[theo_luddite]

For a while there I thought someone had organised the Womens Rugby with a tad of common sense, but as it goes on it's fairly obvious the big games still gravitate darn sarf while the little games (barring the opener and a few games in Exeter) are played mostly ooop Nooerrth and in Middle England in middling sized stadiums. Picking a couple of normally RL grounds is nice of them but typical of the RU they ain't that big as stadiums go either. One of those "scratch away at the surface" moments that we are supposed to be grateful for I suppose. Yes I expected the final to be at Twickers but where the heck does Brighton come from as a force in rugby? I don't think I'm being "that" naive either.

[theo_luddite]

Well that's me out of the Mens US Open Tennis - Draper out with w@*k**s cramp.

[theo_luddite]

A bit later than usual but here's the latest update.

The tennis in Noo Yark is just over halfway through and all the Brits are on a flight home or to their next tournament. No surprises there then.

In the womens rugger, big scores still abound with Welsh Wales as good as already heading back to The Valleys, the USA and the Aussies playing out a draw in York, and Spain and Italy giving Ireland and Seth Efrika a run for their money. Round 3 next weekend. If I heard it right, England ran up their highest World Cup score ever and Samoa got ther first points ever in the same game.

With 3 matches or so still to go in Super League, troubled Salford got a shock win at Warrington, surprise of the season Hull KR lead the table by 4 points from Wigan.

Fore!

The Ryder Cup captains have both named their teams for later this month.

Shane Lowry, Jon Rahm, Sepp Straka, Viktor Hovland, Ludvig Aberg and Matt Fitzpatrick, who all played in the 16½-11½ victory in Rome in 2023, were Donald's selections for Europe. They join Rory McIlroy, Robert MacIntyre, Tommy Fleetwood, Justin Rose, Rasmus Hojgaard and Tyrrell Hatton, who automatically qualified.

Keegan Bradley could have picked himself as a playing captain, having six top 10 finishes this season, instead he selected Justin Thomas, Collin Morikawa, Ben Griffin, Cameron Young, Patrick Cantley and Sam Burns to join automatic qualifiers Scottie Scheffler, JJ Spaun, Xander Schauffele, Russell Henley, Harris English and Bryson DeChambeau.

More of that closer to the Tournament starting.

F1 came back with a bang (and a crash or two) and an oil leak in The Netherlands this weekend. Aussie Piastri won again as his team mate Norris started dripping oil a few laps from the end and retired. He could have tried to continue until his engine blew, but Super Mario tactics aren't de rigueur in F1. 34 points behind he needs snookers (or at least punctures) to catch up with his team mate. The Hamster also parked his car in the barriers. They go to Monza in Italy this weekend with Ferrari still looking for a good result.



The Shale Shifters were sliding round the corners in Poland at the Wroclaw Olympic Stadium on Friday and Saturday The qualifying finished with another Sprint Race won by Brit Dan Bewley, followed home by Robert Lambert, Bartosz Zmarzlik and Max Fricke. Those two points were crucial as Brady Kurtz again won the main event (4 in a row) but Zmarzlik came 2nd to keep his 3pt gap at the head of the standings. The final meeting is in Denmark on 13th September.







The Boys of Summer are now into their last month of the regular season before the World (cough) Series starts. In the American League, the Detroit Tigers lead all the standings including the AL Central, with the Blow Jays still top of AL East but closely followed by both Noo Yark and Boston. Houston Astros lead the AL West but are behind all the above.

The National League has a similar theme with Milwaukee Brewers heading the standings in the NL Central and nationally. They are 5 wins ahead of NL East leading Phillies, with NL West leaders LA Dodgers 7 wins back.

[theo_luddite]

I just watched the highlights from Wroclaw, this was the final.



If you think that was fun, this was the British Final at Belle Vue a couple of months back



I can't remember a race like it in all my days of going down The Shay, Belle Vue, Bradford, Sheffield and anywhere else. In all my years in Wolvo - I never went once. Tell me why but I didn't like Monday's which s when they mostly raced. Compared to The Shay, I considered it a Mickey Mouse track that you could only really go round on half throttle. Anyone on full throttle was always going backwards on the crown of the bends.
With Brum closing this week, there isn't a track operating anymore in the West Midlands. Wolves gone, Brum gone, Cradley and Coventry long gone, Stoke gone. Leicester are still around but Long Eaton are also long gone and the first meeting I recall going to in 1965 was Halifax v Long Eaton Archers and they stuffed The Dukes that night. Things got better for the one and only season the following year. They almost made Town look successful.

[theo_luddite]

Remember the Wimbledon Final where Amanda Anisimova was swatted aside by Iga Swiatek in the final? Well, she got her revenge the other night and has gone on to beat Naomi Osaka to get to the final in Noo Yark, where she'll play top seed Aryna Sabalenka. That means SCO is the only one in with a shout of a point. The mens semi's go today with Jannik Sinner up against Cannuck, Felix Auger-Aliassime and Novak Djokovic up against Carlos Alcaraz. That means everyone is still in with a shout, except me.

The F1 moves to Monza where The Hamster has already apprently picked up a 5 place grid penalty for not slowing down soon enough on his pit to grid lap last week.

The Ladies RU Egg Chasing continues with the final Pool matches this weekend. Each group is already sorted regarding who's going through, it's just a case of who goes through 1st and 2nd from each Pool as the strongest sides play each other and then the knock-out stages start next weekend.

In a bit of a warm up for The Ryder Cup, The Walker Cup, for USA v GB&I amateurs takes place this weekend in California. Some names for the future will be pitting their wits and golf skills against each other.

World Cup Footy Qualies are under way, but we'll leave that for next season.

[theo_luddite]

To the strains of Sheffield's finest entertaining the Essex boys and girls (though like me they are mostly a tad more wrinkly than we all used to be) at what used to be Prawns in the Pork, the Tennis wrapped up in Noo Yark even if it took ages to get everyone in thanks to some old codger turning up in the Rolex hostility boxes.

Aryna Sabalenka won the womens title on Saturday, point to SCO so he's no longer tail-end Charlie and Carlos Alcaraz won in 4 sets on Sunday, scoring points for Snoots, themaclad and SHEP, putting Snoots and SHEP at the top of the pile, but there's only 3 points between us.

In motorsport, Crash won in Monza despite having to give 1st place back to Norris after taking a short cut on one of the opening corners. The two wheeled chaps were in Barcelona for Moto GP with the Marquez brothers finishing 1st and 2nd, the World Superbikes were in France and The British version seemed to dodge the downpours we had in Wolvo at Donnington.

In other two wheeled sport, the pedal pushing lads on the push-rods were divided between La Vuelta in Spain, which still has another week to go and the Tour of Britain. This marked the final professional race for Geraint Thomas, fittingly ending in Cardiff. The Tour was won by Steven Williams of the Israel-Premier Tech Team. That team has been the subject of a few protests in La Vuelta with at least one stage being cut short. There was also a protest of sorts on the final stage between Newport and Cardiff up the The Valleys when a heard of cows blocked the road for a while. They left a pile up rather than causing a pile up allegedly. 'A Goodyear for the Roses' as Elvis Costello once almost sang.

The quarter final for the Egg Chasing will be contested next weekend between
New Zealand v Seth Efrika
Canucks v Aussies
France v Ireland
England v Scotland
.
The Walker Cup singles are still in play with GB & Ireland needing 6 from 10, to get 13.5 to win but at the moment only lead in 2 games.
The US only need 5 after the Sunday morning foursomes left the score USA 8.5, UK&I 7.5.

England v Andorra made Town v Pish Posh's 1st half look like a classic. Nuff sed.

The NFL started again this weekend, but that's another for next season. The CFL is well underway and I'll try to make sense of that next week before their play-offs get anywhere close to fruition.