Ed Dunlop

The most telling working relationship in the stable at the moment is with jockey Hector Crouch, and the numbers there are actually better than the yard average. Crouch has ridden 43 times for Dunlop and come home first on 5 of those occasions — a win rate of around 12%, or just over 1 in every 8 rides. That small but meaningful edge above the stable's overall figures suggests Crouch and Dunlop have developed a genuine understanding, the kind where the jockey knows the horses and the trainer knows which races to target.

The one partnership that stands out for entirely different reasons is with Don Simon. Ten races together, zero wins. That is not necessarily a disaster — plenty of horses take time to find their moment — but ten races is long enough that you start to wonder whether the right race has simply never come along, or whether that particular combination just hasn't clicked yet. Every trainer has a few of those situations on the books at any one time, and how Dunlop resolves this one will be quietly interesting to watch.

Four years in and 237 winners deep, Dunlop is still in the phase of his career where the foundations are being laid. The numbers suggest a trainer operating competently and consistently at a solid level — not yet making headlines every week, but ticking over in a way that serious owners and patient observers tend to notice. The next question is whether a season comes along where the win rate climbs and the bigger prizes start to arrive.