Is there anybody out there who actually fancies Luxembourg? Anyone at all?

Let's rewind to early May and a Jockey Club press morning at Ballydoyle before the Epsom Derby. With hacks from both sides of the Irish Sea wrapped around Aidan O'Brien and not prepared to let him escape from the huddle unless he revealed the pecking order for his three-year-olds, the master trainer left us in no doubt whatsoever about who was top of the pile.

"I don't think Ryan [Moore] would have had a choice to make [in the Derby] if he were fit," O'Brien said of Luxembourg, who, only a few days earlier, had been ruled out of the Classic due to a muscular problem, with stablemate Stone Age replacing him as favourite.

O'Brien added: "He probably has more scope than St Nicholas Abbey had. St Nicholas Abbey ran in the Guineas as well, but he didn't run as well as this lad. Luxembourg is very classy. What he did in the Guineas he shouldn't have been able to do. He ended up totally out the back and he still kept coming. For him to do that, it was a very serious run for a middle-distance horse."