FRIDAY morning's weight of money behind Duke Of Marmalade for next Sunday's Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe from the right "faces" as the layers like to call them, suggests Coolmore bosses might be thinking "Let's show 'em who's boss then" after Thursday's retrospective decision to punish the "Ballydoyle Three" for using team tactics in the Duke's last race at Newmarket.

The perceived wisdom before that decision was that Duke Of Marm-alade had proved himself in Europe and would now be trained solely for a crack at his chosen Breeders' Cup target. However, after Aidan O'Brien had been fined for "ignorance of his obligations" when it came to instructing Messrs Murtagh and O'Donoghue before the rescheduled International Stakes, Coolmore might now want to remove any doubts as to the great horse's superiority.

Despite assurances from the BHA that they were satisfied there had been "no attempt to cheat", it seems even the suggestion that team tactics had won the race for Duke Of Marmalade has stung Coolmore into seriously considering taking the Arc route to dispel any doubts that this is the best middle distance horse in Europe.

Two final thoughts on the subject are these. Can Zarkava be ridden the way she usually is from behind if there's a Duke Of Marmalade in front to get past?

Also, when will the Newmarket stewards who officiated on Inter-national day be strapped to a wagon wheel and pelted with stale cheese for not dealing on the day with what looked a cut and dried case, saving everyone all this embarrassment.

NOBLE CAUSE APART from yet another cunningly planned long-distance raid on Perth which saw Naunton handler Nigel Twiston-Davies leave with four winners from 12 runners last week, the most visually impressive performance came from the Nicky Richards-trained Noble Alan in Thursday's opening race, a qualifier for next month's Jewson Novice Hurdle Final at Cheltenham.

A German-bred horse which cost 100,000 as a three-year-old, Noble Alan is a brother of Full House, which ran in the last race at Ascot yesterday but which is better known as a two-and-a-half mile chaser. Noble Alan ran four times last season, winning his bumper at Newcastle before running too free in a Grade Two bumper at Ascot then, switched to hurdles, finishing second on his debut before winning at Newcastle again.

He looked to have really come on at Perth and seemed very capable of stepping up again and heading for Cheltenham before any decision has to be made about an anticipated switch to chasing. He is one to note for Cheltenham in three weeks and is another string to the bow of a trainer who also has the likes of the promising Money Trix, Double Default and Viking Rebel to back up stable star Monet's Garden this coming season.

CHAMPION PICKS VICTORY for CFR Cluj-Napoca at Roma in the first round of Champ-ions League fixtures certainly woke a few people up and good away performances from Anorthosis Famagusta (drew at Werder Bremen) and Aalborg (drew at Celtic) should probably put us off going for the obvious homes for this week's Matchday Two games on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Having said that, Arsenal's form this season makes them look the Tuesday night banker at around the 4/9 mark to beat Porto, a price so much better value than the 5/6 about shaky Bayern Munich at home to Lyon. Liverpool also look the bus-iness at 2/5 on Wednesday at home to PSV and the third home banker would have to be tournament second favourites Inter at home to Werder Bremen.

Marseille have slowed up recently and were disappointing at home to Monaco last weekend so Atletico Madrid at home to Eric Gerets' side at 4/6 could be worth including, despite my early season enthusiasm that Marseille might upset the formbook in this particular group.

Arsenal, Liverpool, Inter and Atletico look solid choices and the accumulator can be boosted by 19/10 Bordeaux at home to Roma. Laurent Blanc's side have a home league match with St Etienne to negotiate tonight first but they had an excellent away win last week and on their own pitch against Roma, decent odds against looks excellent value.

If you want to get involved in Celtic's group then expect 4/7 Villarreal, 11/4 the draw and 11/2 against Celtic getting a first away win in the group stages. Manchester United will be 2/5 to win in Denmark with the draw at 16/5 and Bruce Rioch's Aalborg at around the 15/2 mark, the same price as BATE Borisov to dump Juventus at home and PSV to win in Liverpool.

Last week's advice to grab the 100/30 (Betfred) about Motherwell qualifying against Nancy on Thursday night still stands and it looks like they'll go off about 7/4 on the night to win the match itself.

TIPTOP HOPE SOME poor selections at Hamilton and Perth last week have seen yours truly toppled from a hard won pole position in the tipping table on the Scottish Racing website but with a couple of months to go in the 2008 competition, the Sunday Herald is battling away in second spot.

The new leader is John Scanlon who edits Mark Johnston's in-house newsletter, the Kingsley Klarion, so with Musselburgh due to say goodbye to the Scottish Flat season on November 7, the other 20 of us can only hope the front-runner runs out of ammunition as jumping takes over for the final nine Scottish cards of the year.

I can only sympathise with three of my colleagues further down the table who have now gone 33, 31 and 22 days without a winner and hope I can get back to winning form before any dreaded losing sequence really kicks in.

I'm going for course winner, Zabeel Tower, to bounce back to winning form in Musselburgh's 5.50 today, after a month off to recover from exertions on less suitable soft ground.