There's no doubt jockeys with that hard-to-define 'star quality' are an integral part of the attraction of racing, as Damien Oliver once again underlined with his participation at Sha Tin last Sunday.
Oliver was seen at his powerful best getting River Jordan home in the final event for the John Moore stable as the highlight of his one-day cameo as understudy to Christophe Soumillon while the charismatic Belgian was sidelined by suspension.
So as a club which prides itself on being a world leader in racing and betting entertainment, how long can it continue to justify its failure to invite one of the world's best, the Australian icon Darren Beadman, to return to the fold, especially when there are owners and trainers who want to retain him?
Beadman was here as the retained jockey for trainers John Moore, initially, and then Neville Begg, in the early 1990s. In 1993, he was found guilty of not allowing a horse to run on its merits and disqualified for nine months.
The key to that decision by the stewards was the term of the sentence - nine months. So can anyone explain why the club might hold that offence against him now, in 2007, some 14 years later?
Someone convicted of murder in 1993 is probably back on the streets by now and accepted into the mainstream of the population, the theory being they have paid their debt to society. But a jockey having been found guilty of giving a horse a quiet run, it's apparently okay for us to keep judging him 14 years later.
Since his return to racing in Australia in 1994, Beadman has put his life completely back in order. His marriage to wife Kim, which teetered on the knife edge between success and failure when he was here, has been totally renewed and is stronger than ever.