If sport means anything Honeysuckle should be running in the Champion Hurdle

Those in charge of sport could hardly be getting it more wrong these days. The Premier League seems to have no idea what is a handball when it is the easiest thing in the world to understand, while NFL games are regularly decided by a zebra throwing a yellow flag on to the field and calling penalties at crucial times.

In racing we have one trainer with about 100 horses capable of going to Cheltenham, while loads of others who have proved time and time again that they're up to the job can't find a single one, and the festival has been diluted to such an extent that the winners of the last three Champion Hurdles aren't even going to run in that race but go for a lesser one instead.

Imagine Pep Guardiola saying "do you know what, let's not play Arsenal tonight. We'd much prefer to play Accrington Stanley because we have a much better chance of beating them". That in essence is what the connections of Honeysuckle said they were going to do last week and the net result is that the best races are being hugely watered down.