EARLIER this week, I headed to Wetherby Racecourse to attend a preview night ahead of next week’s Cheltenham Festival.

A panel that featured Channel Four expert Jim McGrath, assistant trainer Sean Quinn and The Northern Echo’s own pundit, Niall Hannity, debated a number of issues related to next week’s events. Which of Willie Mullins’ first-day favourites is the biggest banker? The consensus was Faugheen. Will Sprinter Sacre reclaim his Champion Chase crown? Probably not. Is Silviniaco Conti a certainty in the Gold Cup? Not if the Festival formbook is anything to go by.

One question, however, was not even deemed worth asking. What are the prospects of a northern winner in one of the championship races? At this stage, it’s not even certain there’ll be a northern runner in the Champion Hurdle, Champion Chase, World Hurdle or Gold Cup, let alone a horse capable of making it into the winners’ enclosure.

In fact, it is hard to remember a time when northern jumps racing was in a worse state, and for all that next week’s Festival will be as exciting and dramatic as ever, it will be hard to watch it from a northern perspective without a sense of sadness.

Gone are the days when northern trainers used to head to the Cotswolds with realistic expectations of carrying home a host of major prizes, and while the likes of John Quinn, Brian Ellison, Malcolm Jefferson and Donald McCain will attempt to claim a handicap or two in order to prevent a northern shutout, there is every chance that the Festival will end without a single trainer from north of the Midlands saddling a horse that finishes in the first three. The markets certainly suggest that even a northern horse placing is unlikely.

“The frightening decline in National Hunt racing in the north spells trouble,” said Yorkshire-born trainer William Haggas, as he delivered the annual Gimcrack speech at York Racecourse in December. “With the threat of Newcastle, one of the very best and fairest turf tracks in England, turning into all-weather, and Wetherby threatening to graduate to flat racing, albeit slowly, there is a real fear that jumping could suffer beyond repair.

“With all due respect to Lucinda Russell, Brian Ellison, Sue Smith and Nicky Richards, and a few others, the power is in the south via Messrs (Paul) Nicholls, (Nicky) Henderson, (Phillip) Hobbs, (Alan) King – even Donald McCain is hardly north.

“When I was young, the (Fred) Winter and (Fulke) Walwyn teams struggled to contend with the WA (Arthur Stephenson), the Dickinsons and Gordan Richards.

“What has gone wrong? In the hope that these things are cyclical, let’s hope that former glories return to jumps racing in the north. But we must be conscious to protect and then restore it the best we can.”

Cheltenham is not the be all and end all of the jumps game of course, but by whatever measure you choose, it is increasingly hard to deny that northern National Hunt racing is in decline.

The number of jumps trainers in the north with more than 50 horses has shrunk dramatically in recent years. Fewer horses mean fewer competitive races, fewer competitive races mean a decline in race standards and prize money, and that in turn acts as a disincentive for owners to send their horses to northern trainers, rather than their rivals in the south-west in particular, who have seen their numbers increase in the last decade.

The northern tracks are doing what they can to support the industry, but Newcastle have seen their flagship jumps event, the Fighting Fifth Hurdle, diminished thanks to the creation of a new £100,000 race on the same day at Haydock, while Wetherby will introduce flat racing for the first time later this year, a development that opens the door to a move away from jumping.

Ferdy Murphy, formerly one of Yorkshire’s leading lights and a trainer who could be relied upon for a Festival winner, moved to France because he could no longer make the economics of jump racing in this part of the world pay, and the fear is that as the ownership of the leading jumps horses becomes concentrated in an increasingly small number of hands, our region will be left behind.

When County Durham trainer Howard Johnson was banned for four years, it was telling that his principal owner, Graham Wylie, immediately switched his horses to Paul Nicholls’ base in Somerset and Willie Mullins’ burgeoning empire in Ireland.

He is the one northern owner with the financial clout to compete with the likes of Rich Ricci, the Gigginstown Stud and Simon Munir and Isaac Souede, owners whose horses are set to dominate next week’s proceedings, but when presented with a choice about where to keep his string, he immediately turned his back on his home region.

Years ago, that wouldn’t have mattered too much. Even less than a decade ago, jumps racing in Britain and Ireland was a much more democratic affair than its equivalent on the flat. A farmer or tradesman could buy a horse for a relatively low sum, pay to keep it with a local trainer, and have a genuine hope of it developing into a Cheltenham winner or Grand National candidate.

Now, the leading jumps stables are developing breeding lines every bit as exclusive as those that dominate flat racing, while simultaneously scouring Europe for the best emerging talent. Horses are purchased for astronomical fees, and the best are kept well away from the stables in the north.

At the same time, horses of a lesser standard find themselves running in races that offer a pittance in prize money.  Yesterday’s opening race at Catterick, a class five selling hurdle, offered a first prize of £2,599, with £763 going to the horse that finished second and £381 for third. Given that there were eight horses in the race, owners would be justified in questioning the sanity of paying expensive annual training fees for such an uncompetitive return.

At the both the higher and lower levels, northern jumps racing faces an increasingly difficult battle for its survival. Sadly, next week’s roll of honour at Cheltenham will provide further confirmation of the ongoing decline.