Banbridge is set to lead a select Joseph O’Brien team to Aintree next week, with Triumph Hurdle fourth Nurburgring also among the Owning Hill handler’s raiding party.

O’Brien may be lacking in numbers in Liverpool but will undoubtedly saddle some quality, with star chaser Banbridge attempting to atone for a disappointing showing at the Cheltenham Festival.

Conditions ultimately proved too soft for the good ground-loving eight-year-old in the Ryanair Chase at Prestbury Park, but he has some high-class chasing form to his name.

Owned by Ronnie Bartlett, Banbridge was a Grade One winner on Merseyside 12 months ago in the Manifesto Novices’ Chase and is as short as 7-2 with bet365 for the My Pension Expert Melling Chase over the same course and distance on Friday, April 12.

However, he will also be given the option of stepping up in trip to three miles for the previous day’s Aintree Bowl – a race where he could meet the likes of John ‘Shark’ Hanlon’s King George hero Hewick.

“Banbridge will have a couple of entries there, as well as a couple of the juveniles, Nurburgring and Intellotto,” said O’Brien, with conditions in the north west set to have a significant bearing on where Banbridge lines up.

“Banbridge has options for both races and of course it will be discussed with Ronnie as we get closer to the time – and we will see what the ground is like. We haven’t made a decision on that yet.

“It was a bit soft for him at Cheltenham and we took a chance running, but when you don’t win, you learn something.”

Meanwhile, Nurburgring will be given the chance to build on his encouraging Triumph Hurdle display when he lines up in the Grade One Anniversary 4-Y-O Juvenile Hurdle on the opening day of the three-day Grand National meeting.

“Nurburgring ran a very good race in the Triumph,” continued O’Brien. “Hopefully a similar performance would see him in the mix for a place and maybe give them a fright for a bit more.”

He will be joined on the teamsheet by the Simon Munir and Isaac Souede-owned Intellotto, who was underwhelming in Grade One company at the Dublin Racing Festival but bounced back to his best with a comfortable victory at Limerick last month.

Sir Gino, the long-time ante-post favourite for the JCB Triumph Hurdle, has been declared a non-runner on the final day of the Cheltenham Festival.

His absence is the latest blow for trainer Nicky Henderson, who has endured a trying week with four of his five runners on Tuesday pulled up, as well as Jingko Blue in Wednesday’s Gallagher Novices’ Hurdle.

Having already taken Shishkin out of the Gold Cup and Jonbon out of the Champion Chase, with Constitution Hill ruled out of the Champion Hurdle last week, Henderson’s biggest hope of the Festival now joins them on the sidelines.

Albert Bartlett contender Shanagh Bob has also been withdrawn and the Seven Barrows team will try to get their stars back on song for Aintree or Punchestown.

In a statement on X, Henderson said: “Very sadly we have had to make a very tough decision which is not to run Sir Gino in the Triumph Hurdle tomorrow and the same applies to Shanagh Bob in the Albert Bartlett.

“Both horses appear to be in great shape but we cannot ignore the performance of all our horses throughout this week and indeed last week as well and we feel it would be crazy to chance it with two very high class young horses with their lives in front of them.

“Joe Donnelly who owns both of these as well as Shishkin has been incredibly supportive as have all our owners as well as the media and indeed racing as a whole, and we appreciate that enormously.

“We are very much looking forward to hopefully Aintree and Punchestown as soon as we get the team back to normal.”

James Owen has raised the exciting possibility of Triumph Hurdle favourite Burdett Road running in the Unibet Hurdle next weekend.

A Royal Ascot winner for Michael Bell, he has been very impressive in two starts over timber to date in the hands of Harry Cobden.

While Cobden’s availability is not set in stone due to his link with Paul Nicholls, Owen is considering taking on the older horses as he feels he would learn more in a better race than if it was a small field in the JCB Triumph Trial on the same card.

With Constitution Hill no longer running in what is registered as the International Hurdle, run on Trials day for the first time this year, the race has suddenly opened up.

“He doesn’t need to run before the Festival, but it would be nice for experience. I think next time he’s going to put a better performance up, especially on better ground, it will help his speed and his jumping,” Owen told Sky Sports Racing.

“I’d like to get another run into him because he’s a fresh horse, he was too fresh at Huntingdon, another run then five or six weeks into the Festival would be great.

“I think Harry is keen to ride him and if he can’t, there’s plenty of good jockeys out there.

“He’ll be entered in two races on Trials day, the four-year-old race and the older race, where he gets all the allowances. It’s not a bad shout, he’d learn a lot in that race and if there were only four runners in the Triumph Trial we might run him in the other one where he’d learn a bit more.

“The Triumph is the aim this year, as long as we get there in the same health we are now – a bit more experience would be great, which way we get there doesn’t matter.

“Whether we go to Trials day or if we are not happy or it’s not on, that’s why he is in in Ireland (Dublin Racing Festival), that’s an option as well. The Adonis is there but personally I think that is too close, if we don’t go to Trials day or Ireland I think we’d go straight there.”