For once the slips with his name on stopped hitting betting shop floors.Nicholls, as you might imagine, is a great defender of his young horse. One bad word and you could have his gloves slapping across your chops. He’ll never, ever be flamboyant and would win a bad race by just as much as he would win a good race I like those sort of horses because they last for ever. “Le Duc is a very laid-back sort of work horse,” Nicholls says “He’s certainly no flying machine at home You’d have no idea how much he had left in the locker.

Especially, talented young ones.Yet, while they may be fairly matched in ability, the two go about their jobs in quite different manner. Proof of this phenomenon will be the presence of Ruby Walsh in the Cotswolds this week. The Irish jockey has been horse de combat for some weeks now, but nothing assists recuperation better than the tantalising prospect of hooking up with talented horses. If you’ve got a decent novice this is the obvious early-season target.”Le Duc and Thisthatandtother not only have the capacity to quicken the pulse, they can actually accelerate the entire body’s recovery rate. They are a pair for whom you have to lift the gaze to imagine their limit.”If we get decent ground it looks like they’ll both have to run,” Nicholls said yesterday “Both owners, quite rightly, want to go I don’t have a problem with that. It’s a nice problem to have if you like.”It might seem like madness to run them against each other, but there aren’t that many really good valuable novice chases around.

But if, as predicted, the rains come from the heavens then Nicholls has two horses which may prove to have the same origins, Le Duc and Thisthatandtother. In fact, the race has probably already passed out.In the unlikely event that the weather does not break, Nicholls will be represented by the hat-trick seeking Santenay. Now he is in with another considerable shout.It would be quite right to observe that the Ditcheat trainer has a stranglehold on the Independent Chase this year. That was Paul Nicholls’s third win in the race, or its equivalent, following the exploits of Fadalko and Captain Khedive in recent years. The winning margin was 18 lengths.The following season, the Independent race completed a five-timer for Seebald, the property of Steve McManaman and Robbie Fowler. He had only the mighty Moscow Flyer in front in the Irish Independent Arkle Trophy at the Festival.Twelve months on, that race fell to another Independent winner, Azertyuiop Crazy name, crazy amount of ability.