MOANTEEN MIKEY ended the year on a high for the Angela Harrison team when landing the Arena Racing Company All England Cup Final at Newcastle on Tuesday.

The final GBGB Category One event of 2021 was worth £8,000 to connections but will be upgraded to £20,000 in 2022 – and the local handler will no doubt be assembling a strong team for the race known as the North East Derby next year, as she did this year.

Harrison sent out two of Tuesday’s finalists with Hardy Rebel joining Moanteen Mikey in the 480m showpiece – and it was latter, an October 2019 son of their own Droopys Buick and Moanteen Golden, who struck gold with an all-the-way success.

Pacing up to lead off the back of a 4.53sec sectional, Moanteen Mikey was soon on his way to reversing Sunderland Classic form with another finalist Narcos The Great, although the last-named’s kennelmate Narcos Dode now proved the biggest danger.

Running on really strongly, the second of George Cunningham’s finalists closed on the leader up the home straight, failing by a neck to get to the 28.72sec (-30) winner, with Harrison’s Hardy Rebel finishing third for an Alnwick kennel one-three.

Victory for Moanteen Mikey is a third All England Cup title for Harrison after back-to-back successes with Droopys Expert and Droopys Verve in 2017 and 2018 – and Newcastle general manager Ian Walton was among the first to congratulate connections.

Moanteen Mikey is owned by Tony Camsell, Fred Ellison and Bobby Lindsay – and they were joined at the presentation by the winning trainer herself, partner and assistant Jimmy Wright and kennelhand Ian Sutherland.

Walton said: “It was another fantastic Arc All England Cup final with Moanteen Mikey putting up a determined finish for Angela Harrison to hold off the fast-finishing Narcos Dode for what was a thrilling finish.

“The last Category One competition of 2021 didn’t disappoint and was extremely competitive.

“There were a lot of exciting performances on the supporting card and two youngsters who look to have a big future ahead of them are Droopys Biggy over standard trip and Titan Jim over six bends.

“Overall the night was very well supported with the north east and Scotland’s greyhound fans coming out in force.

“We start again in a few weeks with the Arc Northern Puppy Derby trial stakes – plus the event itself with a £10,000-to-the-winner final.

“We’ve received interest already with trainers booking trials and this looks set to be a very strong and exciting event and, as ever, we should see plenty coming out of this competition progressing to become major players for the rest of 2022.

“As for 2021, the three Category One champions at Newcastle were all deserved winners and class acts in Jaguar Macie (Arc Northern Puppy Derby), Pacemaker Ted (Arc Northern Flat) and Moanteen Mikey (Arc All England Cup).

Result: https://www.gbgb.org.uk/meeting/?meetingId=380692&raceId=802531