Jonjo O'Neill is to have a small but select Cheltenham team

Jonjo O'Neill says he'd be happy to have Richie McLernon on board leading World Hurdle fancy More Of That.

The trainer says a final decision is still to be reached over the participation of More Of That in the Ladbrokes World Hurdle, but interestingly said that owner JP McManus's first-choice jockey AP McCoy was likely to ride the horse in work in the next few days. "I think we'll know more after that," he said. "It could well be that he runs and so does At Fishers Cross and AP might decide to ride At Fishers Cross - if that's the case then Richie [McLernon] will ride More Of That. I hope AP rides ours but if Richie's on board, that wouldn't worry me at all as he knows the horse well and won on him first time out. "He is in good shape and it looks like he will stay the three miles. He won at Haydock because he stayed. Do I have a doubt in my mind? Well, I think he will stay, though going to Cheltenham for The Festival is a hard thing to do - they don't hang around and the finish is up a hill. We don't really know. "More Of That is a good traveller in his races but it makes me nervous that he has not raced over three miles before - it is going into the unknown. He is a fair horse but how strong is his form?" Of his runners in the handicaps, O'Neill singled out Goodwood Mirage as an interesting contender for the Fred Winter Handicap Hurdle. Bought to win the JCB Triumph Hurdle for Lady Bamford, whose husband is chairman of the race sponsors, things have not gone to plan for the colt this season, but O'Neill believes the situation is far from irretrievable after he caught the eye when finishing behind Activial at Kempton last weekend. "So long as I have a winner, I don't give monkey's which horse in which race it is," said O'Neill. "If Goodwood Mirage acts on the track, he will run a cracker. I am worried about him coming down the hill because he has a floating chip in his joint - some days it is grand, other days it is not. "I thought he ran well on Saturday. He runs very free early on. He is not the easiest but he stays well. I would have preferred to go for the Triumph Hurdle but on what he's done so far, you'd have to say he is not good enough for that. "I haven't given up on him though. He could still be a Champion Hurdle horse next year, because he's got speed and stamina. I want to castrate him in the summer and that could be the making of him."