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Ireland 13 South Africa 8

This epic match more than matched the billing and hype and I share my colleague Derek Williams’ viewpoint that the Boks should be beaten. Their bomb squad of 7 forwards attracted a lot of attention though few pointed out that in the absence of Malcolm Marx they did not have a specialist hooker on [...]

September 24, 2023 // 0 Comments

Gloucester Rugby 25 Harlequins 17

I was initially excited by last night’s visit to the atmospheric Kingsholm until I realised how many Quins players would be absent on World Cup duty: Joe Marler, Jack Walker, Joe Marchant, Marcus Smith, Danny Care, Andre Esterhuizen, Tommaso Allan and Gloucester could not call on wingers [...]

September 23, 2023 // 0 Comments

Brighton HAFC 2 AEKAthens 3

Brighton’s first-ever European game in the Europa League last night was in every sense a damp squib as they lost and the heavens opened. Surprisingly Roberto de Zerbi rested Lewis Dunk and Evan Ferguson. Dunk was particularly missed as the untried combo of Van der Hecke and Igor did not look [...]

September 22, 2023 // 0 Comments

Answered prayers/Duncan Hamilton

Duncan Hamilton is rightly acclaimed as one of our best – if not the best – sports biographer. It’s not a literary field crammed with talent. Most ghosted sports biographies are dull with some revelation for the serialisation in a newspaper. Duncan Hamilton writes on major but [...]

September 19, 2023 // 0 Comments

The Tanner Report: Fulham 1 Luton O

When in the season you play a team is key. Luton are just promoted, lost their first three games and – angered that Garth Crooks in midweek predicted their relegation by Xmas – brought many and raucous supporters. Fulham are regarded as soft, the sort of game from which you might come [...]

September 17, 2023 // 0 Comments

England win O.D.I.

England won by 100 runs over New Zealand at Lords but it was a sterile, dull match. Various reasons were discussed but the accepted one was the 12-30 start. This meant the match went onto until 7-30 pm and began at lunchtime. My neighbour in the Upper Mound stand and his wider were my guests for a [...]

September 16, 2023 // 0 Comments

Sussex win (at last ).

Sussex beat Leicestershire yesterday to achieve only their second victory in the second division of the Championship. They won by 15 runs – a slim victory considering Leicestershire were set 498 and were at one stage 16-2. In the final session they needed 42 runs to win with 3 wickets in [...]

September 14, 2023 // 0 Comments

Wales 32 Fiji 26

Wales’s victory over Fiji was the best World Cup game so far. I had watched South Africa beat Scotland but I find the Boks to be a boring bunch of behemoths. Scotland play attractively but are over-reliant on the mercurial Finn Russell and frankly it was a pea-shooter against a Panzer tank. [...]

September 11, 2023 // 0 Comments

Thoughts on a great England victory

In the Great Debate of Farrell v Smith George Ford was marginalised. He was not yesterday: with some glorious kicking he personally amassed 27 points.  The drop kick is an effective but underused weapon. I was there in the Stade de France when the South African fly half Jamie de Beer  destroyed [...]

September 10, 2023 // 0 Comments

Rugby World Cup Preview

The first observation to make about the Rugby World Cup is that the four best Rugby nations (France, New Zealand, Ireland and South Africa) are all in the lower section. Whilst France v New Zealand is a tasty opener I’m looking forward more to the Pool B encounter between world number one Ireland [...]

September 8, 2023 // 0 Comments

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