IF BLOOD IS THICKER THAN WATER.

​Paul Nicholls has a wealth of riding talent to call upon and I wonder if the hierarchy will remain the same at Ditcheat as last season. Sam Twiston-Davies is the main man, the stable jockey, yet the rides are shared around, with Sam not always the preferred option and towards the end of last season he was riding more and more for his father. This, of course, may be with Paul Nicholl’s blessing. With Harry Cobden and Sean Bevan to call upon he is not exactly scratching around for top-class jockeys. But as Paddy Brennan said when he was stable jockey to the Nigel Twiston-Davies stable at the time Sam emerged as the talent he has proved to be: blood is thicker than water.
Twiston-Davies senior has, perhaps, as many potentially top-class horses to call upon next season as Paul Nicholl’s and he does generally get his horses fit and ready earlier in the season than Paul Nicholls and could arguably give his son enough early winners for him to mount a serious challenge to Richard Johnson. It might be that Sam will see a permanent link-up with his father as his only hope of becoming champion jockey, and he is an extremely likeable chap which will allow him to stay on good terms with Paul Nicholls as well as picking up the good spare rides essential in pursuit of the title.
Sam is honest, too. Several times this season he has suggested he has ridden a few poor races, that he has ‘messed up’ once or twice, and that Nicholls may have had ‘words’ with him. Nicholls has a winning mentality; I can imagine losing races he should have won would not sit well with him. Since he lost the services of Ruby Walsh he has tried several jockeys, each one capable to the point of brilliant, as stable jockey and failed to gel with any of them. Is Sam substantially better than Daryl Jacobs?
In Harry Cobden Nicholl’s has a ready-made replacement. He rides with dash and verve and his smile must wilt every young woman’s will to resist his charms, and he is in the enviable position of being almost first choice for Colin Tizzard, someone who also might be considering having a stable jockey as with the Potts horses, even if they remain within the Potts family, unlikely to have a retained rider next season, it will make it easier for them to have a number one.
The other interesting situation at Ditcheat for next season is where in the hierarchy will National Hunt’s ‘golden girl’ Bryony Frost sit? He’ll not want to lose her, not that she’ll be in any hurry to leave, yet before long she will lose her valuable 3lb claim and as things usually develop for jockeys in big yards when they lose their claim they tend to slip below the next swashbuckling 7lb claimer to come along, and Nicholls always has a hungry claimer to call upon.
With Miss Frost we must forget she is female. Anyone who watched her on Milansbar in the Grand National or Present Man in the Bet 365 (or whatever) at Sandown can bear testimony to the undeniable fact that she is a brilliant horsewoman. I am not suggesting for a moment she will ever rise to the top job at Ditcheat even if the potential is there for her to become the most successful female jockey in racing history flat or jumps. Horses like her and that is a priceless quality for a jockey. What’s more the public and the media like her and that can only be beneficial to Nicholls’ and his stable.
Sam Twiston-Davies is a fine jockey but he has a foot in two camps. I am sure he truly appreciates the honour of riding for Paul Nicholls but there must be times when he wishes he were going into battle for his father, as he did in the Grand National, and that is a scenario similar to when Ruby Walsh was torn between choosing a Nicholls horse and a Mullins horse. Home and nationality won out then and perhaps blood will prove thicker than water now.
I am a great admirer of Sam Twiston-Davies, as I am of Paul Nicholls, but sooner or later the call of the heart will lead him back to Grange Hill Farm, where according to the current edition of ‘Horses in Training’ he remains the number 1 jockey. In fact, if he coverts the champion jockey crown I rather think it is a no-brainer.