Racing is taking a battering - so thank goodness for these heroic saviours

Racing is under a cloud right now. Champions Day was an opportunity for the sport to celebrate an enthralling Flat season, but instead it found itself on the front and back pages of the national newspapers over the weekend for what had taken place off the track rather than on it.

On the Saturday it emerged that Oisin Murphy, crowned champion jockey for the third successive year later that day, had allegedly been involved in a drunken altercation the previous Thursday night before he was stood down for testing over the permitted alcohol limit for the second time. Murphy also served a three-month suspension last November for testing positive for cocaine.

The news came at a time when the jumps season is sputtering into life, but the following day we were reminded that particular garden is not particularly rosy either, with both the BHA and weighing room culture coming under fire as a result of the investigation into Bryony Frost's bullying allegations against fellow rider Robbie Dunne.