Betfair Tingle Creek Chase: The case for L'Eau du Sud

Dan Skelton is a man on a mission and we should all have seen it coming.

Having the rug pulled out from under one’s feet as the trainers’ championship reached fever-pitch on Randox Grand National day at Aintree last spring can’t have felt very nice, and we are still seeing the backlash in early-December. That crushing feeling – well captured in the latest series of Champions: Full Gallop – may continue to spur him on for years to come.

Already seemingly at full throttle, Skelton has skipped almost a million quid clear in the still-early stages of this year’s title race, and he’s done so by winning the Betfair Chase, the Paddy Power Gold Cup, Ladbrokes Trophy, Haldon Gold Cup, a Grade 2 novice with Fortune De Mer, plus a Listed Mares’ Hurdle with Kateira. It’s an impressive haul.

He’s also won a Shloer Chase... by 15 lengths, the sort of statement performance from a horse in L’Eau du Sud who Skelton himself openly questioned whether he’d be good enough to rise to the top of the tree as a two-mile novice chaser last season.

And on the face of, he didn’t.

Having won his first four starts over fences before meeting the biggest names of the division, L’Eau du Sud ended up finishing fourth behind Jango Baie in the Arkle at Cheltenham and third to Kalif Du Berlais in the Maghull at Aintree.

He’d snared his Grade 1 already by landing a four-runner Henry VIII at Sandown, but the most prestigious prizes somehow eluded him.

So, what’s changed?

Perhaps nothing, but the important thing to keep in mind here, members of the jury, is that I’m not asking you to believe that L’Eau du Sud is the 2026 Queen Mother Champion Chase winner-elect. That talk can wait.

For now, we focus purely on the 2025 edition of the Betfair Tingle Creek, and let me ask you this: Why desert Skelton at this point?

The stable is winning just about all the major prizes on offer in Britain and the horse in question is on the crest of a wave after posting a new career-best effort at Cheltenham last month. Go and watch it back right now. See how he takes command after negotiating the third-last obstacle; how he breezes through the gears before accurate, efficient leaps at the final two fences. "There's only one horse in this," cries Simon Holt. He's not wrong.

As already touched upon, L'Eau du Sud rattled off four victories between October and February in the last campaign, including that course and distance win at this very same meeting on soft ground. And he's a horse on an upward trajectory.

Eventual Shloer runner-up Jonbon is, admittedly, entitled to be sharper for his first start of the year, when a few of Nicky Henderson’s were evidently needing a run, but time waits for no beast and it’s clear the younger horses now have his measure – certainly over the minimum trip. That was arguably there for all to see when duffed up by Il Etait Temps in the Celebration Chase here at the end of April, but even more so in the Shloer.

Jonbon has even been given an alternative entry in Sunday’s Peterborough Chase, so while connections are outwardly adamant they’re not willing to throw the towel in just yet, it looks like one or two in the camp are at least starting to remove it from the rail.

So, what of Il Etait Temps? He’s had to earn his stripes with Willie Mullins and now sits just behind Majborough in the pecking order, according to the antepost markets at least.

He’s very good – a genuine 172-rated chaser according to Timeform – but does anyone believe he’s going to sweep all before him from start to finish this season? I'm not sure Mullins, Paul Townend or anyone else at Closutton has ever held him in quite that sort of regard.

Indeed, some of Il Etait Temps’ biggest victories to date have come when others have let themselves down slightly – I’m thinking a lairy Gaelic Warrior at Punchestown in 2024, and an over-the-top Jonbon at the tail-end of last season.

Granted, he saw off Ginny’s Destiny and Grey Dawning over two and a half miles in the Manifesto a couple of years ago, and looked as sharp as ever on his recent reappearance at Clonmel, but that was also over the intermediate trip. He beat Senecia, Intense Raffles and Gentleman De Mee.

This Saturday Il Etait Temps goes back into considerably warmer company, back down in trip, for a race his yard has won just the once courtesy of Un De Sceaux some nine years ago.

Frankly, he’s too short at 8/11 and the 3/1 L’Eau du Sud looks a fantastic price.

A week on from the Paddy Power Gold Cup winner going off 16/1 for the Coral Gold Cup, could this be another case of a big-race Skelton winner staring us in the face? We should all have seen it coming.

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