Meade eyeing Monks return Noel Meade is hoping he can finally get Monksland back on the track at Christmas after two years on the sidelines. The talented performer has been dogged with niggly problems since winning the Christmas Hurdle over three miles at Leopardstown in December 2012. "It's been one little thing after another," Meade told At The Races. "Obviously the one thing we're always worried about with horses is a leg or a tendon, but he's never had anything like had. Instead he's had a stress crack in a front tendon which held him up for a long time. "We had him almost ready to go to Fairyhouse for the Hatton's Grace and just as he started work, he started to go a bit sore behind. "It transpires he had a kissing spine, so we had to treat that and that's pushed us back now to Christmas. "Hopefully we'll have him out for Christmas, touch wood, if we keep going the right way. "There are races for him to run in, it's frustrating to see that we can't get him out there to race but we'll try to have him as fit as we can for Christmas. "He belongs to the same owners as Apache Stronghold, so if he did go jumping fences he'd be running in the similar sort of races, so we've more or less decided we'd keep him over hurdles for the moment. "He's fine. He's just very free. It's hard to keep him settled and relaxed. Paul (Carberry) rides him most of the time and he gets on quite well with him. He's a handful."
