'Breeders are coming back' - the Derby and Arc hero finally promising big things

It is scarcely credible that five years have passed since a glorious winter's morning when Derby record-holder Workforce first walked out of his stable at Knockhouse Stud and into the watery light of the December sun to survey his new kingdom.

All of Ireland's sunny south-east was spread out beneath the hooves of the son of King's Best, and, like WB Yeats's heavenly embroidered cloths, the patchwork of fields, hedges and houses in the valley below Kilmacow seemed stitched with the fabric of the Kinsella family's dreams.

The late Prince Khalid Abdullah's Derby and Arc hero, whose winning time of 2min 31.33sec at Epsom in 2010 remains a race record, had returned to Europe following five seasons at the Shadai Stallion Station. A fresh start as a National Hunt sire beckoned.