Thistlecrack, the Gold Cup favourite, suffered the first defeat of his chasing career at Cheltenham on Saturday but the real drama of the Betbright Trial Cotswold Chase took place after the finishing line when the horse which beat him a valiant head, the 2015 Grand National winner Many Clouds, collapsed and died.

Charismatic, long-serving chasers like Many Clouds attract a huge following within the sport and Oliver Sherwood, his trainer, was not the only member of his profession, hardened by experience you would have thought, in shedding tears for the horse.

As a National winner people will still be talking about having backed or watched him when he won at Aintree in 50 years’ time which is some memorial for horse.

We often talk glibly of racehorses giving their all and on Saturday the 10-year-old did. Indeed as his trainer Oliver Sherwood pointed out afterwards, lowering the colours of Thistlecrack, may in time prove to have been his finest hour, finer even than his victory in the world’s greatest steeplechase.

Just managing to hold back the tears Sherwood said: “I always said he’s one of those horses who would die for you and he died for me and the team doing the thing he loved most. By God, he wanted to win that race.