Should we cheer him or shun him? There was nothing special about the race on Wolverhampton’s all-weather track last Friday night, a 12-furlong handicap won by Paul Howling’s Our Kes, nothing special except for the fact that the jockey on board had ridden his last winner in Britain back in July 2006, at which point his licence was suspended because police believed he was involved in a race-fixing conspiracy.
The day after that case collapsed we learnt Kieren Fallon had for the second time in two years tested positive in France for cocaine use. An 18-month worldwide ban from riding followed. Fallon has in his time lost a retainer with Britain’s two most outstanding trainers, Henry Cecil and Sir Michael Stoute, in the former case after allegations about a ‘top jockey’ (whom Fallon has always denied was him) having an affair with the trainer’s wife. He was once banned for six months because, in temper, he dragged another jockey out of the saddle after a race.
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