The game is nearly up for Fallon

By Ian Carnaby

Sometimes, an article appears in the press which leaves the reader nodding in agreement and, if he is another journalist, wishing he had penned it. Alastair Down’s analysis of Kieren Fallon and the situation in which he finds himself (Racing Post, Sunday) was concise and aggressive but, above all, fair.

At last, here was a piece which ignored possible future embarrassments, such as Fallon appearing on Channel 4 or the Racing Post needing an in-depth interview from the jockey’s point of view. Whether it would be granted is another matter, of course, but that is not the point. Down wrote what he thought - what a good many of us think - with considerations like those booted over the stand. Let the future take care of itself.

The daily Chat Room section in the paper has plenty going for it, with some pithy one-liners now and again. But some contributors are so utterly biased that their comments cannot be taken seriously. Fallon, you feel, would still have his supporters if he committed a capital offence on a whim. Those who rush to his defence would do well to ask themselves whether their principal motivation is a sense of fair play or the unshakable desire to see the ‘establishment’, in this case the BHA, poked in the eye. Well, if that is what they wanted, their wish has come true. Unfortunately, as he waits for the result of the B sample following his positive drugs test at Deauville on August 19, their man is no better off.

There is no need to rehearse here the shambolic nature of the prosecution’s case in the recent High Court corruption trial. The City of London police clearly have no deeper knowledge of racing now than they ever had and no real understanding of betting, either. One hapless individual even failed to differentiate between profit and turnover. ‘Not my bag, guv’nor’, you can almost here him saying, like someone out of Minder.

But the worst performance, even worse than Australian steward Ray Murrihy’s, came from racing’s security chief Paul Scotney. Wholly unimpressive in the witness box, he was also said by trainer Alan Jarvis to have claimed (in drink) that he ‘would get Kieren Fallon if it’s the last thing I do”. Frankly, there is no reason for Jarvis to invent something like that, and no one believes that he did.

So, Fallon - who seemed quite calm during the whole process, not at all the ‘deeply troubled’ figure some have suggested - enjoyed the support of those who are not interested in his truly appalling record, merely the fact that here was a great jockey up against the odds.

For what it’s worth, I believe two main things about the whole affair. One, the BHA, and the Jockey Club before it, had had enough of Fallon over the years and were determined to do something about it. (Not a million miles from Scotney’s ill-advised assertion, then, you will say, but rather more discreet.) And two, although they had bits and pieces of evidence - all three jockeys, Fergal Lynch and Darren Williams, as well as the former champion, might well have trouble reclaiming their licence as a matter of course), there was never enough there to trouble a well-organised defence.

The BHA will manage a stiff upper-lip response, needless to say, and no one expects heads to roll. But it will feel foolish and naïve to a degree, even if, as seems perfectly possible, the French authorities assist Shaftesbury Avenue in its principal aim.

I have no idea why so many people side with Fallon. He has been violent on the racecourse, he rode for people who visited Portman Square so often they must have known every restaurant and clothes shop, he has abused stalls handlers - men doing a dangerous job for a pittance - and he has already been banned for six months for a previous drugs offence. Almost unbelievably, with the full weight of Ballydoyle behind him, he appears to have taken a ridiculous risk at Deauville, thereby virtually ensuring that they will feel enough is enough.

He is not a sympathetic character; he is simply someone who has become so used to waltzing with danger that he has no idea when one tune stops and another begins. As Down rightly points out, racing has every right to be tired of someone whose perverse, almost calm desire to see himself go down involves just about everyone who has tried to help.

He is very near the end and, as he played out the same hopeless, silly game at the Old Bailey, waving his mobile phone at reporters on a stage which mattered no more to him than any other, it was almost as if he knew it. Fallon bothers himself now and then to say the things that people want to hear, but soon they will stop asking anyway. It’s a shame, but no more than that, and it’s time for him to move on and out.