EP: 160 Ayr, Newbury & Hong Kong September 16, 2022 The Ayr Gold & Silver Cups are the feature races at the west Scottish track on Saturday as the sprinters line-up over 6-furlongs. Further south, Newbury stages a trio of Group races on the same afternoon. Trainer John Ryan steps Manaccan up to Group 3 company for the first time in the 5-furlong Newbury sprint [...]
Ollie Phillips: The Premiership is by far the best league in the world September 16, 2022 Last week’s Premiership action further convinced me that the English Premiership is the best league in the world. Other than Worcester Warriors’ loss at London Irish, where the troubled away side were understandably rusty, I really couldn’t have called which way the other matches would go. How Gloucester turned around a 21-point deficit was astonishing, [...]
Worcester face suspension from league at 12 noon over financial woes September 15, 2022 Worcester Warriors have been handed a deadline of noon today by the Rugby Football Union to prove they have sufficient funds to stage matches safely – or face suspension from all men’s and women’s competitions. The troubled Premiership club could be thrown out of the English top flight and other competitions as a result of [...]
Roger Federer announces retirement from tennis after Laver Cup in London this month September 15, 2022 Roger Federer, perhaps the greatest men’s tennis player of all time, has announced that he will retire from the sport after this month’s Laver Cup in London. The 41-year-old, who won 20 Grand Slams including a record eight men’s singles titles at Wimbledon, said it was “time to end my competitive career”. Federer had a [...]
David Dein interview: On Arsenal, Premier League, Kroenke, Wenger and Usmanov September 15, 2022 Fifteen years on from an unceremonious ousting from Arsenal that also cost him a host of other high-powered roles in football, David Dein is still feeling bruised. The club’s former vice-chairman, who rose to the same role at the Football Association, was one of the architects of the Premier League and became president of leading [...]
Rugby’s shadow expeditions: The second string sides heading on tour September 15, 2022 Rugby is set in its traditions, rightly and wrongly, and it takes an enormous shift in will for anything new to seep into the sport. But when Irish province and last year’s losing European finalists Leinster announced earlier this week that they would be playing a fixture against an All Blacks XV during November, it [...]
Ed Warner: How to solve the Hundred and help county cricket with private money September 15, 2022 The Hundred isn’t going away, whatever diehard cricket traditionalists might wish. It’s been cemented into the English calendar until at least 2028 by a television deal finalised just before the arrival of the England and Wales Cricket Board’s new chair. Richard Thompson, erstwhile arch-critic of the controversial competition, now finds his room for manoeuvre severely [...]
Marco Pantani story is a modern fable of fragility September 14, 2022 When you’re at the very peak of your sport there will always be questions asked around how you got there, and how you stayed there. But for some of the very best in history, they became victims of high performance; chewed up by their own hype and spat out at the side of the road [...]
County is capable of giving Fownes a Fine Valley start September 13, 2022 AFTER a two-month break, inner-city track Happy Valley hosts its first meeting of the 2022/23 season in Hong Kong on Wednesday, with an eight-race programme starting at 12.15pm. Most of the talk during the close season centred around the general wellbeing of champion jockeys Zac Purton and Joao Moreira, who both suffered health issues in [...]
Power-packed De Sousa can lift Hercules home to victory September 13, 2022 FORMER three-time British champion jockey Silvestre de Sousa’s return to Hong Kong began with a bang at Sha Tin on Sunday as he visited the winners’ circle on his first day back. An armchair ride on Lucky Sweynesse in the Chief Executive’s Cup was just the start the 41-year-old Brazilian needed, although it did cost [...]