The Irish produced the shock of the season when beating crack sides from Germany and France to win the seventh leg of the FEI Nations’ Cup™ 2012 series at Hickstead (GBR) this afternoon.

Trailing at the bottom of the league table after an inconsistent run that included a miserable last-place finish in Falsterbo, Sweden just seven days’ ago, Robert Splaine’s side appeared to have it all to do in this penultimate round of the eight-leg tournament. But they came out with all guns blazing to finish with just four faults for a definitive victory over the French who completed with eight, while Germany slotted into third with 12.  The host nation lined up fourth when collecting a total of 20 faults, and Sweden and Belgium shared fifth with 24 apiece.  A first-round total of 20 put paid to Dutch chances and they concluded the day with 28 faults on the board for second-last spot ahead of the Swiss, whose 40-fault result left them last by a long margin.

As always, the Hickstead fences took their toll, but faults were spread all around the track set by Great Britain’s Bob Ellis – the man who will build the courses for the forthcoming London Olympic Games at Greenwich Park.

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