Mike Cattermole's Sporting Life column

ECLIPSE THE PERFECT RACE

I love the Coral-Eclipse. 

The first clash of the generations over the perfect intermediate trip, with some of the best milers tackling the cream of the faster middle distance horses on a track made for great finishes, what isn’t there to like?

My Eclipse romance started back in 1978 when Gunner B won for Henry Cecil and Joe Mercer. Henry’s first big winner of his career had been in the 1969 race thanks to Wolver Hollow and his son Wollow also won it in 1976 (after Trepan’s disqualification). 

Three wins in 10 years for Henry, then. You would never have believed there would be a 32-year gap before he won it again with Twice Over in 2010. 

Perhaps more extraordinarily, Richard Hannon senior, who also had a great training career, never won the Eclipse (he didn’t have many runners), so maybe Richard junior can put that right with Barney Roy.

The middle distance brigade all seem to be beating each other and yet there is a chance that Cliffs Of Moher, who I thought would win the Derby, could still prove to be a tip-top colt over 10 furlongs.

Fascinatingly, Eminent was a length behind Cliffs Of Moher in the Derby but was around two and a half lengths adrift of Barney Roy in the Guineas. It’s a form line that could be misleading but I am inclined to believe it, as the milers could be an above average crop.

What I like about Barney Roy is that he is really engaging top gear when he hits the line and the extra two furlongs ought to suit him well. There is encouragement in his pedigree, too, with Galileo sitting there as his maternal grandsire.

There was a moment in the Derby, from about two and a half furlongs out to inside the 2f marker where Cliffs Of Moher quickened up past Eminent in the style of a very good horse. It was also the Eclipse that Aidan O’Brien spoke about immediately after the Derby for Cliffs and he looks set to run a big one over what may be his best trip. Rested since Epsom, he will come here with no excuse and is feared.

They say that Eminent will be ridden more aggressively on Saturday and of course he has a new jockey in Silvestre de Sousa. I wonder why Jim Crowley was replaced? He didn’t appear to have done much wrong to these eyes as it was blatantly obvious that Epsom didn’t suit the colt. 

Eminent could be a bit better than he showed there but so far he has fallen just a little short at the very top level.

Meanwhile, Crowley has an excellent ride to fall back on with Ulysses who was so impressive over the course and distance earlier in the Gordon Richards when beating Deauville.

A good third in the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes behind Highland Reel and Decorated Knight (a short head in front of him), he has a good turn of foot but I just wish he would settle a bit better in his races. Like O’Brien, Sir Michael Stoute has had five Eclipse winners to date.

The unheralded Decorated Knight is in the form of his life right now but he has to find a bit more to prevail here.

Jack Hobbs looked to be struggling on the fast ground in the Prince Of Wales’s but connections will be hoping that the showers come on Thursday as some forecasts predict. He is certainly top class at his best.

Finally, a word about Permian who bounced back to take the King Edward VII at Royal Ascot and is averaging two races a month right now. He will no doubt give it his all once again but improvement is needed.

WINGS OF EAGLES GROUNDED

He was a bit of a shooting star, wasn’t he? 

Wings Of Eagles had made history by becoming the longest-priced Derby winner since 1974 but less than a month later his racing career was over.

I feel a bit sorry for him and hope that he gets the credit he deserves for an extraordinary performance at Epsom. For me, he was coming through to complete the Derby double at the Curragh on Saturday only for his effort to flatten out near the finish. A fractured sesamoid was a very good excuse.

We wonder if Wings Of Eagles went through the pain barrier or, as some experts tell me, he may have felt nothing at all as the adrenaline would have been pumping. But even so, it was a very brave run in those circumstances. It reminded me a bit of Henbit who faltered in the closing stages of the 1980 Derby when he cracked his off-fore cannon bone but still held on to win.

Both Capri and Cracksman, behind Wings Of Eagles at Epsom, ran superb trials for the St Leger, ironically a race that Wings Of Eagles himself would have had excellent claims in. Capri has a pedigree that has Town Moor written all over it but the way that Cracksman was finishing, it may be that Frankel’s first European Classic winner might end up being in a St Leger! Now we wouldn’t have been expecting that.

How fascinating that would be, given the comparisons between Frankel and Brigadier Gerard. The Brigadier, who never produced any superstars, sired his one Classic winner in the Leger, when Light Cavalry stormed home in 1980. (That year again - it could be in the stars).

But I am getting way ahead of myself.

So, just a month on, Wings Of Eagles’s Derby is looking solid. As well as Capri and Cracksman, we have had the fifth Benbatl and 10th Permian striking at Royal Ascot in the Hampton Court Stakes and King Edward VII Stakes respectively, and even the 16th Rekindling landing the Curragh Cup last weekend.

Over now to Cliffs Of Moher and Eminent to try and elevate the form further in the Coral-Eclipse.

DUBAWI DOUBLE

Having run Team Coolmore so close at Royal Ascot, Sheikh Mohammed’s superstar stallion Dubawi is also keeping up the fight in the breeding sheds.

In the space of an hour and a half on Sunday, Dalham Hall’s galactico sired the winners of two Group One’s, firstly with Zarak in the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud and then with the home-bred filly Nezwaah in the Pretty Polly Stakes at the Curragh.

Zarak, being out of the exceptional Zarkava, has probably guaranteed his own place at stud now for the Aga Khan. Nezwaah, meanwhile, really arrived at the top table in style and must be a major player in the Qatar Nassau Stakes at Goodwood in a month’s time.

Dubawi’s Group One tally now stands at 30, which is a superb return, but Galileo is still out there on his own on the 65 mark.

CITY RACING – GOOD IN THEORY BUT…

There has been talk recently of racing taking place down Oxford Street, The Mall or even the Champs Elysees.

The Jockey Club seem keen and there is backing for the event on the commercial side from sports promotions company SEL. Both the BHA and France Galop are said to be talking about it and while it would make for some pretty spectacular images, it is surely courting disaster.

I have no doubt that a racing surface could be created and made safe but what about the participants? We all know that highly-strung thoroughbreds are massively unpredictable.

I would imagine the BHA and France Galop will err on the side of caution and say no, or non. 

MEGAN NICHOLLS LEFT ALMOST EMPTY-HANDED

Megan Nicholls is the daughter of Paul Nicholls but is also a hungry young apprentice who is willing to drive for miles to ride a horse. 

Based up in Yorkshire, she travelled down to ride in the apprentice handicap at 9.00 at Newbury last Thursday only to be told that the horse wasn’t running just 45 minutes before the race. A needless nine-hour round trip.

The horse, McDelta, trained by Geoffrey Deacon and owned by former trainer Peter Cundell, was pulled out because of the ground, even though the description had not been changed (that’s something the BHA could do work on).

Now that is frustrating, even if she would have been entitled to 40% of her riding fee (£48.26) at that time.

It reminds me of a trip to Ffos Las I made a few years ago. Sent there on a rainy Monday night, I drove through some pretty awful conditions and flooded roads only to find, when I finally got there, that it had been called off due to waterlogging an hour earlier.

Nobody had called me and I completed my own nine-hour drive home in a pretty black mood. 

At least I got my full fee, though. I also embraced Twitter (@catters61) a bit more after that!