Sports journalism

Forty or so years ago, when I was at university, my friends Richard, Terence, Harry and I would often go to the Oxford Union to play snooker. There were two immaculate snooker tables in a large room at the top of the building and almost no one ever went there except for us. Unfortunately, our enthusiasm was not matched by concomitant talent. On one occasion it took us 34 minutes to pot a single ball. At a certain point in that endless non-break, Terence had an easy pot to a distant hole. Saying ‘I was going to pot the ball, but instead I’m going to do this’, he hit the

There is a lot of death in the latest, and potentially last, book on boxing by the South African journalist Donald McRae. In less than two years he loses his sister, both his parents and his mother-in-law. To cope with the trauma he returns to the sport that has sustained his life and work for 30 years. But when he reimmerses himself in boxing he does not like what he sees. He finds a sport where bouts are controlled by gangsters; where famous boxers dope and lie about it; where fights still have inadequate safety protocols; and where the centre of power has shifted from Las Vegas to Riyadh, lured

The date 6 June 2021 was a grim day for cricket. As the world was adjusting to life after the pandemic, a Lord’s Test with a full house felt like ‘the promised kiss of springtime’. And so it was, until the final afternoon, when New Zealand challenged England to make 273 in 75 overs. The gesture was recognised as generous by all except the faint souls in the England dressing room, rendered frit by the possibility of defeat. Thousands of spectators, bewildered by five hours of fearful prodding, withdrew their consent. Cricket has witnessed more profound changes in the past decade than in the previous 100 years With ‘the Hundred’