A CONTROVERSIAL race which will be discussed for some considerable time (and which is subject to an appeal) ended with Bondi Beach being awarded the Group 1 Ladbrokes St Leger at Doncaster last Saturday.

Aidan O’Brien’s colt engaged in a protracted battle with Simple Verse and was a head adrift at the line but the stewards ruled that the filly had caused him sufficient inconvenience for the placings to be reversed.

While the same decision might have been reached around the world, it came as a major surprise to many when Simple Verse was stood down because in Britain the officials invariably favour the horse crossing the line first.

Bondi Beach and Storm The Stars had fought out a tight finish in the Great Voltigeur at York and started 2/1 joint-favourites this time. Storm The Stars took over from O’Brien’s Fields Of Athenry two furlongs from home but was being hard ridden and gave way as Simple Verse, with little room against the rails, was switched right by Andrea Atzeni and led inside the final furlong.

Making his effort at the same time, Bondi Beach took a bump a furlong and a half out and another approaching the line. In an all-out battle the filly was holding him close home but the final drama had still to be played out.

DECISION

The decision has divided racing professionals and casual observers alike. Essentially, Colm O’Donoghue was entitled to hold his ground up the straight, keeping Simple Verse in.

With time starting to run out, Atzeni had to switch off the rails and, in doing so, probably checked Bondi Beach’s momentum. Perhaps, had the pair stayed apart from then on, she would have kept the race but the stewards had a second coming together to consider.

The fact is that Bondi Beach was not quite good enough to go past and a neck might have made it more obvious; a head is more a matter of inches and the stewards clearly thought that the interference made a small but vital difference.

Even so, a similar sequence of events at some up-country meeting over the next few weeks might easily result in a different outcome.

Simple Verse (8/1) had proved her stamina at Goodwood. She would have been the first filly to win the St Leger since User Friendly in 1992 and for trainer Ralph Beckett this was a bitter pill indeed, stable-companion Secret Gesture having been stood down after finishing first in the Grade 1 Beverly D at Arlington Park in the US a few weeks ago.

Several fellow-trainers expressed their sympathy last week, most of them (including André Fabre) opining that Simple Verse should not have been disqualified.

However, that view was not unanimous, with William Haggas, trainer of Storm The Stars, saying the officials had made a brave decision.

CAMERAS

The Channel 4 cameras filmed the stewards’ inquiry, where O’Donoghue spoke eloquently and forcefully enough to have some watchers wondering if another career might have beckoned at one stage. Perhaps Atzeni was a little overwhelmed by it all.

There has been a secondary controversy over whether the cameras should have followed him into the weigh-room, where he was clearly distraught as the verdict was announced.

Frankly, this debate should be short-lived; at a time when pictures of the most harrowing incidents around the world become standard front-page fare, the disappointments suffered by leading sportsmen can hardly be conveniently ignored.

Once the cameras are allowed inside the weigh-room, no self-respecting director will sidestep human emotion in the raw. When all is said and done, and much as one may sympathise with Atzeni, television is in the entertainment business.

“He was leaning all over me all down the straight,” the Italian said later. “They gave the race to the second-best horse and I’m gutted. This is a classic and to lose one like this is a killer.”

Unsurprisingly, O’Donoghue reiterated his view that the incidents had cost him more ground than the head he was beaten by.

“He’s knocked me three or four wide and my horse has changed legs,” he said. “He’s lost momentum and I go half a length down on Andrea. I still have time to get back up and I get to within a head of him but he’s hit me again at the half-furlong marker.”

Beckett and Sheikh Fahad of Qatar Racing will appeal against the verdict, the trainer claiming that there is no consistency and citing the interference suffered by Suzi’s Connoisseur at Ascot recently when the result was allowed to stand.

Frankly, he has a perfectly reasonable case, though it will be Thursday before the hearing takes place.

When all the dust settled last Saturday, it was time to acknowledge O’Brien’s fine judgement in deciding that this was the race for Bondi Beach and the Irish St Leger could be left to the hugely impressive Order Of St George.

There was also the little matter of O’Donoghue picking up a two-day whip ban and it might be argued that he was just that bit harder than Atzeni in a desperately close finish.

However, with so much going on, no one was inclined to dwell on this all-too-familiar problem – not that it is about to go away, of course.