“LUCKY NEW ZEALANDERS.”

Taranaki Daily News, 22 November 1929, Page 5

“LUCKY NEW ZEALANDERS.”

“Sound the trumpet; beat the drum; Cheer the victors; here they come ..." Nightmarch is home! Nightmarch, the hero of the Melbourne Cup in 1929—the horse who carried welter-weights and beat Australia’s best handicappers at a mile and at two miles, and took toll of weight-for-age horses over middle distances as well. And the rest of the New Zealand division are now quartered once more in their home land. But while the cheers for the victors still linger in the air, growls of discontent come like ether waves from across the Tasman, and one stops and wonders, “In lionising these returned and returning equines, are we going too far? Arc we giving praise where plaudits are not due?” ■ •' To begin with, our jockeys are not “horsemen.” That is the Single and undivided opinion of the sporting Press of Australia. Roy Reed, according to the “expert,” who turns out a full column and a half of racing copy for The Sydney Bulletin Weekly, says of Reed: “He gets results, but is the most awkward of the leading New Zealand riders seen in Sydney-” No matter if New Zealand horseowners, trainers and jockeys of life-long experience consider that Reed has a splendid seat on a horse, perfect balance,-alertness at the barrier and coolness and judgment in running. They must be Wrong I The “expert” cannot err! And then as regards R. S. Bagby and T. Green: Their “long suit” is throwing away races: The Sydney Referee and Smith’s Weekly says so, so what’s the use i»f arguing? And with these awkward and incompetent jockeys on top, New Zealanders have Still won races. It must be by pure luck; nothing else! • One would have thought that Nightmarch’s Melbourne Cup victory would have cleared Reed at least, but he gets little credit for his exercise of judgment, and Australian writers fall back on slanging their own horsemen. Smith’s Weekly calls the Cup race: “ a farcical affair.” Veteran Bobby Lewis, we are told, “proved incapable of handling Phar Lap and ruined his chance by fighting with him for nine furlongs of the journey.” Carradale, according to the same scribe, “hand the race WON at the top of the straight,” but “ Wilson MURDERED his chance by letting him run off the course.” These happenings, it seems, allowed Nightmarch, who was “apparently hopelessly out of it at the half-mile,” to gain a three lengths victory! Paquito, for the same reasons, struggled into second.place. So New Zealand’s luck was doubly “in.” That the above observations are a true reflex of the last Melbourne Cup. cannot be doubted- They are penned by no less an expert than “Iroquois. ’•’ Therefore, you cheering, hanky-waving New Zealanders, stand back, and thank your lucky stars, not that Nightmarch (and Roy Reed) won, but that Australian horses were on their worst behaviour on the great Tuesday in November, and that Australian jockeys “slipped” badly when put to the test, thus paving the way for New Zealand’s bloodless victory! So—- “ Smash the trumpet; crack the drum; Flukey winners; worth a ‘thrum!’” “Moturoa.”