Hell hath no fury like a punter scorned. Seamie Heffernan will vouch for that after his contempt for punters required a quick and grovelling apology. It was an embarrassing volte-face for Johnny Murtagh’s understudy at Ballydoyle.

Heffernan’s woes started at Gowran Park on Friday when he was hit with a four-day ban for an “injudicious” ride. He allowed a lesser-fancied Ballydoyle runner to build up a clear advantage before asking his own mount for a late effort that never had any prospect of catching the leader.

An incensed Heffernan suggested afterwards that the stewards might have been influenced by angry punters venting their spleen on internet chatrooms. Then he added fuel to the fire. “I don’t ride for punters,” he said, “I ride for [Ballydoyle’s trainer] Aidan O’Brien.”

He will live to regret those words for the rest of his career.

Rarely a day passes without punters reciting the mantra that the prize-money for which wealthy owners compete comes from his pocket. Since jockeys are significant earners from their winning percentage, the least they can do is to pay the punter lip-service.

In reality, of course, a jockey’s primary allegiance is to the owner and trainer he rides for. Should the punter back a winner in consequence, so much the better. But these things are best left unsaid. Heffernan’s mistake was to tell it like it is. He won’t do it again.

Infinitely more interesting was the revealing window the incident opened on Ballydoyle’s mindset. Apparently, Heffernan’s fury was only slightly more pronounced than O’Brien’s. The pair argued that Drumbeat, Heffernan’s mount at Gowran Park, was ungenuine, that they know their horses best, and effectively, that they should be left alone to do what they want. Which is one sure-fire way to promote anarchy.

Drumbeat was sent off the evens favourite. Heffernan gave him no chance of winning the race in the way it unfolded, yet the way it unfolded wasn’t down to fickle fate. Ballydoyle itself dictated the race rhythms when Hail Caesar, a 9-2 chance, set off at a searching pace.

It always grates with punters when a stable second-string defeats the main contender. Heffernan’s exaggerated waiting tactics inflamed a sensitive situation, and for that, his ban was utterly justified.

It was hardly the first time that jockeys riding for Ballydoyle have raised the eyebrows of officials and punters alike. In hindsight, a common theme emerges. Ballydoyle always responds with anger.

There was anger at Gowran Park. There was anger after last season’s International Stakes, when Ballydoyle was adjudged to have deployed team tactics to facilitate Duke Of Marmalade’s triumph. And there was anger when Ballydoyle’s Ivan Denisovich carried Librettist wide, thus easing George Washington to victory in the 2006 Queen Elizabeth II Stakes.

Rather than claim that the world is against them, the Ballydoyle brains trust should look closer to home. They must acknowledge that rules are rules, and respect them. They must understand there will be greater scrutiny when Ballydoyle saddles several runners in the big races, as has become the norm.

Above all, they must recognise that tactics concocted in the private haven of Ballydoyle, which resounds to its own heartbeat, do not ride roughshod over the sensibilities of other parties when they are executed on the racecourse. And that includes punters.