Farewell to Harchibald, the great entertainer who was misunderstood for his whole career

One of the game's great mysteries is how a horse like Harchibald was made out to be a monkey, yet Deano's Beano was branded a braveheart, a warrior who wanted it. One of them gave you everything he had on the bridle, always wanting to please, while the other would barely budge without Tony McCoy throwing the kitchen sink, the kettle, the toaster and the microwave at him.

One wanted to race, the other didn't, yet their reputations suggested otherwise. It never made any sense to me.

Harchibald was an enigma all right, but completely misunderstood. He was a people pleaser, an entertainer, an exhibitionist who made arguably the most handsome contribution to a glorious era of two-mile hurdlers. He was the joker of the pack, always making us laugh one way or the other, but he had the last laugh more often than you were led to believe.