The Morning Sports Briefing

Magnificent Mare Annie Power wins Champion Hurdle

A year on from her infamous final fence fall the magnificent mare Annie Power gained the ultimate redemption as she romped to a stunning victory in the Champion Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival yesterday.

Leading from the front Annie Power's victory evoked memories of Dawn Run's success in 1986 and was the crowning moment of another exceptional day at Prestbury Park for Willie Mullins and Ruby Walsh.

Despite seeing favourite Min beatean by the impressive Altior in the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle first up Mullins and Walsh scored three successes yesterday, with the limitlessly brilliant Douvan thrashing the field in the Arkle and Vroum Vroum Mag doing likewise in the Mares’ Hurdle.

Today's feature is the Champion Chase at 3.30pm, with Un De Sceaux a hot favourite to give Mullins his first win in the race.

Dull City through in Europe

Elsewhere Manchester City are through to the last eight of the European Cup for the first time in their history after a dull 0-0 draw with Dynamo Kyiv last night, while Atletico Madrid needed penalties to get past PSV Eindhoven.

Gordon D’Arcy

Ireland finally got their first win of the Six Nations against Italy last weekend, and in his column today Gordon D'Arcy has emphasised how difficult it will be to get another against Scotland on Saturday.

He writes: “The Six Nations being considered a success or failure gets laid on the line here. This is not the same Scotland side we hammered 40-10 at Murrayfield 12 months ago to retain the championship.

“Unfortunately it’s a very different Ireland team as well.”

Can Stephen Rochford cure the Mayo condition?

And in his column today Sean Moran looks at Mayo, who have enjoyed a miserable league campaign thus far with the Stephen Rochford era getting off to a slow start.

He writes: “Rochford and his impressive backroom team have had to decide whether the shortest route to winning is bridging the narrow divides of the last four years or going backwards and finding a difficult pathway altogether. Realisticalls change is needed but where?”

What to watch out for:

Racing

It’s the second day of Cheltenham with the feature race the Champion Chase at 3.30pm (Channel 4 12.35pm-4.30pm, RTE 1.20pm-4pm)

Football

In the Champions League Arsenal look to overturn their 2-0 first leg deficit (RTE 2 7.45pm ko) against Barcelona while Bayern Munich take on Juventus.