Leg injury threatens to curtail Walsh's season

Ruby Walsh, the reigning Irish champion jump jockey, could face a lengthy spell on the sidelines after a fall at Listowel yesterday. Walsh, 22, suffered a suspected broken left femur after being brought down five fences from home on Johnny Ringo in a handicap hurdle.

Walsh, the winner of the 2000 Grand National on Papillon, was quickly attended to by staff at the track, including the course medical officer, Dr Billy O'Connor, and taken to the casualty unit at Tralee.

"It could be a serious injury," Dr O'Connor said. "But he was stable when he left the track and there was no disfigurement of the limb."

Walsh now faces his second significant lay-off in the last two years. He fractured a leg in a fall at Pardubice in the Czech Republic in October 1999 but returned in March the following year when he went on to successes for his father, Ted, in the National and the Irish equivalent on Commanche Court.