Drever Faces Four In Long Walk Inglis Drever heads a field of five declared for the totesport Long Walk Hurdle at Windsor on Saturday. The Ladbrokes World Hurdle winner will be long odds-on to maintain his current unbeaten run this term in the Grade One contest over three miles one and a half furlongs. The Howard Johnson-trained six-year-old made a successful reappearance in the John Smith´s Hurdle at Wetherby in October and then defeated his arch rival Baracouda in the Long Distance Hurdle at Newbury three weeks ago. Hopes of a rematch were dashed on Monday when the French ace, winner of this race four times in the last five years and second on the other occasion, was not confirmed by trainer Francois Doumen due to a clerical error. In Baracouda´s absence, trainer Ian Williams has taken advantage of the availability of Tony McCoy by booking the champion jockey for Brewster. McCoy though is currently sidelined with flu but plans to return to action tomorrow. Crystal d´Ainay, third to Inglis Drever at Newbury and runner-up to Baracouda in this race 12 months ago, represents Alan King. Completing the line-up are the Nigel Twiston-Davies-trained Mistanoora and Starzaan from Hughie Morrison´s stable. As expected, Inglis Drever´s stable companion No Refuge was withdrawn at the 48-hour final declaration stage. The other horses among the nine five-day entries not to take up the challenge are the Twiston-Davies-trained Tramantano, Jonjo O´Neill´s Hasty Prince and Charlie Mann´s Nathos. Nathos will instead run in the totescoop6 Handicap Hurdle at Haydock on Saturday. Mann said: 'There´s too much to lose by running at Windsor. If he ran well there he´d be ruined for handicaps and if he ran badly he shouldn´t have been there. 'He´s in good form so he goes to Haydock.' ? PA Sport
