Dream debut? Donnacha eyes Group 1 strike with first runner in Britain

Starting at the top leaves you with an awful long way to fall but Donnacha O'Brien has never looked afraid of heights.

Having the favourite for a Group 1 race as your first British runner might faze many trainers, particularly if they were only months into their new career and young enough to be the grandson of some of their rivals.

But the former Irish champion jockey showed the coolness of a tightrope walker in five years riding at the highest level for his record-breaking father Aidan, shrugging off the pressure to land Group 1 races aplenty including three British classics.

Great racehorses rarely sire anything as good as themselves but trainers are different and the early signs are that Donnacha could emulate brother Joseph, who has won the Melbourne Cup and at the Breeders' Cup, by proving up to beating his famous father, on occasion at least.

He has already surpassed his family in one respect. Aidan O'Brien was 27 when he trained his first Classic winner, Joseph was 25 but Donnacha did it at just 21.

He also succeeded where his father had failed in ending a 50-year wait for an Irish success in the Prix de Diane. Irish 1,000 Guineas runner-up Fancy Blue got the best of a tight finish at Chantilly, holding on bravely at the end of a race in which half a length covered the first four home.

Three weeks on and a year older, having celebrated his birthday last week, O'Brien now targets a second Group 1 success in the Qatar Nassau Stakes at Goodwood.

His first British runner comes at a course where he only rode twice as a jockey, thanks to its annual clash with the Galway festival, though he knows its perils after a luckless run on Alligator Alley in last year's Molecomb.

Fancy that: Fancy Blue and Pierre-Charles Boudot after a hard-fought success in the Prix de Diane Longines at ChantillyCredit: Scoop Dyga/France Galop

Fancy Blue has more than just the trickiness of the track to contend with as she takes on older rivals for the first time.

Hamdan Al Maktoum's rare move to keep an older filly in training has paid off astonishingly with Nazeef: last autumn's impressive handicap winner has progressed into a high-class competitor, successful in the Duke of Cambridge Stakes and the Group 1 Falmouth Stakes.

Although those wins came over a mile, there was nothing in the way she was finishing at Royal Ascot or Newmarket to suggest she won't cope with the extra two furlongs here.

Neither trip nor track will be any problem for Japanese six-year-old Deirdre, who won this last season.

Deirdre: will bid for a second win in the Nassau on ThursdayCredit: Alan Crowhurst

Being put in her place in a brilliant Coral-Eclipse does not mean she is not good enough to become just the second multiple Nassau winner this century – and the oldest ever winner of a race that was restricted to three-year-olds from 1840 until 1974.

The John Pearce Racing Gordon Stakes has been confined to the Classic generation from its second running in 1903 and has showcased late-developing talent ever since.

The last five winners have put the race firmly on the world map by going on to land 11 Group or Grade 1 races between them, including a Melbourne Cup and a Breeders' Cup Turf.

It is often seen as a St Leger trial but this year it will be just as significant when it comes to explaining the Derby.

Serpentine stuns Derby rivals for O'Brien to win a race as strange as the day

Khalifa Sat looked to get more of the run of the race than most at Epsom, always in second place in a contest that generated huge debate as to the merit – or otherwise – of the enterprisingly ridden 25-1 winner Serpentine.

The race did not pan out as well for the fifth-placed English King and the sixth Mogul, who were left with a lot to do in the straight.

They did well to finish as close as they did, particularly Frankie Dettori's mount who had to start from stall one that day, and will be fancied by many to reverse the form.

Progressive pair Al Aasy and Subjectivist represent William Haggas and Mark Johnston, who also face off in the preceding Richmond Stakes when July Stakes second Yazaman and fourth-placed Qaader bid to pay a compliment to their Newmarket conqueror Tactical.

But if money talks Admiral Nelson is certainly one to keep an eye on.

Not only was he bought for a record £440,000 at the Goffs UK Premier Yearling Sale at Doncaster in 2019 but he also attracted bundles of cash when sent off 5-2 favourite for the Coventry Stakes at Royal Ascot.

Admiral Nelson: is expected to do better in the Richmond StakesCredit: Patrick McCann

That came just eight days after his impressive winning debut at the Curragh and he never figured after a slow start.

He has been given plenty of time to recover from those exertions and few are better at bringing along a high-class youngster than Aidan O'Brien – as Donnacha may prove later in the afternoon.

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