Alderwood fine after Navan slip

Caption: Alderwood on his way to winning the County Hurdle

Tom Mullins reports Alderwood to be none the worse after stumbling and slipping up on the flat after the final fence on his chasing debut at Navan...

The JP McManus-owned eight-year-old was staying on well in third place behind Sword Of Destiny and Darwins Fox under Tony McCoy when he came down.

"Thank god he's fine. There's nothing wrong with him. I got a bit of a shock yesterday but he seems 100%," said trainer Tom Mullins.

"It was just the bad ground. He put his foot in a hole. That's what Tony (McCoy) said. He jumped well. He was a bit free early on. Tony kept him back a bit to try to settle him as best he could."

Mullins plans to give Alderwood, winner of the County Hurdle at this year's Cheltenham Festival, his second run over fences sometime next month.

"We'll give him a few easy days then we might pop him out at Christmas or the week before," said the County Kilkenny handler.

"We might end up going to Leopardstown for a beginners' chase or we could go somewhere the week before. He treated his fences with plenty of respect so we were happy with that."

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