fallon should have retired two seasons back

he did

i see he is on the cold list--17 days and 34 rides since a winner

The Felon should quit, he's made enough dough !

when he was based in Kildare he would start a row in a confession box

The Priest wouldn't pay him out 'greaser !

the guy was a pure terror, the bouncers in the disco's in Kildare town were always on edge when Fallon and the rest of the five foot nothings arrived.

Don't ever start a row with a jockey in Kildare, you might smash the first one before you know it there will 20 around you, Fallon first in line.

Erm, have I mentioned before that it's far more about the horses than the jockeys?

Dettori has ridden 16 winners all season from 205 (mainly poor) horses at a SR of just under 8% and plenty on here were saying he was yesterday's man and gone at the game and would never be back in the big time again, yet bar an injury would probably have ridden an Arc and QEII winner in the last week or so.

If it's not more about the quality of horse then it must just be coincidence that James Doyle is having his best season ever too.

And I have mentioned before there is a reason he doesn't get the horses ima

if fallon had been a saint during his cereer right now he would be winning derbys and g1s for fun , the talent is still there but the motivation and trust isn't

he was king for a while , real shame but its been downslide really since ballydoyle

Yeah the reason is called other yards have stable jockeys....that's always been the case in racing and was something Fallon benefited from himself in the past.

He was unfairly dismissed at Cecil's and the yard have had a good few stable jockeys since then and he was/is hardly likely to be asked to ride for them again, he left Stoute via choice and he (Stoute) was hardly going to sack Ryan Moore once Fallon was available again and Coolmore were hardly going to sack Johnny Murtagh with the amount of success he had there once Fallon was back. You can't really have a sustained absence from the sport and then expect to walk straight back into it where you left off because things move on and owners and trainers are still going to have runners regardless and aren't going to wait round twiddling their thumbs.

There aren't really that many top stable jockey jobs going anyway and those that there are there are already taken.

he should still be doing time for the ride on top cee's,watching him now he may have to go riding over the sticks,that would suit his way of riding now,steady away,not got a flat finish in him any more.

he continues to ride because he wants to. quite why it should matter to anyone else is beyond me. he will retire when he feels the time is right. as is his want.

He rode a Godolphin 3rd string to win earlier this season and I thought it was a terrific ride - it shows he can still do it when motivated but he seems to let people down with non appearances these days - pity really but too much water has flowed under the bridge for things to change .....

Yeah the reason is called other yards have stable jockeys.

With the greatest of respect that has very little to do with it.

Out of the current top 10 jockeys in the table it's only Hughes and Fanning who could be described as stable jockeys in the traditional sense with the majority of their winners coming from the trainers they are attached to. To all intents and purposes Ryan Moore is a freelance with Stoute only providing around slightly more than a quarter of his winners and rides. Neil Callan lost a decent stable jockey's role before the season started and could have his best ever season riding as a freelance.

The question is why are trainers and owners preferring to use the likes of Callan, Lee, De Sousa etc instead of Fallon? In 2011 he rode winners for 58 different trainers and rode for 139 trainers. Last season he rode winners for 33 trainers and rode for 116 and so far this season he's ridden winners for 28 trainers and had rides for 89. That's quite a rapid drop in trainers using him during the space of 2 years.

Over the past couple of months Fallon has ridden quite a lot for Godolphin and Johnston, both powerful stables in the type of races he's often riding in and he's still not getting regular winners. Graham Cunningham had a throwaway line in one of his RP columns the other week referring to a ride of Fallon's back when "nothing seemed impossible." I don't think even his most ardent admirers could argue that's still the case now.

If a top jockey is going to a meeting to ride for his trainer/owner such as Buick/Gosden, Barzalona/SDS/Godolphin, Hughes/Hannon, Moore/Stoute then it's far easier for either another trainer to book that jockey knowing he's already going there or for the jockey's agent to book the ride by contacting that other trainer and letting it be known that jockey is already going there. Whatever Moore is considered now he's still Stoute's stable jockey for all but one owner and as with Callan, even if he's not stable jockey elsewhere they have long-standing associations with those trainers, so Moore still rides plenty for Hannon and obviously his Dad and Callan still rides plenty for Botti, G Butler, Johnston, Ryan, Tate and still rides/has ridden for Varian, although some of those associations will be coming to an end now anyway.

As I've said to you repeatedly before though Marcee, what's the point of comparing Fallon's stats in 2011 when he was going all out for the title with now when he isn't? Why bother telling us the number of different trainers and owners he rode for then compared to now unless you are also going to his overall numbers then and now, what with him clearly having changed his intentions, isn't that a bit of a pointless exercise and has about as much relevance as Dettori's targets pre and post plane crash and going for the title and not doing so? In 2011 Fallon employed an agent with the remit to help him go for the title and he no longer employs that agent nor has that target.

As I also said to you before, compare Hanagan's and SDS's number of rides this season to when they were going for the title. Both went through the 1000 rides mark in 2011 and Fallon had 901 when they were 1-2-3 in the jockey table, this season SDS has just gone through the 700 mark, Hanagan 665 and Fallon just gone through the 500 so talk about not comparing like with like.

I've asked you this before too but do you seriously think you can make a ropey point like saying Fallon still rides regularly for powerful yards like Godolphin and Johnston but still not riding regular winners and hope that slips under the radar and not be challenged? Is Fallon first choice jockey for those yards then? he's often on the 3rd string for Godolphin and still beats their regular jockeys on the more fancied ones.

He's had around 25 rides for Godolphin all season and how many runners do you reckon they have had so far, 600, 700 800? Plus a good few of his Godolphin rides have been on unraced 2YOs or backward type 3YO maidens needing experience. Fallon's obviously well behind Barzalona and SDS in the number of rides for Godolphin and they also tend to use other jockeys too with associations to the family such as Ajtebi, Hanagan and Dane O'Neil and he's well down on numbers at Johnston's behind Fanning, SDS, Callan and is about on a par with Jones, Kirby and Nicholls in the pecking order.

It is and always will be far more about the horse's than the jockeys, otherwise owners and trainers would just enter a handicapper in black type races and book a top jockey to ride it.

I'm sorry ima but you really seem to have no idea how booking jockeys works. If an agent has a sought after jockey on his books and rings regarding a ride a trainer doesn't think about whether that jockey has other rides at the meeting. A trainer just wants the best available. You refer to the links that Callan, Moore etc have retained as if it was impossible for Fallon to have done the same with trainers he's had link ups with in the past. Rather than maintaining links Cumani seems pretty much dead in the water for him now plus Meehan doesn't seem to be using him now either. That's 2 of the 3 trainers giving him most winners in 2012.

You ask what's the point of comparing Fallon this season with 2011 and them refer to 2 jockeys who went from being the top 2 choices for spare rides at meetings up north to riding down south where there's more competition for those spare rides. Plus as I've said to you before despite the change both those jockeys have pretty much maintained their strike rates. This is despite them not having the benefit of as many Fahey and Johnston good things nowadays.

The point of comparing things with 2011 is that you seem to have this idea in your head that was a one off year for him. Do you honestly think that had he been offered 900 rides this season he wouldn't have taken them? I've told you before he was 7/2 for the jockeys title at the start of the 2012 season. If it wasn't his intention to go for it then nobody told the bookies.

I also said Fallon has ridden quite a few for Godolphin and Johnston over the past couple of months. The latter trainer since Franny Norton's injury. Are you going to tell us none of these rides have had winning chances? Just a quick scan through his Godolphin rides over the past 14 days tells me the average SP was around 5/1.

What a strange sentence your last one is. I'll ask you again why do so many owners and trainers bother with expensive retainers if it doesn't really matter who rides their bluebloods?

It's getting tiresome having to shred your half baked reasons as to why Fallon is no longer getting the winners and rides he used to. You'll make things far easier for yourself if you just accept what most already know that he's just nowhere near the jockey he used to be.

I did reply to that but it seems the moderators on here would prefer libelous allegations on a daily basis rather than actual debate.

So the quick gist of what I said was that trainers are not less likely to give a ride because a certain jockey is already at the meeting. An agent trying to get a ride indicates that a jockey is planning to be at that meeting anyway. Trainers choose the best available to them. You also go on about Callan and De Souza retaining some previous links as if Fallon is completely excluded from doing so.

You then say it's pointless to compare Fallon from 2011 to now yet compare Hanagan and De Souza from that same period to now. At the same time completely ignoring that they were probably the 2 most sought after jockeys for spare rides up north at the time and have now both moved down south where there's more competition. They rode for respective trainers who are one of only 3 to send out more than a 1000 runners a season. Of course the number of their rides has dropped off.

Then you go on about Fallon in 2011 as if that was a complete one off. Do you not think he would take 900 rides now if they were offered to him? I've said before that he was 7/2 for the jockeys title at the start of 2012. If he had no intention of going for the jockeys title last year nobody had told the bookies that.

I said that the rides for Johnston and Godolphin have mostly come about over the past couple of months. The Johnston link seems to have come about again following the injury to Franny Norton. Are you telling me he hasn't been getting on winning chances for them? A quick scan of his rides for Godolphin over the past 14 days shows the average SP to be around 5/1.

Your last sentence is a little confusing. Why on earth do owners and trainers pay expensive retainers to jockeys when according to you it doesn't really matter who rides their bluebloods. In any job there are some people who are better at it than others. Jockeys are no different.

You keep putting forward these half baked arguments as to why he's no longer getting the rides and winners when the simple fact is he's just not the same jockey he used to be.

The man should head back north where he started out. Would get a decent job with fahey etc and could easily ride over 100 winners a year.