Homecoming

“It was great winning the Guineas on Mawj and it really helped with my confidence”

“I was supposed to ride Porta Fortuna in the Albany but Qatar had an intended runner who then had a setback, by which time Frankie (Dettori) had got on her. So I missed a Royal Ascot winner, which was frustrating, but Donnacha said to me that when Frankie was unavailable in the future I could ride her.

“Porta Fortuna likes good ground and that was a special moment because I spent time at Ballydoyle for the next two years after I’d been at Fozzy’s and I’d ridden gallops with Donnacha and Joseph. We’d got on very well, and I was delighted for Donnacha, who has achieved an awful lot in a short space of time. They can pick any jockey, so it was great to have been asked.”

If the lack of big-race success for the Qatar Racing team through the year had been a source of frustration, there was some relief late in the season when the David Menuisier-trained juvenile Sunway, a brother to Sealiway in whose part-purchase Murphy had been instrumental, took the Criterium International at Saint-Cloud. Hopes are high that the colt can go on to even bigger and better things at three.

“The first time I rode him, before he’d ever run, I told Sheikh Fahad he should buy into him, and he did so on my recommendation. He looked a smart horse when he won on debut at Sandown, particularly in the last furlong, so I can’t explain what happened at Ascot next time where he gave me no feel at all. David freshened him up for the seven-furlong Group 2 at Doncaster, where he ran well and kept going right through the line, and he then picked the mile Group 1 at Saint-Cloud, where Sunway travelled like he was always going to win. As a type he’s the perfect model, and as a full brother to a Champion Stakes winner who ran well in an Arc, there’s lots to look forward to.”

While Murphy has ridden no end of winners for Irish trainers around the world he has had surprisingly few in his native country - just five at the last count - so the handicap win he enjoyed on Dragon Of Malta in front of friends and family at Listowel’s Harvest Festival, a meeting he had attended many times as a child but had never before ridden at, meant a lot.

“I’ve known Pat Healy (renowned racing photographer and former racecourse chairman) since I was about four years of age from my mum and my Uncle Jim (Culloty, Best Mate’s rider and Lord Windermere’s trainer) bringing me to the races, and when Frankie couldn’t come he asked me if I’d like to. Listowel was one of our tracks, because while I was born in Cork I’d grown up outside Killarney until I was 11. With help from Mark Enright I had three rides, and they were Dragon Of Malta and two seconds.

“There was a good connection with the trainer Pat O’Donnell too, as myself and his son Patrick were both at Fozzy’s at the same time and we are still very good friends. My grandmother was there, and I think all of my mother’s brothers and sisters were too, and she’s one of eight. My father’s family will all have been watching at home too, so I got immense pleasure from it.” The wins on Kieran Cotter’s Matilda Picotte in the Sceptre Stakes at Doncaster and the Challenge Stakes at Newmarket also gave Murphy a lot of pleasure.

“Matilda Picotte is owned by friends of my mother. I got on her at Doncaster because Ronan Whelan had to ride in Ireland, and I rode her by feel that day. She felt super and it was a very good performance, but she took it to another level when she won the Challenge. Kieran is a very good trainer who wins maidens in Ireland, which are always hard to win, before often trading them on. Matilda Picotte is quite fast and there’s a race in Saudi they are looking at. They do a very good job with the ground there, and I think it might suit her.” In a year encompassing some 1000 or so rides, there were bound to be occasions when things didn’t go so well, and Murphy singles out two in particular.

The first is that he accumulated 15 days of suspensions in Royal Ascot week, where he followed a two-day careless riding ban at Lingfield on the Monday with three further breaches. They included three days for careless riding and another eight for his use of the whip on Qatar Racing’s Valiant King, whose head defeat by Royal winner Desert Hero was frustrating enough in itself in a week when there were all too many seconds.

“The championship is obviously very important to me and I led it for a long way, but I missed half of July through suspension and when I came back I was 20 behind. I probably rode for only around nine days in the UK in July, because of foreign trips as well, and I had only seven winners, compared to around 30 most years. The championship had definitely gone by the start of August.”

A second significant setback, and possibly even more painful to a jockey who is his own harshest critic, came when Via Sistina was caught close home by King Of Steel in the Qipco Champion Stakes. Besides dropping his stick, Murphy was publicly criticised by owner Stephen Hillen for getting there too soon.

“I probably do more work on the Equicizer than any other professional and I could go 800 rides or more without dropping my stick, but I dropped it there and I was so disappointed with myself. Everyone can have their own opinion about whether we got there too early, but I think she’d have won if I’d been able to keep her up to work.

“It was fantastic to be given the opportunity by George Boughey and by Stephen Hillen and his wife to ride Via Sistina, who was obviously going to be very popular at the December Sales. Winning a Champion Stakes would have been an amazing achievement and I was gutted not to do it for them. I blame myself for that. Absolutely.”

Murphy will have another crack at the championship in 2024 but it will no longer be his number one consideration.

“I’ll try my best again next year, but you won’t ever find me missing Group 1s abroad to stay here and ride maiden and handicap winners. My focus will be on big races and when they come around I won’t be prioritising the jockeys’ championship.”