Fleming backs makeshift meetings to beat freeze

While trainers and jockeys are thrilled with the prospect of Flat races being staged for jump horses at Southwell tomorrow, punters should be wary.

The cold snap has not made it easy to keep the industry's show on the road and the British Horseracing Authority have been lauded by many for laying on a card consisting of five races for horses that have run over hurdles or fences and one National Hunt Flat race, all over a two-mile trip.

However, Beare Green trainer Alan Fleming understands why punters will have mixed feelings.

Fleming, who is hoping conditions improve in time for Champion Hurdle prospect Starluck to take his place in the Christmas Hurdle at Kempton on Boxing Day, said: "I don't think punters will be short-changed.

"When you have horses ready to run, and at a certain level, you simply have to run them or they can go flat very quickly. That's why most trainers will welcome the initiative.

"Some people will be sceptical but punters know the form. These are jumps horses, some running over wrong trips on the Flat. I don't think any serious punter will put money on them. I know I wouldn't."

Weather permitting, On Borrowed Wings could take his chance in Grade One company for the first time in the Feltham Novices' Chase at Kempton on Sunday. Fleming said: "We've also got him in at Wetherby [on Monday] but with the weather as it is, Kempton is in the forefront of our thinking."

However, bookmakers Stan James make it 8-15 that the Kempton meeting will be abandoned and 11-8 that any racing will take place on Boxing Day.