Yorkshire trainer Ferdy Murphy's idea to stage a National Hunt meeting on the all-weather track at Southwell to beat the freeze has met a positive response.

The industry have agreed to the card on 13 January. There has been no National Hunt racing in the north for a month.

The Middleham trainer told BBC Radio York: "They've had a fantastic entry of 240 horses for six races.

"What we've done at Southwell is put on six bumpers, which is six races for National Hunt-bred horses."

Murphy gives credit to the racing authorities for being flexible.

We need to get the whole country opened up because there is a massive population of horses waiting to run Ferdy Murphy

"There was a time when a race schedule was written in stone and the British Horseracing Authority wouldn't vary away from it, but now they're very flexible.

"That's fantastic for racing because when something like this happens, you don't bargain for it in your plans.

"If you get a month's cold snap, and the BHA can put on these meetings, at least we're getting some action."

Murphy trains around 85 horses at his West Witton yard, all of them National Hunt horses, and he is desperate for somewhere to race them.

"It's been a nightmare. We've a lot of horses queueing up to run and when we start back racing everyone will want to run their horses so they will be balloting out - it's going to be messy."

Murphy has five horses entered for the Southwell card, and intends to run four of them. He says the BHA is now looking to add similar meetings to the schedule.

"We need to get the whole country opened up because there is a massive population of horses waiting to run," he added.

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