Foot hoping Jacktavern Chief can land knockout blow in Ladbrokes Gold Cup Final at Monmore Greyhound Track

Jacktavern Chief aiming for Category One success at Monmore Greyhound Track on Saturday night

 Former Prizefighter winner, English Champion and Super-Welterweight Commonwealth Title winning boxer Glenn Foot is hoping that Jacktavern Chief can produce a knockout blow to his rivals in the Ladbrokes Gold Cup Final at Monmore Greyhound Track on Saturday night

Having won both heat and semi final of the Ladbrokes Gold Cup at Monmore, Jacktavern Chief lines up in the final on Saturday as the only unbeaten runner left in the competition with his eyes firmly set on landing the £10,000 winners prize, and in doing so, securing Glenn Foot a first Category One title since becoming a greyhound trainer.

Jacktavern Chief started his career in the hands of Kevin Hutton, finishing runner up in the final of the Arena Racing Company Puppy Trophy at Sunderland behind Slingshot Poppy in his last start before being sold into Foot’s kennels.

“I’ve been good friends with David Sutton for a while now and Callum Purdy who owned him, and I was on the way back from my stag do when they rang and I was able to purchase the dog from them”

“We just freshened him up, he was a bit trapped up when we got him from Kevin Hutton, we just untrapped him and started off fresh with him. He trialled really well at Newcastle. His did 28.53 in his first look round so I was really happy, and the week after he absolutely bombed out and did a 28.28 in the heats of the Northern Flat. To be fair I really expected to win it after that run but in the semi final he made a proper hash of the start coming out six behind, but he did some serious running in coming third and just failed to qualify”

Trapping concerns

 There is no doubting the pace that Jacktavern Chief has, but, just like his Northern Flat semi final run, he has produced two slow starts at Monmore, but Foot is still confident that his runner can take all the beating

“I don’t think he likes the traps at Monmore. They are hydraulic traps but the traps at Newcastle have front loaded springs, but he just can’t handle them at the moment. He’s not trapped on either occasion and he’s giving them too much of a start but we are happy with the draw on Saturday. He might get first look at the bunny and he’s only got to trap well once and that’s in the final. The dog is really well in himself and we will just take our chances on Saturday. I think he’s one of the fastest greyhounds I’ve ever put a lead on and if we can get him out of the traps on Saturday, I think he will be a real player”

"I used to be in with Harry Burton and we won the Arc Classic with Jonny Whiskers. I had my own block of kennels at my home address, and it’s hard getting on at Newcastle being just a little trainer, so Harry Burton was struggling at the time and he asked me if I  wanted to move my dogs in with him and to give him a hand. I think I had nine dogs in with Harry and Jonny Whiskers was one of them who won in 2023"

Other stars in the kennel

But it’s not just Jacktavern Chief that is running well for the kennel at present and as Foot went on to say, he has a few useful greyhounds who are paving their way on the open scene

“We’ve got Dreamin Porcha, who has won her last three opens at Star Pelaw. She came off Kevin Hutton and she’s the best bitch at the track. She did 25.37 when winning on Sunday which is the fastest time of the year for the 435m trip"

“We also bought one out of the Star Pelaw sales called Barnfield Duke. He didn’t stay the 480 out in Ireland but we bought him because of his early pace and he looks like he is coming to hand now. He’s won five of his six starts at the track and won a couple of opens as well as a couple of top grade races so he looks like one to watch, and we’ve also got Emilys Superstar. She’s the queen of the 590’s at Star Pelaw and has won seven out of her eight opens over that distance including the last five, and she made the semi final of the Angel of the North where she was unlucky not to make the final”

Foot continued "We’ve got kennels at the Star Pelaw track and we’ve got 37 greyhounds at the moment. Things are going well at the moment. I used to take the former owner Jeff McKenna’s dogs on when I was a kid when we used to do flapping here, but things are going well. StarPelaw are trying their best by putting on opens and competitions and they get a really good crowd on a Sunday. It’s probably the best supported track in the North East as it gets that busy"

Boxing career

Clearly Foot is going through a good period since taking on his trainers licence four months ago and is making his name in the greyhound industry, but before setting out as a greyhound trainer, Foot also had a successful career as a boxer. 

“As an amateur I had 102 fights, I fought in three Junior B A finals, I boxed for England and I’ve been captain for England at amateur level and boxed all over the world really. Then I turned professional and was promoted by Frank Maloney. I won the Prizefighter competition which was on Sky, I won the English title, and I won the Super-Welterweight Commonwealth title, but I’ve retired now as I had an arm injury and bad elbows. My last fight was five years ago now”

“I’m the fourth generation of greyhound trainer in my family on both my mum and dad’s side, so all we’ve done is greyhound racing. We’ve raced at Sunderland and Pelaw and all the flapping tracks, we are from a flapping background and I when I retired from Boxing I got my licence."

Success with greyhounds

" I worked for Savva Roberts for a while as well when left Harry and I own Stonepark Hoffa. He’s reached the National Sprint final at Nottingham and he smashed the track record at Sunderland so we’ve had some nice greyhounds, but then I left Savva and set up on my own"

 Foot continued "But we can definitely train a greyhound, but the trainer is only as good as the greyhound and that’s the same with the Boxing, a coach is only as good as his boxer. Like I say, we’ve had some good dogs.  We also had Optic Jimmy and we won the Arena Racing Company Puppy Cup final at Sunderland in 2023 with Ballybough Mags, and we made the final of the Northern Flat at Newcastle with Tonelagee in 2024 with Savva and the dogs didn’t cost a fortune either. Optic Jimmy was only £2500 and Jonny Whiskers was £5000 so we’ve had decent success with dogs that weren’t too expensive."

“We’ve had a new roof put on the kennels, we’ve had all the kennels cleaned out and had them all re-painted so we’ve had a real busy four months but it's been enjoyable and hopefully we can kick on"