THERE will be many hands flying the flag for Scottish sport this week.

Vern Cotter is preparing the Scotland team’s challenge for the rugby World Cup, beginning with the Pool B match against Japan next Wednesday, while Andy and Jamie Murray are charged with helping Great Britain reach their first Davis Cup final since 1978 at the Emirates Arena this weekend, but the wait for a home-trained winner of the William Hill Ayr Gold Cup has been even longer.

This rare beast was last sighted in 1975 when the massive chestnut Roman Warrior carried a record-breaking 10 stone over the line for Nigel Angus.

Roman Warrior was a true local hero – Angus trained his horses just across the road from the racecourse at Cree Lodge stables – and 40 years on Scottish hopes rest with Jim Goldie's top weight Jack Dexter, who was third two years ago, and Sound Advice from Keith Dalgleish's stable.

Dalgleish began the Western meeting in good form with a double on Thursday led by Maleficent Queen’s victory in the fillies’ handicap. That was her third win from just four starts but that record is unlikely to move her high enough in the ratings to make the field for the Cambridgeshire at Newmarket later this month.

The days of races like the Gold Cup providing storylines more labyrinthine than an Agatha Christie plot – such as when Jack Berry smuggled So Careful so carefully into the bottom of the handicap to win off just 7st 7lb in 1988 – have given way to an era when the field is covered by a weight range spanning a little more than a stone.

Sound Advice carries 9-5 as a result of winning his last two starts, both at Chester, and Dalgleish admitted he is not entirely sure about the reasons why he has come good. “He’s in great form going into the race. He seems to have progressed lately – whether that’s a liking for Chester or not I don’t know. ”

Another unknown for Dalgleish is how Sound Advice will perform over six furlongs for the first time. “He showed plenty of toe around Chester,” he said. “This may just be a bit sharp for him but he might be able to pick up the pieces at the end.”

Ending that 40-year wait is not something that plays heavily on Dalgleish’s mind as he closes in on last year’s career-best total of 67 winners.

“To be honest I’ve never really thought about it like that,” he said. “It’s a valuable handicap and a good race to win, but being the first since Roman Warrior would make it even sweeter.”

One part of history that Dalgleish and all the other trainers considered was the draw, with Dalgleish opting to run Sound Advice from stall 22 in a race that is supposed to favour high-drawn horses, although the majority of the runners for yesterday’s Bronze Cup won by the Alan Bailey-trained Go Far raced down the centre of the track.

It probably would not have mattered where Lochsong (stall 28), Coastal Bluff (28), Bahamian Pirate (seven), Continent (22) and Regal Parade (20) were drawn as they all went on to win Group 1 races. If there is a horse likely to progress to that level it could be Don’t Touch, trained by Richard Fahey who won the Gold Cup with Fonthill Road in 2006.

Don’t Touch did not race as a two-year-old but has made up for that delay at almost dizzying pace with four successive victories culminating in the Great St Wilfred Stakes at Ripon last month. “He had a little issue with a knee last year,” Fahey explained. “We didn’t rush him but we’ve had no trouble with it at all this year. Everything has gone according to plan. This was always in my mind but he’s got to man-up now.”

Don’t Touch has been in the mind of every punter and bookmaker since Ripon. The winning margin was only a head so the handicapper could only put him up 5lb but with no sure idea whether the rating is keeping tabs on the horse’s rate of progress. That factor explains why he is trading at around 7-1 and every other of runner in the field of 24 is at a double-figure price.

Figuring out whether that makes Don’t Touch easy money is not quite that obvious but stall 20 should be no inconvenience even if the runners go centre track and Fahey said: “He’s a talented horse. He probably wouldn’t have as much natural speed as Fonthill Road – he was an out-and-out sprinter, this horse will probably get further in time.

“You’ll know your fate in the first three furlongs, whether he’s travelling, and if that’s happening he’ll come home.”

After six furlongs we’ll know who will be hanging out the flags.