‘I love everything about him’ – The New Lion ready to roar at Cheltenham

There was a glint in Dan Skelton’s eye as he paraded his star novice hurdler The New Lion in front of the assembled press at his yard near Alcester on Friday.

Unbeaten in a bumper and three hurdle races, including the Grade One Challow at Newbury, he made such an impression that leading owner JP McManus splashed out to add him to his team for the Cheltenham Festival.

While he also holds an entry in the Tuesday’s opening Supreme Novices’ Hurdle, the longer Turners on Wednesday is his aim unless the ground is testing.

“As you can see he looks outstanding. This horse’s coat, I have to say, is one of the most forward of all of our horses. He looks great and I love to see him bright like this,” said Skelton.

“I took him to Huntingdon the other day for a canter round and a day out. But this is what I love about him – that energy. He’s happy, he’s healthy, he’s bright. I love all this about him.

“When we took him to Huntingdon, he was like this when we got him off the lorry. He walked round the paddock full of exuberance and happiness. He’s never a horse that pulls in a race and he’s never a horse that pulls in work. He’s never going to boil over and do it the wrong way. I just love to see him looking so well.

“He’s going to be going on the Wednesday unless the ground was very soft or heavy in which case we could switch to the Tuesday, but the reality is he’s going to be going on the Wednesday.

“I love him. I love everything about him. I love his attitude, I love the trainability about him. You ask Harry (Skelton, brother and jockey) – he loves the way he is to ride and if you want go inside you can go inside, if you want to go outside you can go outside, if you want to go a bit quicker you can go a bit quicker and if you want to go a bit slower then he does that as well. He can do it all.

“Those good horses have that big day attitude and big day mentality.”

Of The New Lion’s rivals, Skelton said: “I’ve got a lot of respect for The Yellow Clay but he’s a shorter price for the Albert Bartlett. I’m not worried about them with him. He’s a good horse. What will be will be. If we get beat then we get beat, but I’m super happy with this horse.”

Skelton managed four Festival winners last year and Protektorat will aim to repeat his victory in the Ryanair Chase.

“He’s so tough this horse. Last night he started with an infection in his off hind, but you wouldn’t even know there’d been a problem this morning,” Skelton said at an event organised by the Jockey Club.

“That shows you how tough he is, I was worried he wouldn’t be on show this morning, but he’s absolutely fine. I can’t tell you how tough he is.

“He’ll head back to the Ryanair and I think he’s got a great chance. Early in the season he had a lot of weight in the Paddy Power Gold Cup and he might not have been as fit as I thought he was and then I always knew we were going to get in a row at Huntingdon going right-handed. I hoped it would be different but maybe we rode him wrong, who knows.

“I think Il Est Francais will run in this, as a sportsman, and I’m not just saying this because it would suit me, I’d like to see him in the Champion Chase going full bore. He’ll be hard to beat and so will Fact To File, but I’m sure they’re looking at us thinking we did nothing wrong at Windsor and we’ll be hard to beat.”

L’Eau Du Sud has been unbeaten in four since switching to fences having gone close in the County Hurdle last season, and Skelton believes he will be a tough opponent for hot favourite Majborough in the Arkle.

“He’s done nothing wrong over fences, he’s four from four and I always expected him to be a much better chaser than hurdler. Although to be fair, he was useful over hurdles being placed in some big handicaps like the Betfair and the County – I still don’t know how he got beat in that. Even though we had four winners, when it came to the Friday I thought he was our best chance of the week,” said Skelton.

“He’s gone chasing and hasn’t looked back. He’s got course form, if it’s soft he can cope but if it’s better all the better, he can drop in or make the running – he’s just very versatile. There’s nothing I don’t like about his chance in this race

“He’s a good enough hurdler to win an Arkle. We’ve had Arkle runners in the past who weren’t good enough over hurdles to win an Arkle. This year we’ve got Majborough who was a Grade One winner over hurdles, so we need to be a good hurdler to have a chance of winning and I think we were just good enough.

“I’ve a lot of respect for Majborough. I really like our horse, I don’t want to say he’ll win, but I think he’ll make it a lot closer than the prices make it look.”

L’Eau Du Sud’s chance has been made marginally easier due to Sir Gino missing the race, though.

“If I’m being honest, I wouldn’t say I was starstruck but that was as good a performance as you could see from a horse first time over fences (from Sir Gino at Kempton), what Sir Gino can do in front of a jump is unusual, he can almost move his feet independently,” said Skelton.

“He was so, so good, but he’s not there and hopefully he’s OK long term and he gets his chance another day.”