MALTON duo Richard Fahey and Tim Easterby need a big final push today at York Racecourse if they are to get their hands on the top trainer title at Knavesmire.

Following a day when neither handler was able to add to their tally of five winners apiece for the year, the pair fell behind in the race following Godolphin's treble.

That pushed trainer Saeed bin Suroor up to six wins and he now tops the table with just one day remaining in York's campaign.

The closest either North Yorkshire trainer got to a winner was when Fahey's Valley Of The Moon was just unable to get ahead of 5-1 favourite Princess Ellis - piloted by Lower Dunsforth's Kevin Darley - in the Persimmon Homes Stakes.

For Easterby, Hamish McGonagall trailed in a not-so-close second to Frankie Dettori's impressive charge Calming Influence in the IG Index EBF Maiden Stakes.

Otherwise it was the Dubai-based racing empire which dominated affairs at Knavesmire, also celebrating successes with Fairmile in the opening Garbutt & Elliott Stakes and Amarna in the TSG Stakes.

Fahey and Easterby both saddle an impressive army of runners today, while bin Suroor is set to have only one entrant - Extreme Measures in the Parsonage Country House Hotels Stakes.

Elsewhere at York yesterday, Floristry (8-1), with champion jockey Ryan Moore in the saddle, was delivered late to win the Acorn Web Offset Stakes.

The two-year-old had to hold off a determined fight from Barry Hills' Striking Spirit, with Fahey's Excitement in third, to take the £7,000 first prize.

For a while it looked like old stager Sporting Gesture might just pull off another York win in the closing Betfair Apprentice Training Series Finale Stakes.

The ten-year-old, trained by Sheriff Hutton's Mick Easterby, led from the front in the one mile four-furlong encounter.

But, as the runners entered the final furlong, Sporting Gesture (14-1) - owned by York businessman Steve Hull - was reeled in by Luke Morris on 6-1 shot Esthlos, and was forced to settle for second.

Today's York tips

2.10 Nanton

2.40 Gallileo Figaro

3.10 Mister Hardy

3.45 Fonthill Road

4.20 Tighnabruaich

4.50 The Grey Berry (NAP)

5.20 Market Forces