Cricket
The only way is up for England’s cricketers
The timing of Brendon McCullum’s appointment as England’s Test match coach couldn’t be better for him, or for the matey…
What English cricket needs now
You couldn’t ask for a more amiable man than Rob Key to run English cricket: affable, shrewd and universally liked,…
Pep and Klopp, kings of England
It’s a game for the ages all right, City againstLiverpool on Sunday as the Premier League moves to its most…
Where Eddie Jones is going wrong
Rugby Union, bloody hell. We’ve got to talk about Eddie, but before that, what about something much cheerier? Just when…
Time for rugby to sort itself out
If you were one of the sharp-suited head honchos at CVC Capital Partners, the private equity megalith that has ploughed…
Rest in peace, Shane Warne
Headingly, July 22nd 1993 and the opening day of the fourth test that summer between England and Australia. This, as…
Is football missing a trick?
Well, there’s a surprise: Nike have cancelled their sponsorship of the Manchester United and England footballer Mason Greenwood, who is…
Letters
Russia’s star Sir: Wolfgang Münchau is surely right to highlight the risk posed to European peace and stability by Germany’s…
The BBC is killing cricket
Full homage to the nail-biting cricketing miracle in Sydney, while bearing in mind that miracles, like lightning, rarely strike twice…
Why England lost the Ashes
England’s wretched performance in the Ashes – which saw the side lose three tests and so the series to Australia…
Another year of brickbats and bouquets
Sport and politics have always been intertwined, but this was the year they became joined at the hip. Yorkshire racism;…
The ridiculous rehabilitation of Azeem Rafiq
Has Azeem Rafiq been forgiven yet? He’s certainly working on it. After finding himself on both sides of a racism…
Why the Reds have got the blues
Not so much the hair dryer: more a gentle home perm. Contemplating the increasingly less youthful visage of Ole Gunnar…
England’s shameful betrayal of Pakistan
Any English person with a love of cricket knows life has its ups and downs. But until now we have…
Testing times
In London, the weather is a gentle sashaying mockery. An Indian summer reminds us of the sullen apology of summer…
Busted flush
Forgive the personal question, but how long does it take you to, you know, go to the gents, ladies, non-binary?…
Can the Lions prise open the strong Boks?
You would need a digger to explore the levels of irony in a Springbok chief slagging off an opponent’s dirty…
Cricket notebook
Although it was a miracle that he survived until a few weeks before his 95th birthday, the death of John…
Hateful Hundred
This slick new tournament will ruin cricket
Ollie Robinson’s ritual humiliation
One of the more egregious innovations of Chairman Mao’s cultural revolution was something called the ‘struggle sessions’. This involved the…
Portrait of the Week
Home The government pondered delaying the end of coronavirus restrictions on 21 June. But Chris Hopson, the chief executive of…
Judge Ollie Robinson on his cricket skills, not his tweets
Ollie Robinson, who made his Test debut for England at Lord’s last week against New Zealand, is an outstanding cricketer…
Foreign clash of the English titans
Thank heavens the Champions League final is being played in Portugal, now Turkey’s off the menu (sorry). It will certainly…
A strange and beautiful language
So wickets are out and outs are in for the new Hundred competition. But why? The language of sport is…
A glimpse into cricket’s future
After the thrills and spills and last-gasp excitements of England’s triple-headed series in India, the attention of the cricket fan…
