Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales on Nintendo Switch review: Gwent is back and it’s never felt so good February 17, 2020 Gwent, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. The Witcher 3 is one of the truly great open-world games, mind-boggling in its scope and masterful in its execution. But there were times when it felt like elaborate padding around the in-game pastime, Gwent. I clocked over 300 hours in this [...]
Four years without a win and now two in a row: king of the swingers Adam Scott is back at the top of the game February 17, 2020 You will never watch Adam Scott play golf on television without the commentators gushing about how good his swing is. When you think about the great ball-strikers, the Australian is one of the first names that comes to mind. For me, he is up there in the top 10 of all time, along with Tiger [...]
England right to be excited about the Twenty20 World Cup after flexing their muscles in 2-1 South Africa series win February 16, 2020 England came into their Twenty20 International series with South Africa out of practice in the format, confident, but not entirely sure about the specifics of their route to this year’s World Cup. Through their mastery of the 50-over format over the last four years they knew they had the players and attributes required to be [...]
Chelsea v Manchester United: Blues’ poor home form under threat from big-match specialists in top-four showdown February 16, 2020 While this season’s Premier League title race is now non-existent, the battle to finish in the top four is still very much on. Everyone from Chelsea in fourth to Arsenal in 10th will have aspirations of finishing in the final Champions League spot, while Manchester City’s prospective European ban has given even more teams hope. [...]
Arsenal 4-0 Newcastle: Mikel Arteta’s side finally turn the tide of draws in crucial, confidence-boosting home win February 16, 2020 Suddenly it all clicked into place. After a run of four successive Premier League draws and 45 minutes of predictable, frustrating and ineffective side-to-side football, Arsenal found their mojo. In the grand scheme of things it wasn’t much – a 15-minute spell of domination and creativity, and a strong finish against a unadventurous Newcastle side [...]
Manchester City could win legal row with Uefa but club’s Champions League ban is already having an impact February 16, 2020 If Friday’s announcement that Manchester City face exclusion from the Champions League for the next two years was a bombshell, then the accompanying shrapnel is the endless list of questions posed by Uefa’s verdict. What now for the most expensively assembled project in the history of football? Can Pep Guardiola be persuaded to stay at [...]
Steve McQueen at Tate Modern review: Dramatic retrospective muses on what it means to be human February 14, 2020 I’m not sure anybody has perfected the art of translating video installations into blockbuster gallery retrospectives, but the Tate Modern comes pretty darned close. Having Steve McQueen as your subject helps, of course. He’s the man with the Midas touch, a Turner-prize winning artist turned Oscar-winning director. The Tate collects pieces from after his 1999 [...]
Nora: A Doll’s House review: Elaborate reworking doesn’t do Ibsen’s classic justice February 14, 2020 The works of Ibsen are perennial candidates for a thorough reimagining, his quietly devastating studies of class struggle and women’s rights depressingly relevant for each subsequent generation since he started writing in the mid-19th century. A 2018 production of The Wild Duck at the Almeida, for instance, featured actors speaking as “themselves” as it explored [...]
Death of England review: Rafe Spall dazzles in this timely portrait of the resurgent far-right February 14, 2020 Rafe Spall asserts his credentials as one of the finest stage actors around in this percussive, often hilarious one-man play about working class racism. He plays Michael, an Essex flower-seller whose oily patter masks a vast well of toxic emotion. He’s the guy in the pub who’s all smiles until he’s kicking the life out [...]
Sonic the Hedgehog review: Everyone’s second favourite videogame mascot’s gotta go faster than this February 14, 2020 There’s a point about halfway through the Sonic the Hedgehog movie in which Sonic farts unexpectedly, forcing the viewer to reckon with the notion that he has a functioning anus. I’m no prude – farts are one of the most sophisticated forms of humour there is – but being made to conceptualise the sphincter of [...]