Godolphin/Darley article

[NoChanceToDance]

* The Guardian,
* Tuesday July 29 2008

Tonight, Kerrin McEvoy quits Britain and his job as understudy to Frankie Dettori to return to his homeland as Sheikh Mohammed's retained rider. "I am from Australia and this is probably the biggest job for a jockey in Australian racing," he said. McEvoy's identity and future is clear, unlike that of the operation he leaves behind.

Godolphin is not what it used to be - that much we know. It was conceived as a taut, elite squad of fewer than 50 horses that plundered the world's top races. It enjoyed instant success, winning the 1994 Oaks with Balanchine and peaking in 1999 with 18 global wins at the highest level.

Now, it numbers around 200, based in Newmarket, Dubai and America. Since 2004, after abandoning juvenile academies in France and the US, it has included numerous two-year-olds. This annual enlistment has been consciously downsized, averaging at about 80 now - far fewer than the distended years of 2004 and 2005.

That was why, in 2004, there was a job for McEvoy and partly why there are no plans to replace him. The other reason is Godolphin's stagnation. Last year, its worldwide haul of six Group Ones was the lowest for 11 years (although its British tally was the highest since 2004, due almost entirely to one horse, Ramonti).

The median ability of the squad has plummeted. In 2003, Godolphin did not have a single runner in a British handicap. In 2008, this division produces its best strike rate. Its class players are sidelined: Ibn Khaldun and Fast Company indefinitely, Ramonti and Creachadoir perhaps permanently.

Last Saturday, for the first time since its inaugural year, Godolphin did not even have a runner in the King George, a race it has won five times. Dettori rode Campanologist in a Group Two at York instead - and finished second.

Meanwhile, the Coolmore Stud-Ballydoyle stable axis continues to give a master class in how a racing superpower should work. There used to be two horses in this global race. Now it is a walkover. Although the prowess of Aidan O'Brien is impressive, the paucity of resistance to his dominance is to the actual detriment of Britain's top races.

If there is a device to achieving recovery, it will not be precipitated by the prevailing guesses. Simon Crisford, Godolphin's racing manager, rejects both well-intentioned counsel to revert to a smaller squad and, more forcibly, the latest malicious rumour that Saeed bin Suroor will be replaced as trainer, this time by Mark Johnston.

But neither debate nor gossip will cease as long as Godolphin's very evident problems remain. Speculation has now been rife for years. Is it the quality of the bloodstock? Bad purchasing? Intemperate nurturing or injudicious training? Is it connected with the departure of key players, such as Jeremy Noseda and Tom Albertrani?

The only outward concession to this common currency is Sheikh Mohammed's recent huge expenditure on wholesale breeding operations and nascent stallions. The most striking of the latter purchases provide access to some of Coolmore's newly successful bloodlines, originating from stallions he is said to have self-defeatingly forswore.

If this is indeed his only response, it may imply that he believes - or has been advised - that the inadequacy lies within his breeding stocks. Time may show his was a brilliant move, the re-forming of an empire in echo of - and challenge to - Coolmore.

Yet relying as it does on unproven sires, it is not guaranteed to succeed. Either way, it will be a long wait to find out: the first progeny will not race until 2011. It is also something of a gamble that this is the only shadow that falls between ambition and achievement in latter-day Godolphin.