Cue Card made a deflating return to action here, the popular chaser, now into the veteran stage, finishing only third in the Charlie Hall Chase behind Irish Cavalier. Given that he was said to be thoroughly fit and had even had a racecourse gallop to put an edge on him, his followers must surely be wincing over this three-length defeat at odds-on and fearing that the years have finally taken their toll.
After all, Cue Card is 10 and has turned in a shift of more than six years at jump racing’s highest level. No one could blame him if he was ready to step down a division but connections are nowhere near ready to accept that scenario after a single setback.
“He just got tired in the end,” said his trainer, Colin Tizzard, who had thought Cue Card was on his way to victory halfway up the straight. “You see him odds-on, you think it’s going to be a penalty kick but it never is. He hasn’t done too bad.”
Paddy Brennan made an aggressive move in sending Cue Card to the front at an early stage of the final circuit, which forced the early leader, Dynaste, into a blunder that ended his chances. But Irish Cavalier and Menorah moved comfortably behind the favourite before staying on past him in the straight.
“I’m disappointed I didn’t win but there’s always positives to take out of it,” Brennan said. “I think, back on slightly slower ground and having that run under his belt, you’d be hoping that he’d improve a lot for the Betfair Chase.
“His jumping was good but I probably never travelled as comfortably as I would normally have on him. You look back at last year’s Charlie Hall, we beat Dynaste four lengths. We beat him a lot further today with 10lb more.”
One issue for the Tizzard camp to consider in the coming days is whether Cue Card’s wind remains as clean as it was last season. He benefited enormously from an operation to help him breathe early last year but the effects of such interventions do not always endure.
Tizzard confirmed the Betfair at Haydock on 19 November remained the horse’s target and he may yet be the one to beat if he makes the same improvement he showed last year in moving from this race to that one. The bookmakers still have him at the top of their market, at a top price of 11-4.
Irish Cavalier is available at 12-1 for Haydock, which might provoke some resentment among his followers. He had 4lb less to carry than Cue Card and the advantage of a prep-run, so the possibility exists that he was flattered, but this grey was good enough to win a handicap chase at the Festival when he had just turned six and, 18 months later, he may still have more to offer.
“He’s only seven and he just seems to be improving every season,” said the winning trainer, Rebecca Curtis. “I suppose you have to go to all the top three-mile races now,” she added, mentioning the Betfair, the King George and the Gold Cup. This victory cemented Curtis’s partnership with her new stable jockey, 22-year-old Jonny Moore, who won himself the job with success on Irish Cavalier at Punchestown in April.
“Plenty of nappy money won there, I think,” said Moore, who has a five-month-old girl at home in Castleblayney, County Monaghan. “When I took the job, these are the kind of days I had in mind. Today, you were going to be up against it, taking on Cue Card and the likes, but what an honest horse! Fourth-last, third-last, he was way too long, I was asking way too much of him but because he’s so honest and genuine, he came up for me and really battled to the line.”
