Spectator sport
Why rugby is a perfect match for Japanese culture
The ITV set for the channel’s thunderingly good coverage of the Rugby World Cup is more Japanese than anything in…
Farewell, Garry Richardson. We’ll miss you
A day of sporting shocks this Sunday past. As if the news of Tracey Horrobin’s bewitching performance with the ball…
Will Ben Stokes be the greatest cricketer of all time?
Feeling depressed about politics? I hope not. Politicians don’t shape the world: they are the furniture movers, not the furniture…
Bring out the biltong for Labuschagne, an Ashes hero
Funny, the things cricketers put on their bats. England’s Jos Buttler has ‘Fuck it’ written at the top of his…
Any true English cricket lover has to acknowledge that Steve Smith is a great hero
During the World Cup (remember that?), Virat Kohli, the very model of a modern major cricketer, appealed to Indian fans…
Why women shouldn’t play Test cricket
The name Cameron Delport might not be immediately familiar, but his exploits last week could mean more for the future…
What the new generation of tennis players could learn from Rocket Rod Laver
A chum was in Waitrose a year or two back, and was bending down with some difficulty to look at…
Sports journalism in Britain is being attacked by an American predator
Forty years ago the football transfer market went crazy: the British record was broken four times in 1979, more than…
The timing of Channel 4’s cricket highlights show is an outrage
Hardly any men can hit a tennis ball on clay better than Dominic Thiem. Unfortunately he ran into one who…
Cricket’s – finally – coming home
Well, you have come a long way baby. As the whizz-bang hoopla of the cricket World Cup strides into view…
The fans make British football what it is – stop fleecing them
It is always possible to tell the difference between a bunch of Manchester City fans and auditions for the latest…
Leeds United is the soap opera which keeps on giving
Say what you like about Elland Road — and in my experience it is not a place to linger —…
Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, master of the seas and model Englishman
Something very odd happened on the Today programme the other morning. Amid the mountains of bombast that usually fill the…
Have referees just given up?
Sometimes you fear for Neil Warnock. The embattled Cardiff manager is 70 and operates at level 11 all the time;…
How Scotland humiliated England in the Six Nations
Outside the rugby superhighway of the A316, linking Richmond, Rosslyn Park, the Quins and HQ, it’s hard to imagine anyone…
Meet Chris Gayle, the coolest man in sport
It can’t be a coincidence that two of the coolest sportsmen on the planet are from the same place, Jamaica.…
We football romantics love the fifth round of the FA cup
And so we say farewell to the round of 16 in the FA Cup, traditionally a viscerally thrilling process that…
If England play like they did against Ireland, they’ll be formidable at the Rugby World Cup
At the same time as England’s rugby union players delivered a magnificent hearts-of-oak performance to humble a very good Irish…
When trans sportsmen and women compete, can it ever be a level playing field?
Amid the many splendours of West Side Story is this lyric: ‘My sister wears a moustache, my brother wears a…
If ever a man deserved his gong, it’s Sir Alastair Cook
Here’s a date for the diary: if you’re in south London on 11 April, head for the Oval. It’s going…
Why the end of 2018 is also the end of a sporting era
It may be the end of the year but it’s also the end of some major sporting eras. Alastair Cook…
Talksport, cricket’s new radio stars
‘And I need a wee,’ said the former England fast–bowling legend Darren Gough, as tension built up during the Sri…
The All Blacks: world-class time-wasters
Marvellous team, the All Blacks, of course. But they certainly know how to waste some time. Here are some things…
Rugby union vs league – or Barbour-clad southerners vs the whippet brigade
Leader in the clubhouse for top rugby try by an Englishman in 2018: Oliver Gildart. Oliver who? Oliver Gildart, only…
The terrible injury toll of modern rugby
Eddie Jones’s sorrows as England’s rugby coach certainly keep coming in big battalions. Now the giant battered No 8 Billy…
