By Nick Harris 8 November 2010 Sir Ian Botham has stoked the rivalry between England and Australia by claiming the English will “stuff” their rivals in the forthcoming Ashes series, and says victory for the tourists will be all the sweeter when England “beat the convicts in their own back yard”. Botham has a famous […]

5 November 2010 Can you identify the sporting arena? We take an aerial view of a topical ball park, football stadium, marathon course, golf course, Games venue, race track, iconic arena, athletic theatre (some literally theatres), pitch, park, stretch of water or wherever else sport takes place. And we ask you to identify it with the […]

By Nick Harris 5 November 2010 David Gold, the former co-owner of Birmingham and now the co-owner of West Ham, has today been banned from attending tomorrow’s match between the teams at St Andrew’s over comments reported in a variety of newspapers today. Remarks reported in this report in the Telegraph were key to the […]

4 November 2010 . A digest of some of the Newcastle United stories making headlines today . Chris Hughton should be given a long-term contract at the club according to goalkeeper Steve Harper. “He has been the ideal manager for us,” Harper says. “He doesn’t work the crowd; he just gets his head down and […]

4 November 2010 . A digest of some of the Manchester United stories making headlines today . From the official website, Nani insists that United are now the ‘real deal’ and will start a proper challenge to Chelsea. “I think you are starting to see the real Manchester United now. We are very confident at […]

By Nick Harris 4 November 2010 UK Anti-Doping has today issued a warning to British sportsmen and sportswomen to “be extra vigilant” when using dietary supplements in the wake of the first UK athlete receiving a ban for testing positive for the prohibited substance methylhexaneamine. UKAD says the warning follows a number of recent international […]

By Brian Sears 4 November 2010 Back in September after five game had been played in this Premier League season, sportingintelligence analysis showed Newcastle, Blackpool and West Brom had made the best starts, collectively, of any group of top-flight newcomers since 1992. With double the number of games played, the upstart trio have continued to […]

By Brian Sears 4 November 2010 While one of this Sunday’s ‘major’ Premier League games features table-toppers Chelsea away at lower-half opposition, the truly big game between a pair of genuine top-four aspirant clubs is surely West Bromwich Albion at home to Manchester City. Removing tongue from cheek, it is certainly a contrast of wealth […]

By Nick Harris 4 November 2010 A Chinese football club considers the size and shape of young players’ private parts as one factor in an overall assessment of whether they’re likely to make it as a player. An unnamed coach from Tianjin Locomotive, who play in China’s third-tier League Two, told reporters that “many factors”, […]

3 November 2010 . A digest of some of the Liverpool stories making headlines today . Damien Comolli has been hired as the club’s “director of football strategy”. Roy Hodgson welcomes the move, apparently, although he stopped short of praising the former Spurs sporting director’s – ahem – contribution at White Hart Lane. It’s being […]