Premiership Rugby £500,000 salary cap rise could tempt England stars in France to return September 15, 2014 Aviva Premiership Rugby is set to increase the league’s salary cap by 10 per cent in future seasons, and will also allow clubs to sign a second “excluded” player from overseas. Clubs’ spending on player wages is currently capped at £5m, but the Aviva Premiership will permit a further £500,000 spending ahead of the [...]
Sport Comment: Rugby has the ability to infuriate but when in full flow the game simply inspires like few others September 14, 2014 Many of you will have spent last Friday hunched over a computer pretending to be observing market trends and world news, when in fact you were trying to access tickets for the Rugby World Cup next year. Some will have been lucky. One or two will have given up after encountering the usual glitches that [...]
NFL season begins: Why American Football could be bigger than rugby in the UK September 8, 2014 While the Premier League takes a break this weekend, another "football" league has got underway. Across the pond, the National Football League (NFL), the flagship American Football league whose teams beat even the Premier League in terms of revenue, has kicked off a new season. With its return will follow a growing legion of devoted UK fans [...]
Welsh cakes, whiskey and rugby balls: What’s in the Nato goody bag? September 5, 2014 US President Barack Obama, Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko and German chancellor Angela Merkel were among the Nato leaders presented with a goody bag of Welsh goods today – and the contents certainly made us stop and look. No doubt Obama and Merkel bonded over the Welsh cakes they received. Maybe Poroshenko used the honey [...]
Skipper backs more rugby joy as England’s women turn pro August 25, 2014 WORLD Cup-winning captain Katy McLean is confident full-time contracts will keep English rugby at the top of the women’s game after the sport’s governing body confirmed top female players will be paid for the first time. England Women’s Sevens side will now operate on a professional basis and the Rugby Football Union has issued 20 [...]
Sport Comment: World Cup has been huge credibility boost for women’s rugby August 17, 2014 IT IS the nature of our sporting world that football is the rich man from whose table every other sport has to eat the scraps, and so amid all the hoopla in the week of the resumption of the Premier League it has been particularly bad luck for English cricket and British athletics that their [...]
Cowes Week Diary: Rugby stars and royalty set to collide in Artemis Challenge August 5, 2014 IT HAS been almost 20 years since my retirement from international rugby, and although I miss playing the game I’ve been fortunate enough to attend some of the greatest sporting events on earth since, so it’s certainly far from being bad. One of those has to be Aberdeen Asset Management Cowes Week, and for four [...]
City Dogs come out on top of Rugby Sevens pack again July 27, 2014 They’ve only been playing together for two tournaments but City A.M. sponsored Rugby Sevens team City Dogs have made it two out of two, winning Saturday’s FRM Sevens Tournament at Ilford Wanderers, beating Oxfam 21 – 19. Captain Edward Yarnton, who is today enjoying his last day working at BP, said, “Onwards and upwards. We’ll [...]
Mike Tindall becomes last of class of 2003 to hang up rugby boots July 16, 2014 World Cup winner Mike Tindall has revealed that he decided to retire from rugby after realising he could not face playing for anyone but Gloucester. Former England captain Tindall – the last of the triumphant 2003 squad to hang up his boots – spent nine years at Kingsholm, following eight seasons at Bath. “I could [...]
Sport Comment: For Milner and England, see Michalak and French rugby June 8, 2014 CONSUMED by optimism, most of you reading this will be in front of a television next Saturday evening, believing that a combination of Steven Gerrard’s drive, Gary Cahill’s determination and the odd flash of brilliance from Wayne Rooney and/or Daniel Sturridge will upset Italy and kick-start England’s World Cup challenge in style. However, if things [...]