We need to show them that it's not just our club sides that are

We need to show them that it's not just our club sides that are the best in Europe, but that our international team can be, too."A substitute on that occasion, he feels such a part of things now that a "Kee-own" chorus or two at Wembley would not sound out of place.. WITH JUST over 48 hours to go to the Derby, the images of the Blue Riband are beginning to sharpen. The anthill mound of the infield, the shining top hats and braces, the Queen's Stand stuffed full of more titles and hyphens than the New York Public Library. It is in this environment that many will expect the 220th Derby to be won by a smart, shiny, well-connected chap of a trainer with proper connections.

It should be him locked in victory with a majestic horse bearing a majestic appellation, moving across the Surrey skyline and dancing through the lightning. Nijinsky, Shergar and Golden Fleece are the sort of names. As it is though, the world's premier Classic may be won by a former market stallholder and an unspectacular horse which sounds like the bus which stops outside Old Trafford. David Elsworth and Salford Express may not be the perfect representation of the sport of kings, but that does not diminish them. Indeed, as the racing power base contracts, there will be many wishing the diminutive chestnut and his cranky old trainer fair passage."It would be nice to have a bit of rough winning the Derby wouldn't it?" Elsworth said this week."It seems it's the same old faces at the Derby again, trainers with the best ones, Derby-potential horses, but if somebody like Mick Channon or Michael Jarvis or myself think we have a Derby horse then we'll have enough vision to have a go.

Too many trainers don't think they can train a Derby winner and they dismiss it, which is silly as this is only a question of one horse going faster than another."We're not sure we can win the Derby mind, but we're quite definite that if we do so we'll be able to rejoice in it as well as anyone else. The celebrating wouldn't be a problem."And with that, David Raymond Cecil Elsworth swung open the creaking door of his Laurent-Perrier champagne grotto, a room alternatively known until recently as the kitchen pantry.When it comes to what may politely be termed as bons vivants, Elsworth has had few who could go with him over the years. Even earlier this week he was talking of a party attended the previous night and the alcohol consumption of others. He counted all the guests in and he counted most of them as they passed out.If Elzy can stand a celebratory booze-up it is because he has had so much practice. As a National Hunt trainer in an earlier life, the trainer was peerless. Desert Orchid, Barnbrook Again, Floyd and Oh So Risky were tutored quite brilliantly at his academy.

But, just at a time when the wins became commonplace, Elsworth lost his affection for the winter game."I think it's me," he says "I've lost my balls. Jumping is very stressful and tough and when you train jumpers you're always getting the odd fatality I think I got too old for it. It's a state of mind I arrived at."I had a horse break his leg one day called Fionans Flutter. He was a mad little bastard who used to try too hard and would die for you. He had no brains but he was a brilliant, athletic jumping horse."He went round the corner at Lingfield and hit one hard He broke his shoulder I got down there and I could see the horse If he could have talked he would have asked me for help. I just lost my nerve."Elsworth also lost his desire when he moved from his Whitsbury castle to Whitcombe Manor in Dorset, a location he now looks back on as "a prison".