Ollie Magern, who has been a real star for Oxfordshire owner Roger Nicholls, could be retired after fracturing a bone in his off-fore leg.

Nicholls reported that the 13-year-old gelding had been successfully operated on at Newmarket with three screws being put in the leg after he suffered the injury on Nigel Twiston-Davies’s Gloucestershire gallops.

He is now undergoing box rest at Nicholls’s farm at Milcombe, near Banbury, after which a decision will be made on his future. Nicholls said: “I suppose really and truly percentage-wise it will be retirement, but there is a question mark there.

“It is going to be a horrific decision to make because we have had so much fun with him.

“We will play it by ear. If he is jumping and screaming when we get to July or August we may have second thoughts.

“I am going to do what is best for the horse and he will tell us, but all good things come to an end.”

Ollie Magern has won 13 of his 58 starts, picking up £386,861 in win and place prize money.

His wins have included the Grade 1 Feltham Novices’ Chase at Kempton in 2004, and the Grade 2 Charlie Hall Chase at Wetherby in 2005 and 2007.

Nicholls picks out the win at the Sunbury track as his highlight.

“Trabolgan took it up about 150-200 yards from home and Ollie came and got him on the line,” he recalled.

“He was also second in the Hennessy (to Celestial Gold) which doesn’t get mentioned much.”