday said: “Aidan O’Brien unleashes his latest juvenile sensation at Tipperary.”
Note the use of the word sensation, this about a horse who had just won a maiden, even if it was a fine performance.
Why does the Post behave like this? They don’t have any competition and are preaching to the converted.
I speak as one who buys the paper six, often seven, times a week. If it came out twenty times a week I’d buy it twenty times. And so would would most other regular readers, one suspects.
They have a growing tendency to sensationalise and to treat their readers like clowns, rather than intelligent human-beings. I don’t like it one bit. Oh, for an alternative!
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IT’S a gas world entirely! Next month Newmarket plans to run a race confined to greys.
This is what Lisa Hancock, managing director of Newmarket, said: "It would be fantastic to see a big field of greys battling it out up the straight.”
Really. Lisa, old girl, punters couldn’t care less if the horse they back is pink, as long as it sticks it’s old snout in front at the line. Oh God.
But, perhaps, we are too quick to criticise and there’s an edge in this for racecourses.
Could Michael Lane in Cork, Peter Roe in Tipperary, or any enterprising manager of a track, come up with a race that would pack them in?
How about a contest confined to horses who can fart the Polish National Anthem? Now that could be an explosive winner!
