A 35-year friendship between John Singleton and Gai Waterhouse ends over a horse tip IT seems absurd that a series of Chinese whispers starting with an innocent conversation about horses between Andrew Johns and Tom Waterhouse has ended a 35-year friendship between the bookmaker's mum and John Singleton. A month ago, Gai Waterhouse came out swinging for her son in the face of criticism over his ubiquitous presence on Channel 9's rugby league coverage. Yesterday, Tom was doing the same after racing's famous partnership of Gai and Singo imploded following More Joyous's disappointing run in the All Aged Stakes at Randwick on Saturday. More light will be shed at an inquiry on Friday about who has given Singleton the impression that all was not well with his mare - and that Gai had failed to tell him. Yet, as it stands, it appears more likely that general tattle about More Joyous has snowballed and culminated in Singleton's fury about being a forgotten owner. For his part, Johns is stunned at being implicated, having asked Tom in passing what he liked on Saturday while the pair were miked up ahead of Nine's coverage of the Roosters-Dragons Anzac Day clash. Johns repeatedly told this journalist on the set of The Footy Show at Nine's studios in Willoughby yesterday that he had casually asked Tom for punting advice, nothing more. Every bit helps, of course. Racing stewards, meanwhile, have asked Nine to send them snippets of their coverage from Friday night so they can examine what Tom Waterhouse has said about his mother's horse. Either way, the extraordinary set of circumstances has drawn a line under the racing industry's most well known - and volatile - partnership. Singo and Gai first met when her late father and legendary horseman TJ Smith sent her to see Singleton at his Sydney home when she was a teenager. His plan was for Singleton to convince his daughter to abandon her plans to become a television actress. "I went around to his Rose Bay home and knocked on the door," Gai has said before. No answer. So I went around the back and here was this body lying near the pool. I thought he was dead. I said, 'Hello, Mr Singleton, it's Gai Smith'. I had to flick him with water from the pool to wake him up. 'Great,' he said. 'Let's go to the pub'. Singleton recalled it this way: "It was unfortunate that the newspaper banners lining the streets were screaming, 'SINGO LOCKED UP AGAIN'. I'd spent a few nights in the cells after, um, an indiscretion at the Cross. Just a couple of differences of opinion with a few people. Roll forward to 2001 when they combined to see Ha Ha win the Golden Slipper, when Singleton famously tackled former wife Julie Martin in the Rosehill mounting yard and then shouted the bar while Waterhouse stood in the stands with tears of joy streaming down her face. Owner John Singleton and premier trainer Gai Waterhouse celebrate winning last year's Doncaster Mile with More Joyous. Picture: Sam Ruttyn She sent Singleton a signed copy of the framed image a few months later with the inscription: "You make me so happy." But their arguments and disputes have become the stuff of legend in racing circles. Usually, it is dismissed as playful banter and vaudeville. But things have certainly soured since Gai drew barrier 11 for More Joyous at last October's Cox Plate barrier draw. The sad postscript to this is Singleton has often gone in swinging for Gai, too. "It's better winning with Gai than anyone else because I've known her so long," Singleton said in 2008. I just think she's the best trainer in Australia by far. She's better than TJ. Hotter competition. Far more commercial. And the major studs here are anti-Gai. She gets very few horses from Coolmore, Arrowfield and Darley. It's a boys' club, I think.