Chris Tremlett: Smart bowling can help England at World Cup October 25, 2021 England got their World Cup campaign off to a great start with a dominant six-wicket victory over the West Indies as they bowled out their opponents for 55. Spinners Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali impressed on Saturday but they have done for the last few years. Rashid is such an underrated bowler outside of England, [...]
Man Utd 0, Liverpool 5: Ruthless Reds expose Solskjaer’s limitations October 24, 2021 Before his desperately out-of-form Manchester United side took on Liverpool today, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer explained the wisdom of keeping faith with the same starting XI that fell two goals behind to Atalanta in midweek. They had “played well”, Solskjaer insisted, adding that he wanted them to “start on the front foot” and “dominate the game” [...]
Ed Warner: Activity vouchers can solve post-Covid sport participation problem October 21, 2021 I addressed a bunch of politicians, advisors and sports industry types at a Westminster Forum this week on the challenges facing sport and the public funding priorities as we come out of the pandemic. The risk on these occasions is that you get caught in an echo chamber, telling the audience what it already thinks [...]
Eoin Morgan: I’m not going to stand in the way October 20, 2021 England captain Eoin Morgan will drop himself from the playing squad should his run of poor batting performances continue. Ahead of today’s T20 World Cup warm-up match against New Zealand, Morgan admitted that he needs to improve otherwise he will not feature against the West Indies on Saturday in his side’s opening match of the [...]
Premier League clubs block Saudi sponsorship deals with Newcastle United October 19, 2021 Premier League clubs have moved to stop Saudi Arabia flooding Newcastle United with big-money sponsorship deals that would allow them to spend freely on transfers. Eighteen of the 20 top-flight teams approved a block on related-party transactions, in which a company that shares the same owner as a club pays it money via a commercial [...]
Newcastle 2, Tottenham 3: New owners witness false start to Saudi era October 17, 2021 Out with the old, in with the new. That was meant to be the theme as Newcastle United played their first game under Saudi ownership today. In the St James’ Park directors’ box, the club’s new rulers – chairman Yasir Al-Rumayyan and Amanda Staveley, the public face of the £300m takeover – took their seats [...]
Axe hovers over Ole Gunnar Solskjaer as familiar questions haunt Man Utd boss October 17, 2021 It was a 3-1 loss to Liverpool that finally brought the chop for Jose Mourinho and opened the door for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer to return to Manchester United. Mourinho went into that December 2018 game on a run of two wins in seven matches and amid a growing sense that, 31 months on from being [...]
Football training can be safer with VR technology October 15, 2021 A whipped cross and a powerful header towards goal are staples of football and the essence of set-piece tactics used by every football team. But building Cristiano Ronaldo-like leg power to spring higher than your opponent and honing the skill to guide the ball into the net requires endless training drills. The other, more serious [...]
Indian Premier League gives England cause for concern ahead of T20 World Cup October 13, 2021 The Indian Premier League is one of the best proving grounds in Twenty20 cricket; perhaps the perfect competition for some of England’s stars to find form before the T20 World Cup begins on Sunday. Since the IPL’s return, in the latter weeks of September, seven English players have featured in the competition’s group stage. But [...]
Delphlyx: The start-up offering football bosses data analytics for dummies October 8, 2021 From Harvard graduates building bespoke programmes for Liverpool to the video analysis tools now available even to Sunday league coaches, 21st century football is awash with data. But what might have been overlooked is that some are drowning in it; while today’s club analysts and scouts may be data-literate, their older superiors frequently are not. [...]