Road to Cheltenham March 5, 2015 ON PAPER the Irish look to have as strong a hand as ever before at this year’s Cheltenham Festival and one race they have a great record in is the County Hurdle on the final day. Paul Nicholls won it with Lac Fontana 12 months ago, but prior to that Ireland had taken the previous [...]
Cheltenham – a special week March 5, 2015 BILL ESDAILE TAKES AT LOOK AT THE BEST OF THE BOOKMAKERS’ CHELTENHAM FESTIVAL SPECIALS WITH only days to go until the start of the Cheltenham Festival, bookmakers are falling over themselves with generous offers to attract new clients. Champion Chase sponsors Betway have pledged to refund all losing bets on their sponsored feature race next [...]
The Gunners can earn replay at Old Trafford March 5, 2015 BEN CLEMINSON PREVIEWS THE UPCOMING FA CUP AND PREMIER LEAGUE ACTION MANCHESTER UNITED and Arsenal leave their battle for European football next season aside for the moment as they vie for a place in the FA Cup semi-finals. It’s the only silverware United have a chance of getting their hands on and it’s a similar [...]
Rejuvenated Aston Villa ready to inflict more pain on the Baggies March 5, 2015 It was difficult to find a superlative on Tuesday evening which was a fair reflection on what Christian Benteke’s injury time penalty meant to all associated with Aston Villa. Newly appointed Tim Sherwood saw his side collect three points against a West Brom outfit who had lost just one of their last eight prior to [...]
Maximum excitement on the FA Cup March 5, 2015 MANCHESTER United take on Arsenal on Monday night and it’s a match that will lead to a shake-up on Sporting Index’s FA Cup Outright Index. The index rewards teams in the FA Cup points according to how far they get in the competition with the winners getting 100 and the runners-up 75. Losing the semi-final [...]
Considered for Fifty Shades of Grey, Christian Cooke is one of the UK’s hottest new actors March 5, 2015 There’s handsome, and there’s “that guy should star in a soft-core BDSM blockbuster” handsome. Christian Cooke is the latter, to the extent that he was in the running to bag the lead role in Fifty Shades of Grey, before it was given to fellow Brit Jamie Dornan. In person Cooke seems far too nice for [...]
Flower power: Get ready for the new season in floral prints and pastel shades March 5, 2015 Christian Dior jumpsuit, £4,700, dior.com Giorgio Armani dress, £18,440, armani.com; BLK DNM shirt, £195, net-a-porter.com; Jimmy Choo flats, £375, jimmychoo.com Peter Pilotto dress, £1,500, harveynichols.com Marni dress, £1,170, 26 Sloane Street, SW1X 9NE Kate Spade top, £395, katespade.co.uk; Brooks Brothers shirt, £95, brooksbrothers.com; Hudson jeans, £250, Selfridges.com; Jimmy Choo flats, [...]
The Bottle Opener: Winemaking in the middle east March 5, 2015 Among the many wonderful things about wine are the extraordinary people who make it. Part artist, part scientist, they are always passionate, hopefully commercially minded, and never dull. Of all of them, Serge Hochar of Lebanon’s Chateau Musar was one of the most magnificent. It was his passion that created one of the world’s finest [...]
Beautiful things: Miyabi knives and science-inspired Adidas trainers March 5, 2015 Chefs are infamously disagreeable, but one area they do tend to agree on is the importance of decent knives. It is widely accepted that the Japanese craft the very best, and these ones made in Seki, central Japan, certainly seem to confirm this. Each handmade utensil is made up of 101 layers of ice-hardened steel. [...]
Against the Tide: A survey of the late, great Richard Diebenkorn March 5, 2015 Few painters capture the openness and light of California like Richard Diebenkorn. His bright and breezy paintings – some abstract, some figurative, some in-between – won him plenty of fans during the 20th century, even if the critics remained nonplussed. In the 50s, when New York was exerting a strong gravitational pull with its distinctive [...]