There seems little doubt he'd have been fiercely anti-FOBTs

I don't mind my life being out of kilter but the calendar itself is all over the place this year. The BetVictor Gold Cup at Cheltenham came a week after Remembrance Sunday and the former Hennessy Gold Cup, now a Ladbrokes extravaganza, has drifted into December.

The big race was yesterday, 50 years to the day since Bill Wightman sent Spunyarn to win at 20-1 at Saint-Cloud. It's not the missed opportunity or the financial implications; at 19 I suppose it would have been a tenner each-way on the pari-mutuel, followed by a night out at the ice hockey watching Southampton Vikings play Brighton Tigers.

They were wonderfully atmospheric evenings and there was always the chance that the Tigers number seven, Jackie Dryburgh, returning to his old stamping ground, would lose it and start a war. He was a brilliantly gifted if mad Scotsman who later became a much-respected administrator.