No Basil? No problem! Plenty of new stars for ITV and racegoers at Newbury to enjoy

Things are rarely as good when your star performer is missing, in sport or show business.

Look at Manchester City’s travails since Rodri ruptured his anterior cruciate ligament, or the England cricketers being put to the sword more often than not in India while Ben Stokes recovers from hamstring surgery.

Relying on the rest to get you through does not always work. Ask the US television producers who made the bizarre decision to leave out the character of Basil Fawlty when they remade Fawlty Towers for an American audience as Amanda's – the one and only series was cancelled even before all the episodes had been shown.