Ballydoyle still a Futurity Trophy force - but has it become an afterthought rather than a target?

We have become accustomed to seeing Aidan O’Brien run a good one in this race down the years and even in the last ten seasons he has sent out two subsequent 2,000 Guineas winners and a Derby hero. However, he has had 24 runners in that period and often ran more than one.

That begs the question of what has changed in recent times because the Ballydoyle trainer has saddled just four of those 24 runners since the turn of the decade and only once in the last four years has he run more than one, while he was not even represented in the 2020 running.

It has almost become a bit of an afterthought rather than a legitimate end-of-season target, and O’Brien’s runner this year, Delacroix, is generally 33-1 for the 2,000 Guineas and Derby.