Chambard deserves a National spot after Becher triumph - surely it's time to embrace 'win and you're in'

Races over the Grand National fences always seem to give me an extra buzz and it was no different with Saturday's Becher Chase, in which Chambard put in a great round of jumping and won decisively.

Decisively enough, in fact, that he might just about have done enough to get a run in the National itself in April – but the fact that is still questionable doesn’t sit well with me.

Just 34 will line up for next year's race. If you look at last year's field, the 34th runner was rated 147, meaning Chambard needs to go up 7lb to be on the threshold. From the marks they carried on Saturday, only the top three runners in the Becher would have got in last year's National, while none of last month’s Grand Sefton would have got in, with the topweight rated 145.