6 Flat Meetings Today

Day 4 of our jump racing sabatical and we have six meetings on the level to bring you this afternoon from Haydock, Brighton, Yarmouth, Sandown, Southwell and Chepstow.  Unsurprisingly, despite the amount of action on offer on these shores the most prize money on offer today comes from the two Irish meetings at Leopardstown and Sligo - the meeting at Sligo is a jumps card and even that has more money on offer than any of our flat fixtures!  Two of the races at Chepstow are worth less than £2,000 and by the time you take expenses into account there wouldn't be much left over for the poor owner...mind you someone has to keep these poor racecourses going.

It never fails to make me chuckle when I listen to these trainers or racing managers...it would seem that every horse they have in their care is working well!  I cannot remember the last time I heard them say that one wasn't working very well...if perhaps they were to throw that in occasionally, I might be more inclined to believe what they have to say.

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The British trainers' championships are a complete joke - just take a look at this season's flat table...Richard Hannon is rightly leading the way on 161 winners, but Aidan O'Brien is currently lying in second postion despite only having trained 9 winners, while Mark Johnston is third despite having trained 141 winners.  To outsiders it must look ridiculous, but as we know it is decided on prize money won.  It is the same story with the jumps, when are we going to go back to how it should be done?  On the number of winners trained...

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I hope Liverpool just play Luis Suarez in the reserves until he come to his senses.  The trouble is, there is just too much money sitting around.  They will have to let him go in the end - it is just a shame that there is not a team in Siberia with a lot of money to spend!

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I see that some Aussie television channels have hinted that some of our players have put silicone on their bats to avoid detection from the 'hot spot' thermal imaging cameras when they edge the ball.  I know some women who use silicone, but I can't say I have ever heard of it among cricketers!