Green on the mark for Mullins signature winner

Emmet Mullins might have expected a day like this to have come a bit sooner for his stable star St Stephens Green, but his comfortable victory in the Grade B handicap hurdle feature on the first day of Killarney's May festival indicated better things may well be to come.

A horse that got within a length of the ill-fated Heartbreak City when giving him 6lb at Galway last summer should not have took this long to win a race over hurdles, but this €50,000 contest was a good opportunity to break that losing streak.

The son of Diamond Green took it up two out in the hands of the trainer's cousin David Mullins and in the end he had plenty in reserve in beating Chambord Du Lys by three-and-a-quarter lengths. It was David Mullins's first ride for his cousin.