Dalgleish among the smaller beasts making mark in the jungle

At the top of the Flat trainers’ championship table Aidan O’Brien has trousered £5,725,226 and were he running the London Marathon he would be somewhere near the Mall while his nearest pursuers were still having a guided tour of the Cutty Sark.

O’Brien is around two and a half million quid ahead of Messrs Hannon, Gosden, Fahey and Sir Michael Stoute in that order. Extraordinarily none of that four has yet reached the sum by which Aidan leads them.

But it is a tremendous tussle between them as the four were covered yesterday morning by little more than £136,000, which is about the sum Richard Hannon snr spent in the average season on champagne at home and lunch in the Shears.