Oisin Murphy: maybe I'll let Marquand and Buick have a go at next year's title

Oisin Murphy has said he is considering not fighting for a fourth British Flat jockeys' championship in 2022 after feeling the strain of this year's desperately close battle with William Buick.

Murphy was eventually crowned champion again on the same day he made tabloid headlines for a drunken altercation with a bloodstock agent in a Newmarket pub. In an exclusive interview in Sunday's Racing Post, he discusses the incident and his drinking very frankly as well as revealing the steps he has taken to turn around his life since then.

As for his future on the track, Murphy revealed that winning big races around the world might be his focus next year rather than another exhausting title race.

Oisin Murphy celebrates winning his third British Flat jockeys' championshipCredit: Edward Whitaker

"I never really enjoy it," he said, "but my friends know how much being champion means to me and there's always a good reason to go for it. I finished second to Silvestre [de Sousa] in 2018, so in 2019 it was important to give it a go; 2020 was to prove it wasn't a fluke; then this year I was coming back from a ban and maybe some people thought it would be hard for me to do well.

"I don't know if I'll try and be champion next year. My father would really like to see me just enjoy it, not put that pressure on myself again, and I think Andrew [Balding] and Sheikh Fahad maybe feel the same way.

"Maybe we'll let [Tom] Marquand and [William] Buick have a good go at it while I try and win big races around the world; maybe Silvestre [de Sousa] will start riding up north a lot more like he used to; 'Doyler' [James Doyle] would have claims, and Andrea [Atzeni], and some of the young lads like David Egan."

New champion Oisin Murphy defended by Sheikh Fahad over drunken altercation

However, Murphy admitted that come next spring he might just rethink his priorities.

"Maybe I'll start riding out again next spring and I'll sit on the three-year-old that's improved and might have a stone in hand, which is a couple of winners already; I'll gallop a few two-year-olds and find a couple of early ones; and all of a sudden you're looking at another year of chasing the title.

"Maybe I'll have a point to prove again because every year you start afresh and everybody is like me, they have short memories."

Read more from Oisin Murphy in the Big Read, available online for Members' Club Ultimate subscribers from 6pm on Saturday or in Sunday's Racing Post newspaper. Not a member? Click here, select 'Get Ultimate Monthly' and enter the code JUMPOFF to get your first three months for just £10 per month.

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