SAVILL TO THE RESCUE, ANGLO/IRISH CLASSIFICATIONS, IMAD, LIMERICK & SKELTON AT THE SALES.

Encouraged by the support of over 200 racing professionals, Peter Savill has thrown his hat into the ring. Whether the B.H.A. will want to appoint him as Lord Allen's replacement is uncertain enough for a market to form around whether he will be adopted or not. He was regarded as a success back in the early 2,000's when he was the chair of the B.H.A. and he certainly fulfils my criteria as someone who has worked, and continues to work, at the clif-face of the sport. We will discover next week whether the B.H.A. has listened to the groundswell of opinion that the sport needs a proper racing man or woman at the tiller of the sport. Fingers firmly crossed.

Even I cannot argue against the Anglo/Irish classifications for last season's jumps season. Not surprisingly, Gaelic Warrior is way out in front on 180 over 3-miles and 174 over 2-miles 4. Fact To File and I Am Maximus are on 173 and Jango Baie and The Jukebox Man on 168. I would expect and hope that the latter two will close that gap next season. Lossiemouth heads the 2-mile hurdle division on 162. I thought she might be worthy of a few marks more, I thought it insensitive to rank Sir Gino given his sad demise. That said, 161 seems derisory. I would also contend that Teahupoo did not do enough to be ranked equall to Lossiemouth on 162 in the 3-mile division and would have thought that on form Home By The Lee should have been ranked several pounds in front of Teahupoo not 1Ib below him

Unlike Hollie Doyle, I like to crow occasionally. It was around this time of year last season that Imad Alsagar, without giving a reason, removed Hollie Doyle from her position as his retained jockey, appointing Oisin Murphy as his preferred jockey, even though the champion only promised in return that Imad would be third choice of his book of retainers. If sacking Hollie was supposed to improve Imad's win to run ratio, nothing much has changed. In fact, in not being tied to the retainer, has allowed Hollie to ride more winners for other people, with her services in demand by many more trainers than before. I  crow on her behalf. She will not thank me, though, as she is polite and ladylike, a credit to her upbringing.

Something that continues to intrigue me is how Irish racecourses regularly have races sponsored by not only companies local to them but that far larger organisations will sponsor a comparatively minor race, as with Calor Gas sponsoring the first race at Limerick today, worth 5,000+ euros to the winner, alongside the sponsors of other races on the card Mann Family and Richard Egan, Maloney's Bus Hire and Munster Drilling. I sometimes wonder if the marketing divisions of British racecourses actually bother looking for sponsors outside of the big bookmaking companies.

Reading through the purchasers at Goff's Spring Sale in today's Racing Post, I began to notice that Dan Skelton, along with his sales advisor Ryan Mahon, had purchased quite a few 'cheapies', unlike the 360,000-guineas Kaiser Ball, bought by Tom Malone for a client of Skelton's. In all, the Mahon/Skelton name appears against 12-purchases. Given that they only paid 12,000-guineas for Thistle Ask, I thought I would name these horses so you can keep an eye out for them as the season progresses. Loman Lady, 10,000-guineas; Glenmalure Flyer, 5,000-guineas; Sparkling Water, 12,000-guineas; Colegram, 21,000-guineas; Kiwi de Cotte, 15,000-guineas; Longhouse Star, 8,000-guineas; Northern Singer, 54,000-guineas; Depalma, 20,000-guineas; Fine Thing, 20,000-guineas; Park Hall, 27,000-guineas; Muskerry Rock, 17,000-guineas and Redbarn, 25,000-guineas.

Perhaps Dan is setting up a few syndicates and needed horses of the calibre above to fill a few vacancies. Who Knows? Perhaps the exploits of Thistle Ask has demonstrated to the Skelton brothers that there is under-achieving horses out there to be bought for moderate prices. One thing is for sure, if all twelve have been bought to race - there are a fair few mares amongst them which might be for breeding purposes - there must be a whole lot of races to be won with them.