The curious case of the Emmet Mullins plunge - and other tales of punting woe

It looks like we need a bit more practice at this jumps racing malarkey. Field sizes may not be as strong as in days of yore but collectively we punters struggled to identify the right horse in a series of quality contests over the weekend, including four beaten odds-on jollies in Irish jump racing over the past two days.

For much of Saturday's Paddy Power Gold Cup, I was feeling a bit queasy about my firmly-expressed view that French Dynamite was the wrong favourite. Mouse Morris's raider travelled and jumped like the best horse as far as the very last fence, where he hollowed his back to fiddle over it, losing ground and momentum.

That opened the way for a storming finish by Ga Law, on only his second run back from a tendon injury. He hit the front with about five strides to spare, Jamie Snowden naturally suggesting the six-year-old could go up in distance at some stage.