RACING:JOHNNY MURTAGH aims for a fourth Derby victory on Native Khan this afternoon but a brilliantly resourceful first Oaks success on the 20 to 1 outsider Dancing Rain at Epsom yesterday will rank as one of the sweetest of the Irish jockey's illustrious career.

The man who resigned from the job as Coolmore’s number-one rider last winter got the better of Aidan O’Brien’s Wonder Of Wonders in a thrilling duel down the Epsom straight after making all the running on the William Haggas-trained winner. The first two horses were first and second throughout which testifies to the canniness of Murtagh’s tactics from the front and even though Wonder Of Wonders got to within a head of Dancing Rain inside the final furlong she couldn’t get past.

Now installed as the Aga Khan’s retained rider in Ireland, Murtagh didn’t attempt to underplay the importance of a first Oaks success in 11 attempts. “I knew Group Ones were going to be hard to come by this season,” he admitted. “I was hoping to be a ‘go-to-man’ and I was delighted when William gave me a call. I said to him I didn’t think there was going to be much pace to the race so I thought I would make the running.”

That “go-to-man” status will be emphasised this weekend as he steps in for the ride on Native Khan after Kieren Fallon’s controversial desertion of that colt while Murtagh also travels to France tomorrow for a French Derby ride on Sandagiyr for Alain de Royer-Dupre at Chantilly. Haggas secured a Derby victory with Shaamit in 1996 and Dancing Rain was redeeming herself in the eyes of the trainer’s wife, Maureen, who broke her leg in a fall off the filly last month.

If the O’Brien team were out of luck in the Oaks, they had better luck in the Coronation Cup. St Nicholas Abbey’s reputation may have been a little hollow since the glory of his two-year-old days but a battling Coronation Cup victory at Epsom yesterday illustrated no such hollowness exists in his appetite for a scrap. Europe’s champion juvenile of 2009 secured the first Group One prize of his career since that sparkling Racing Post Trophy victory – under Murtagh which at the time seemed just a taste of a major new Classic talent. That Classic campaign fizzled out in the 2,000 Guineas and an initial four-year-old start at the Curragh this year looked like St Nicholas Abbey was yet another adolescent superstar that failed to train on. Aidan O’Brien, however, never lost faith and some radical reassessment looks on the cards for everyone else after the Montjeu colt’s exciting defeat of the five-time Group One-winning filly Midday.

St Nicholas Abbey had every opportunity to chuck it in yesterday as Midday challenged on his outside surprisingly early and passed the Irish horse with a couple of furlongs to go, drifting across her rival in the process. Ryan Moore switched his horse to the right, towards the middle, and St Nicholas Abbey rallied to such effect that he overhauled Midday less than a 100 yards from the line to ultimately win a trifle snugly.

Afterwards O’Brien said: “I messed him up last year and didn’t want to mess him up again. I wanted him to be natural and not to overwork him. The horse has a big heart which is marvellous,” he said. “The King George is a definite possible.”