From Racing Post: James Doyle retained rider for Khalid Abdullah By David Baxter 1:50PM 29 AUG 2013 JAMES DOYLE has landed a plum job with the news on Thursday that he will be retained rider for all of Khalid Abdullah's runners in Britain. Doyle has already ridden plenty of horses for Abdullah, and has secured 18 winners in Britain the last three years in the famous silks. The pair have also teamed up for international success, with victory in the Dubai Duty Free at Meydan in 2012 with Cityscape. An immediate snapshot of the talent that Abdullah owns and Doyle will now get the chance to ride will be this weekend in the Group 3 Betfred Mobile Solario Stakes, with Doyle confirmed to ride 2,000 Guineas ante-post favourite Kingman. Lord Grimthorpe, racing manager to Abdullah, said on Thursday: "Prince Khalid has been very impressed with his riding, including, of course, Al Kazeem this season. "James will ride all Juddmonte-owned, UK-trained horses, starting with Kingman at Sandown on Saturday." Doyle was quickly congratulated on social media, including weighing room colleague George Baker, who tweeted: "Well done to @the_doyler! Much deserved." Coral make Doyle a 4-5 chance to ride a UK Group 1 winner for Juddmonte this year following his appointment.
I find this an odd appointment actually in as much as I would see it as very little gained and something lost. I feel that the Prince was having each of his horses ridden by a decent jockey anyhow, it was not like he was left looking for a jock for any. By taking this step however he has effectively jocked off Ryan Moore from the Stoute horses along with William Buick from the Gosden horses, and I do not feel James Doyle to be a better jockey than either of these. Off the top of my head I think the Princes horse are trained and usually ridden by the following Michael Stoute - Ryan Moore John Gosden - William Buick Roger Charlton - James Doyle Lady Cecil - Tom Queally Charlie Hills - an assortment of Jocks Amanda Perrett - Pat Dobbs mainly Whilst it could be argued they have obtained a marginally better jockey for some the price must surely be considered to have off set this. I feel there is no need have a retained jockey when your horses are with the best trainers as they already have the services of good jockeys secured. I actually feel Hamdan Al Macktoum would do far better without a retained Jockey as the job is not sufficient to attract the best so he has since Willie Carson left had an average jock, when he could have had better Jocks by going through the individual trainers.
I wonder who actually suggested this arrangement?...I think it is highly unlikely that Khalid Abdulla suddenly said to Teddy Grimbags "..what about this for a plan...?".....or,if he did it's highly unlikely anyone understood him. All very strange on the day the Aga Khan sacked Declan McDonagh as his trusted saddlemaster. As blue says,it makes little sense and I thought the plan was shelved after Hughes got sacked from the same job...Pat Eddery was his first retained jock if my recollection is correct. Moore to Coolmore next year? Anyone fancy listing their most favourite/unusual/failed/successful owner/jockey partnerships?
Always liked Steve Cauthen / Sheikh Mohammed (usually for Henry Cecil) Worst - Sheikh Hamdan / Richard Hills oh dear me Over the jumps its usually tthe yard jock but Geraghty riding for Simon Munir or Michael Buckley is usually a good sign
Oi Oddy!!...leave Dickie alone! Compared to PH he is was complete master. He was a little weak in a finish but no more so than G.Lee,J.Fanning or Buick...I feel another thread coming on!.
Dear ole Dicky... I presume PH is the one and only Paul Hanagan... Well, you may have a point there Dex...
That Hamdan retainer job is a poisoned challice - he just has lots of ****e horses. Hanagan did much better riding for Richard Fahey.
Oddy, Fahey was the man who put him on the front, or back page if you like, and he went for the big stable... The grass isnt always greener on the other side... I bet he would snatch his hand off to be back among the number of winners he had under Fahey than Hamdam...
The big retainer is probably dulling the pain though..Red...AP gets a cool £1m retainer off JP plus travel and an elevated percentage if reports are to be believed. They will have a different relationship of course in that they speak as equals and are friends. I'm sure PH is just as well rewarded and tbh there was little point in staying with Fahey whose horses rarely run two races alike.His lack of top owners reflect that. His one G1 was at Longchamp where the poor old horse was beaten like a carpet in deep ground...didn't like that tbh but a first G1 supersedes a lot of considerations. I vaguely recall Pat Eddery having stallion percentages when riding for Sangster and the greatest trainer of them all..(sorry SHC fans!).I have no doubt that option will not be on the table to any jockey riding for the Arab "royal families"
Dont get me started on Paul Hanagan. A one armed man would be stronger in a finish. He only won champ jockey when with Fahey cos of the sheer amount of horses he got in egg and spoon races at the northern tracks. Looks like no one needed to get me started
I think Hanagan was a decent enough Jockey the year he won the title, not great but I certainly would not have given a sigh seeing he was on one of mine. Whilst Hamdan could have been having his horses ridden by the best he has had them ridden by Richard Hills, Martin Dwyer, T. O'shea, Paul Hannegan and Dane o'neil, In my opinion he does not benefit from a retained jockey and neither will the Prince. As an aside Tom Queally must have been put out a bit as he was obviously likely to be available. With regard best retainers Dex Michael Kinane @ Coolmoore..... by far Frankie @ Godolphin Let me think about worst retainers in my opinion....... Jamie @ Coolmoore Jamie @ at the good Doctor Kukash Jamie @ Quatar Racing ...... sorry am I jumping the gun The thing that upsets me most is he is a fantastic jockey but sadly with such poor tactical awareness, he makes all the mistakes you never see Ryan Moore make.
Good call's Blue. I think the loyalty showed by the thoroughly decent David Johnson to Timmy Murphy was a nice thing and resulted in a successful union. It's no secret that D&M Pipe were not advocates of his style of riding on their super fit interval trained horses and thus he rode for his retainer exclusively and received no "outside" rides from that yard. I think the arrangements that PN and NH struck up with RW and BG respectively were really innovative and not something anyone would have considered 25 years ago.Both were/are hugely profitable for all parties concerned.
Also it's no secret that Sangsters success was rooted in his association with the great Dr VO'B and Magnier..these are the guys who effectively shaped European bloodstock with their,at the time,unique policy of purchasing transatlantic stock and incorporating it here in breeding patterns. He was equally far reaching when sourcing human talent such as "the $6m kid" and bringing him across the pond.A lot more gained from that bold move than just his initial employer.A move which was largely met with derision and incredulity when first mooted. He also brought Brett Johnson here from Oz to ride his horses. A true visionary amongst greater visionaries...Sheik Mohammed gave us Ahmed Ajtebi!!..lol!
I think you made a good point regarding the Fahey horses Dex as he is a punters nightmare. I tend look firstly to form, then check money then significant jockey bookings in that order, once these things have been looked at for the day I end up with a few horses I am interested in, however I write off so many races due to it having a Fahey runner as they are just so unpredictable, I also find both the Easterbys the same. Without wanting to start a fight I find southern tracks and southern trainers easier to predict, although O' Meara is proving ok at present.
Blue,I actually had the same internal argument crossing my mind last week at York and you can throw Ryan and the grumpy vet into that "in and out runners" category. Johnstons runners are ****ing exasperating!!..never run two races the same although they are tactically consistent in that they blast from the front. One could understand if they run up a sequence and get gripped by the assessor but this is so not often the case.They win a couple,go up in in the weights,run a couple of stinkers,go in again,still above their last winning mark etc...Skytrain yesterday an example albeit he is a 3-y-o and physical improvement may be offsetting gradual hikes in the saddle lead. I think it is fair to say that given the ammunition he gets form Sheikh Mo's eldest Darley stock his ratio in Group races is very poor. Sorry Nothern lads!..bunch of ****ing fiddlers! How was the cricket Red?...cracking 20/20 tonight if you tuned in.
I could not agree more Dex, I find Johnston very frustrating and ridden often with very little imagination in my opinion, the times this year at Golorious Goodwood when you would see them try and make all and waste what would have been a better chance if ridden with more constraint. I am not sure if you saw it but Ryan Moore was interviewed after beating a Johnston horse, Emma Spencer came out with the lazy remark of how hard was it to get past, those Johnston horses keep finding and finding, Moore remarked something along the lines of that's just a commentators myth I am afraid. He was not being disrespectful just correcting a clearly ludicrous claim that all of Johnstons are akin to Giants Causeway. I also find Godolphin exasperating by the way, not helped by Barzelona who could easily have got a mention in the poor retainers list. On the positive I find John Gosden runners very easy to read, as are Ed Dunlop and Ralph Beckett, with Beckett and Dunlop if it's shorter than it should be it will go very close. I have also got quite good at reading Jim Crowleys bookings as well as William Buick's.
Missed that quote from Ryan Blue!..priceless...but a classic example of falsely applying traits to certain aspects of racing without due statistical consideration. I think Godolphins problem is/has been a poor purchasing policy,inabilty to match mares to stallions and a poor broodmare pool if truth be told. The organisation has been reinvented at least twice.In its last incarnation it negated it's childish sales spat with Coolmore by buying their stock by proxy..hence all the second generation Coolmore bloodlines within it's output. Magnier et al appear to have chilled and have been buying offspring by Elusive Quality for example,such as the very exciting Great White Eagle. Big boys and their toys. PN could obviously give a real insight in the running of the team infinitely better than my sofa ramblings.
Superb Dex, thanks for asking... saw over 400 runs, 14 wickets, several mighty blows for 6, a great bowling performance from Kyle Hogg taking the first 4 wickets and getting a 5fer... Good weather, good company and the beer was cool and refreshing... What more can i say... Just got back to the pub for the T20 and watched some almighty blows from that aussie chap, Finch. Jeezus, that man has some bat in his hands... came home at the turnaround and watched us give a damn good go at chasing nearly 13 runs per over... Im not a big fan of T20, but when you see clean hitting like that, you have to applaud it...
Hanagan hasn't suddenly become a bad jockey and I think Hamdan's horses are improving. Hanagan will get better press I'm sure. Although Sangster brought Cauthen over it wasn't that successful for Sangster was it? What was their biggest winner? Cauthen was more successful as Cecil's jockey, although when still with Hills a statistics man did point out at the time that horses ran marginally better for him than other jockeys. So probably more a case that Sangster's horses in England weren't the same calibre as the Irish ones. Eddery with O'Brien was a pretty successful partnership. It followed another pretty successful partnership. I think a stable jockey worked when stables were aligned with owners. A stable jockey who knew the run of the horses in a stable are an enormous benefit to an owner and certainly a trainer. There have been several successful partnerships. However these mega owners like Khaled split that up. Having horses at several trainers spreads the risk but reduces the control I would think. As far as I can remember in modern times the Eddery/Khaled relationship was the first of its type, but swiftly followed by others mentioned here. It must suit an owner to know who is riding their horses and to not have another owner taking the stable jockey. Doyle might be a bit too much too soon, but maybe he's the next great. To be proved I think.
That is true Bustino. I know he had several G3 winners for Sangster in his stint with Hills...To return to my point,it was Sangster who identified and tapped into his talent and invested in it...very innovative and unique at the time. Perhaps his most notable success in his fledgling UK career was aboard Tap On Wood in the Guineas for Tony Shead...I wasn't even nearly a teen at that stage and was just developing a life long love of the game so have only a limited recollection. I do remember Tony Shead having three runners in the Derby in 1979 when Lester was on the Queens runner Milford...the 200th Derby if memory serves. Can anyone name them and their jockeys and the races they won before the Derby?..all trained by Barry Hills...I actually remember all of them...unfortunately like Milford they all bombed,as did most behind the peerless Troy who won by about 5/6L (think!) Bustino you are my evens favourite for this one!
