Golden days when the great grey Desert Orchid was the Whitbread toast

The Whitbread Gold Cup was once a great race, a glittering coda to a tumultuous season, its historic status as the first commercial sponsorship in sport – let alone racing – aligned to its allure for the best of the staying chasers.

Arkle won it, Mill House won it, Pas Seul won it, and when in 1984 Special Cargo got up in the last quarter-stride to win a three-way photo, it reached its lofty apotheosis in the context of the jumping year.

Yet times change and the race has changed with them. Now it is just another valuable staying handicap, fashion and the increasingly prestigious alternatives of Aintree and Punchestown having conspired to dilute its potency.