Following the trial the prince changed his behaviour to some extent, and although he continued to gamble, he did so in a more discreet manner; he stopped playing baccarat altogether, taking up whist instead. While he was unpopular at the end of the case, Ridley considers that the matter "probably did little serious damage to ... prince's standing"; Havers, Grayson and Shankland agree, and write that by 1896, when the prince's horse Persimmon won the Epsom Derby, the prince "had never been more popular". Matthew observes that it was only when one of the prince's own circle of confidantes brought him to court that the newspapers would "seriously harr him ... the British in the 1890s had no general wish to see their future monarch fail".