Plenty of Christmas spirit needed to help racing's factions sing from same hymn sheet

All I want for Christmas is for peace to break out in the world of racing, but that seems less likely than ever after a week in which Chelmsford City began a legal challenge to the way the BHA allocates fixtures and the BHA riled the jumps superpowers with the suggestion that trainers should be limited to four runners in major handicaps. And that was before BHA chief executive Julie Harrington used a Gimcrack Dinner speech to suggest the lack of transparency in the way money flows through the sport causes suspicion and impedes progress, a remark which many will take to refer to racecourses' secrecy over media rights income.

Harrington referred to "vested interests and siloed operations" and suggested she has wasted plenty of time "handling conflict as stakeholders turned inwards on each other".

The inability of racing's factions to come together for the good of the sport is nothing new and it is hardly surprising tensions should rise as the financial pie shrinks and everyone wants a slice before only the crumbs are left.