Mullins rules Supreme

Leopardstown report: David Casey and Rule Supreme conspired to provide Willie Mullins with the sweetest kind of headache by winning yesterday's Hennessy Gold Cup at Leopardstown.

A race that was widely expected to provide the ideal Cheltenham Gold Cup warm up for Beef Or Salmon instead reverted to type and a Mullins-trained horse emerged best for the sixth time in the last seven years.

Only Beef Or Salmon in 2003 has managed to interrupt one of the most remarkable winning streaks in recent racing history but even the odds-on favourite couldn't manage to do it again when faced with Rule Supreme yesterday.

Florida Pearl's four-timer and Alexander Banquet (2002) proved Mullins's ability to hit the Hennessy spot but whereas Florida Pearl's post-Leopardstown holy grail was always the Gold Cup, Rule Supreme presents the trainer with a very different challenge.

Success in last year's SunAlliance Chase, on top of the French Champion Hurdle, still hasn't managed to completely assuage Mullins's suspicion of Rule Supreme's jumping technique and the Ladbrokes World Hurdle has long been proposed as his festival target this season. That could be about to change.

"I don't know what we'll do. I have no doubt about this fellah's engine, but I've always been worried about his jumping. But he was very good today and travelled great. I will have to talk to the owners and have a look at the Gold Cup opposition before we decide.

"I've always said that if you get a horse with even half a chance in the Gold Cup you have to go for it but maybe this is a horse to make me eat my words. I think we might leave him in both races until as late as possible," said Mullins afterwards.

Bookmaker reaction was to cut Rule Supreme for both the Gold Cup and the Hurdle and he is now as low as 8 to 1 with some firms for chasing's blue riband.

Other firms go the same about Beef Or Salmon despite yesterday's 14-length defeat and an excuse for the Michael Hourigan-trained horse became immediately apparent after he was found to have an upper respiratory tract infection. Paul Carberry reported that Beef Or Salmon "gurgled" between the last two fences and added: "He wasn't the same horse as the last day. I wasn't happy from a long way out."

Hourigan's response was upbeat and asked if Cheltenham is still the plan, he replied: "Where else is there to go? The winner is very good but we'll have fun with our horse yet."

But when it came to fun yesterday, no one was having more of it than Casey. On the sidelines for three months with a broken leg, the jockey only returned on Thursday and his first winner back was Strangely Brown in the Cashmans Juvenile Hurdle just two and a half hours before hitting the big-race jackpot.

"Once we get him to Cheltenham in one piece it will be great to take part in whatever race," said Casey but Mullins declared: "David gets on especially well with the horse and knows him inside out. I left it all up to him."

The PJ Moriarty Chase turned into a Jessica Harrington benefit as Carrigeen Victor beat off his stable companion Well Presented by a length. The two favourites, Mark The Man and Newmill, were well beaten and afterwards found to have respiratory infections. "Neither of them are in at Cheltenham," said Harrington. "Well Presented could be a horse for the Midlands National and Carrigeen Victor might go for something like the Power Gold Cup."

Favourite backers got it right in the Deloitte Hurdle, however, as Royal Paradise confirmed himself as the likely leading Irish contender for the SunAlliance at Cheltenham.

Tom Foley's horse is a general 8 to 1 chance for the festival and the trainer admitted: "If he was to go to Cheltenham he had to win today. That's probably why we were probably more nervous this time than we will be next month. The SunAlliance is more likely than the two-mile race but he has plenty of pace and will prefer better ground."

Strangely Brown is on course for the Triumph Hurdle after a two-length defeat of Barati in the first that provoked trainer Eric McNamara to say: "He's a proper horse and is entitled to a shot at the Triumph." Paddy Power make him 16 to 1 for the festival.