What a week it’s been for racing news. You no sooner sat down to write about the news of the day, than events over took it. We moved at a merry old dance of gigs and reels, he stepped in, he stepped out again. To think last week The Great British Bake Off made headline news in Ireland!.

First it was Colm Murphy retiring, followed by Alan Potts moving his horses from Henry de Bromhead to Colin Tizzard. This began the “crisis in Irish jump racing” debate that then saw the spotlight moving on to HRI and the means of Brian Kavanagh’s reappointment to a third term at the helm. Dail questions caused concern, if Irish racing was under scrutiny, we needed to be concerned. Government needed to be kept on side. Exchequer funding couldn’t be taken for granted, as many in racing appeared to do.