Cheltenham Diary: Pick on someone your own size, Lard of the Ring

There can't be many people annoying enough to distract a professional in the midst of one of the most glorious moments of his career. John McCririck happens to be one of them.

Channel 4's betting guru – aka The Lard of the Ring – incensed the weighing room with his critical comments concerning Brian O'Connell's ride on the beaten hot pot Dunguib in the Festival opener. "They should replace him with a proper jockey," was one of McCririck's kinder comments. John Francome, his TV colleague, yesterday pulled him on his abuse, telling him he "was out of order". Yet to the boys still toiling in the saddle Francome's rebuke did not begin to sum up the fury.

When Davy Russell returned to the winning enclosure having won the RSA Chase aboard Weapon's Amnesty he was keen to perform his victory salute — in the big man's direction.

"If it was me or Ruby [Walsh] or AP [McCoy] we can take that sort of nonsense," he said. "But Brian is a young lad on the way up and he doesn't need that sort of thing, especially from someone like that. Brian rode the horse fine, he was just beaten by better ones on the day, and if punters feel bad, that's nothing to how he feels. John McCririck doesn't know one end of a horse from another. If he's lost money as a punter, let him stand up and take it on the chin like a good solid man rather than hit at a young lad who can't hit back."

But which chin to take it on? You can understand McCririck's problem.

The Inspector calls home the wrong horse

Inspector Lynley, the toff detective of BBC fame, was snooping around the parade ring here yesterday. Alas, the old boy's powers of deduction at Prestbury Park do not measure up to those at Scotland Yard. "I was screaming home the wrong horse," said the actor Nat Parker, who is here fronting a six-part series about the thoroughbred. "I thought I was on Becauseicouldntsee in my placepot, but, in fact, I was on Mobaasher. The former finished second, the latter finished out of the frame." It was all to do with Synchronised's withdrawal and the rule about the bet then switching to the unnamed favourite. All very complicated. Particularly for an inspector.

Still bowling the punters over

It's easier to find a famous footballer at Cheltenham than it is a winner. Already spotted here this week have been – in no particular order, except the last-named – Michael Owen, Trevor Francis, Joleon Lescott and Lee Hughes. However, the player always guaranteed to turn the heads is Stan Bowles. He does so every year. "If I could have passed a betting shot like I passed a ball I would have been a legend," he says. Stan, to the punter ankle-high in discarded slips you are anyway.

People in glass houses...

Does any other mug punter out there recognise the irony in the Channel 4 coverage being sponsored by Dubai? But then, perhaps the sun-kissed don't-you-wish-you were-here nonsense which is screened at the end of each and every ad break is actually meant to console us. After all, we may have done the house-keeping but it could be far, far worse. We could be into our cousin up the road to the tune of $10bn.