Henry De Bromhead has described the decision by the Sandown stewards not to award Saturday's Tingle Creek Chase to Special Tiara as "wrong" and the horse's connections are mulling over the possibility of an appeal.
Special Tiara appeared to be launching a challenge to win the prestigious Grade One prize only for the winner Sire De Grugy to jump dramatically left at the last, into his Irish rival, who was knocked sideways in the incident.
Special Tiara rallied to close the gap at the line to three parts of a length but a subsequent enquiry allowed the result to stand, although it did impose a two-day ban on Sire De Grugy’s jockey Jamie Moore for his use of the whip.
Real rattle
Asked immediately afterwards if he thought he'd have won without the interference, Special Tiara's rider, Noel Fehily, said: "I thought so. At the time I was coming with a real rattle to the last and got turned sideways."
De Bromhead's initial reaction was that his horse should have won and 24 hours later the Co Waterford trainer indicated an appeal could be lodged before today's evening's deadline.
“The best horse on the day didn’t win the race and I think that’s wrong. Our horse was impeded, nearly taken out of the race completely. He was coming to win, under a perfectly timed ride, and was stopped in his tracks.
“It’s wrong. It’s wrong for connections. It’s wrong for those who backed him. The result should have been changed and we are looking at the possibility of an appeal,” De Bromhead said.
After Identity Thief's Fighting Fifth success a week before, Saturday's Sandown raid was a frustrating one for the De Bromhead as Sizing Codelco unseated Barry Geraghty at the first fence in the Grade One Henry VIII Novices Chase. The race was won by Sire De Grugy's stable companion, Ar Mad.
De Bromhead had to settle for a couple of placed efforts at Punchestown on Sunday, including Sizing Gold’s third to Sumos Novios in a handicap chase.
Sumos Novios completed a Punchestown double for jockey Robbie Power who’d earlier scored on the 6/4 favourite Oscar Sam for Jessica Harrington.
The winner thrived on the testing conditions, which were officially heavy after 70mms of rain had fallen on the track in the previous three days. “We’ll find another handicap for him over Christmas,” Harrington said. “They went quite quick on the ground and he does stay well.”
