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Kate and Andrew Brooks haven’t jumped ship yet as far as I’m aware. Not that they seem to have anything out of the ordinary now.
I’d like to see the old Nicholls. To me he just seems to have mellowed too much and maybe the edge he once had has gone.
When he’s asked about Cheltenham these days, he often says that its not the be all and end all, he has re-prioritized etc. I totally get that that is the case but i’d just like to hear him fight his case more, bang the drum over his achievements. Owners want to chances at the festival.
I honestly refuse to believe that he isn’t still as capable as any trainer out there.
I also think that he is brilliant at bringing hoses along slowly. Clan des Obeaux, cyrname, Pic d’orhy, Silviniaco Conti – horses that weren’t winning the supremes or arkles but were made into G1 winning chasers. Maybe people want the more instant success that the Skeltons/Mullins teams seem to be able to deliver.
Isn’t that just something people say. He doesn’t have the ammunition for Cheltenham so says it isn’t the be all and end all when in fact that probably isn’t what he wants to be saying at all.
The more I know the less I understand.
Agree RTB. Nicholls didn’t underplay Cheltenham in the era when he had Kauto Star, Denman, Master Minded and Big Bucks.
If you don’t have the top class horses to fly the flag with then you are at a big disadvantage because your only other option is to get a hoard of much lower class horses and run them in all the lower class races and become simply a numbers trainer.
Nicholls has never been that kind of trainer and given the star horses he has had (a lot at the same time or one after another) I don’t see him changing but lets face it the landscape of getting hold of the raw material is now more cuthroat – I believe this is where Mullins has been many steps ahead now by sourcing horses from France like a conveyor belt etc (his last two Champion Hurdlers both being French bred), he is also a bit into the German market too in that Gaelic Warrior is a German bred horse.
Lets not forget though that at one time recruiting French bred horses was an untapped market that Nicholls was farming with the likes of Kauto Star, Big Buck, Azertyuiop, Master Minded, Silviniaco Conti and Neptune Collonges to name a few all coming from there.
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