I remember Christmasses past, getting the Sporting Life and the Sporting Chronicle and the Irish Field on 23rd or 24th December, the ones that had the declared runners for St Stephen’s Day – or Boxing Day as we were sometimes apt to call it, influenced, no doubt, by the diaries that we used to get, all printed in the UK, and by the BBC racing commentators – and going back to my grandfather’s house, huddling around the turf fire with my brother and my grandfather and poring over the form for three days, swearing to my dad that we were helping my grandfather wrap his Christmas presents.

I remember one year, getting to the shop a day late – maybe the decs were in a day early, maybe Christmas Eve fell on a Sunday that year, who knows – being told by our local shopkeeper that they had sold out of Sporting Chronicles, and hearing my grandfather use words that I didn’t think anybody under the age of 12 should hear and anyone over the age of 60 should use to describe said shopkeeper. It never happened again. As long as the Sporting Chronicle lasted – sadly, not too much longer – there was one in my grandfather’s house every Christmas thereafter, with his name on it.

I remember another year, we decided that there was a bet in one of the novice hurdles at Kempton, Derby Dilly I think his name was. David Elsworth had the likely favourite in the race, a grey front-runner, but we thought that he was vulnerable. The horse we backed ran okay, he stayed on late to snatch third place, as I recall, and save the each-way money, but he never got near the favourite. That favourite, the one that we thought was vulnerable and possibly over-rated, was called – yes, you’ve guessed – Desert Orchid.

This year, it was a festive season of near misses for me on the betting front. It started with Starluck in the Christmas Hurdle at Kempton on St Stephen’s Day. In fairness, it would have been a travesty if he had got up to beat Go Native, unquestionably the best horse in the race, and I’m not sure why he is not now favourite for the Champion Hurdle. He has now won the Fighting Fifth and the Christmas Hurdle, he is a previous Cheltenham Festival winner, and he is no better than third favourite for the Champion.

The near misses continued with Weapon’s Amnesty in the Knight Frank Chase back at Leopardstown on the 28th. I thought that Davy Russell gave him a top ride, settling him nicely out the back, allowing him warm to his jumping, making his ground from the second last, delivering him with a killer blow over the last and going at least a half a length up on the run-in, a horse whose stamina over the trip is proven. Game over. He traded at 1.13 on Betfair in-running. (Yes I checked. You always check these things just to make yourself feel worse.) But that was to not reckon with Pandorama’s determination and stamina, his will to win. The manner in which Noel Meade’s horse stuck his neck out for Davy Condon after being passed impressed greatly. He has a serious engine, but he may need easy ground to be at his best and therefore, of the pair, Weapon’s Amnesty, winner of the Albert Bartlett at Cheltenham last March, is a more likely type in my book for the RSA Chase.

Next near miss was Money Trix in the Lexus. Okay, so it wasn’t as near a miss as the first two, a half a length as opposed to two flared nostrils, and if the race had been run on the 28th as opposed to the 29th, on yielding ground as opposed to softening ground, he probably would have been fifth. By the same token, if it had been run on the 30th instead, with the rain sheeting down on a racegoerless Leopardstown, he and Notre Pere would probably have had it between them. Such are the vagaries of this game. We’ll get him in the Hennessy if the ground is soft. He won’t be a 14/1 shot, but he could still be under-rated.

Reve De Sivola in the Challow Hurdle at Newbury on Tuesday put a better gloss on the P&L for the four days, and it didn’t matter that I felt I had run the two-and-a-half-mile trip on heavy ground myself after watching it. Nick Williams’s gelding really does need a test of stamina, but he is going to have to brush up his jumping if he is going to count at Cheltenham in March, even if he does run in the Albert Bartlett instead of the Neptune (say: Sun Alliance/Ballymore Properties Hurdle).

Plenty to chew over this Christmas then, even our own modern day Desert Orchid. Bay, not grey. Awesome, though, wasn’t he?

* For more of Donn’s thoughts, visit www.donnmcclean.com.

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