Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2017 i Inside Sport

What we appreciate about the Ashes in the context of modern sport is how authentic they are. A HYPOTHETICAL: you’re launching a sporting event, but you're in need of a concept to underpin it. Something the marketing department will love. You seize on a fun bit of trolling in the media, which was later augmented thanks to an in-joke of one of the captains of the teams involved. The trophy you create is literally funereal; it is so tiny and fragile that it can’t be held aloft in a victory celebration. Then you contest this prize over a sporting format so antiquated that even its fans question its relevance sometimes. We’re pretty sure these kinds of ideas weren’t heard in focus groups for the Big Bash. And yet, these are…

AFL Draft 1 It’s the critical day for your team’s premiership hopes ... five to seven years from now. Or something. Who knows? It’s the AFL offseason, and unless you would rather talk about how kicking a Gaelic ball is different to kicking a Sherrin, the topic at hand is the draft. 2 The 2017 draft, which will be held in Sydney on November 24, is the first to be affected by last year’s rule changes regarding the trading of future picks. The AFL evidently is getting into the fantasy football spirit – it has floated the possibility of allowing live trading of picks during draft night, as early as next year. 3 The Brisbane Lions hold the top pick and also have the 15th and 18th selections. Fremantle and…

Ashes After Dark As Fred Spofforth famously said, albeit in another context: “This thing can be done.” So after 135 years, an Ashes contest will be played at night – more specifically, the Second Test (from Dec 2). Adelaide is again the venue, and we can trust the denizens of the City of Churches to produce a convivial atmosphere (even if there’s no pool deck!) And while the Australians have banked a bit of experience in this format, this isn’t entirely new ground for England, which played its first day-night Test last August in Edgbaston. Granted, it was against the hapless West Indies, and they wrapped it within three days, taking 19 wickets on that third day. The Aussies will be a tougher proposition, and have a perfect record of…

Before they were international rugby league coaches and television personalities, Freddy Fittler and Joey Johns were representative teammates. The camera seems to have caught Fittler at a delicate moment here during a team photo session back in 2002. What’s going through Joey’s mind? ’47 is giving you the chance to be in the running to spend $150 on any of their merchandise at www.47brand.com.au, simply by providing a funny caption for this photo. If you’re our winner, choose from ‘47’s range of NRL, MLB, NBA and Wallabies headwear and apparel. ’47 is known for its exceptional licensed goodies. With hundreds of products and teams to choose from, you don’t want to miss this opportunity. To enter this awesome photo caption competition, hit up the “WIN” panel on our website –…

1 Sydney’s Nathan Walker becomes the first Aussie to play in ice hockey’s NHL. Drafted back in 2014, the 23-year-old finally made the Washington Capitals’ team, and scored a goal on debut for good measure. 2 Iceland becomes the smallest nation to qualify for football’s World Cup, securing one of Europe’s spots at Russia 2018. With a population of 335,000 – roughly the size of Canberra – Iceland undercut Trinidad and Tobago (1.3m) as the World Cup’s littlest tribe, and will blow up all those per-capita comparisons made every time the tournament rolls around. 3 Strange injury alert: Welsh rugby hooker Scott Baldwin suffered a lion bite, while his Ospreys team was in South Africa to play the Cheetahs. Baldwin was remarkably glass half-full: “The surgeon said it was like…

IT’S BEEN a wild ride for Esther Brooks and a horse called Johnny. Ever since the 74-year-old won a Clubbie for Best Masters Performance, she has become a media favourite. No one is more surprised than Brooks herself, who didn’t realise she was in the running until the votes started pouring in earlier this year. “I was told by my farrier when he came by one morning; he said that they were voting for me out there on Facebook,” Brooks says. “I Googled Esther Brooks and up it came ... I was just quite amazed. I don’t know how I did it, but everyone got behind me. It was a huge surprise.” Atherton Tablelands and District Dressage Association president Margot Warnett says the attention is well-deserved, hailing the elite dressage…

VISION  Dave Warner doesn’t only see a ball well, but when he sees it, he has all the equipment to hit it – hard. Warner’s sharp eye and reflexes enable him to play onside shots late and with full power. His judgement enables quick singles that turn the strike over. MIND  The way Warner sees the game – opponents, bowlers, batting, fielding and even, occasionally, bowling, makes him unique. Like a machismo-driven Mexican boxer, he refuses to acknowledge anything good about an opponent, on any level. Most of his “mouthing off” as he’s served as Australia’s “attack dog” for years now has actually been a case of self-motivation. Expressing contempt for fast bowlers – the more dangerous and renowned, the better – is part of his motivational makeup. He doesn’t…

Back in 2001, at an old Australasian Tour event known as the Canon Challenge, Paul Gow was just trying to get out of his own way. He had won the tournament the year before, and was ducking back home before returning to the United States and his first full season on the PGA Tour. In the familiar confines of the Castle Hill course in Sydney’s west, Gow had a reasonable expectation of playing well. But as he went out for the opening round, starting on the back nine, the results were better than what he might have hoped for. It was a gettable day, he recalls, and Gow went about getting it. When he made an eagle just after the turn, then poured on three more birdies, he had the…

Want muscle? You need an Accredited Practising Dietitian on your side. Want to come out the other side of Christmas without a hangover and an extra few kilos? Here’s how to maintain your health without missing out on the things you love ... or being a party pooper! 1. Start the day right Yes, you’ll soon be indulging in heavy food, but don’t skip breakfast to compensate for it. Make sure to enjoy a light and healthy brekkie, such as a yoghurt and muesli or a fruit smoothie. 2. P-a-r-t-y wisely You may have a stack of party invitations, but you don’t need to attend them all. Choose the most important events to attend and only go to these. 3. Succeed with salads When faced with a big Christmas buffet…

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It could even be argued that sporting rivalry with England helped to form an idea of Australian nationhood. after 1 beer REASONED ARGUMENTS WHY, YES “Of all our international sporting exchanges, England is the one that matters the most – if only for cricket and the Ashes alone. But in a range of other sports, Australia versus England always adds that bit of added frisson, and it doesn’t matter what sport it is. That alone tells you that this is the rivalry that matters.” YES. IS THIS EVEN A QUESTION? “There was a rivalry between us before there was an Australia. It could even be argued that sporting rivalry with England helped to form an idea of Australian nationhood. Whenever we lose to anyone else, it’s just a defeat…

DEFENDING THE fledgling women’s tennis tour in 1973, Billie Jean King sealed her legend as the firebrand who defeated Bobby Riggs in the charged "Battle of the Sexes", before a record crowd of more than 30,000 at the Houston Astrodome and a worldwide TV audience of 90 million. Like her contemporary Muhammad Ali, King was a polarising figure in her heyday, reviled and later revered for daring to fight for social change. She paid the price – notably a shot at the Grand Slam in 1972. She had won three of the majors but bypassed the Australian Open, exhausted after her 1971 season – Year One of the standalone women‘s tour, which she co-founded. King’s legacy as a feminist icon is being celebrated anew with the absorbing Battle Of The…

“I CAN’T REMEMBER IF THE SOUTH AFRICANS WERE CHIRPY OR NOT. I WAS IN MY OWN WORLD. IT’S SOMETHING I’VE SORT'VE ALWAYS BEEN ABLE TO DO. AND THAT DAY I GOT INTO IT PRETTY QUICKLY.” The Renshaw family landed in Brisbane late on a delayed Air New Zealand flight into the Queensland capital one stinking hot evening in January 2007. They were upping shop for good from Auckland, as they’d upped shop for good four years earlier from England. They found their bags and stamped their stuff, and rolled their lives out of the terminal into the balmy Queensland night, taking their first nascent steps into a new life. For ten-year-old Matthew, it was like another world. On the way down to the Gold Coast in Aunty Margy’s SUV, there…

You have traversed many lands, from one side of the empire to the other. Your trusty squire’s hands are swollen and sore from countless hours of coconut-clapping. You have survived many life-threatening challenges: from cute, killer bunny rabbits and a bunch of tall, ditsy knights who say “Ni”. Along the way you have even been forced to answer silly questions about the airspeed velocity of unladen swallows, before having to cross something called the Bridge Of Death, which spans a happy place called the Gorge of Eternal Peril. But you’ve made it. Finally. Your mate has made it as well. He drove. He just lives up the road; knows one of the event’s organisers, who fixed you guys up with some corporate area tickets which he’ll scan from his phone.…

“WE GET HIT IN THE LEGS A LOT, THE INNER THIGH AREA, BECAUSE WE HAVE TO ROTATE TO MAKE A SAVE AND IT OPENS UP THAT AREA.” RACHAEL LYNCH is a stalwart of the Hockeyroos, having made her international debut back in 2005. The goalkeeper was a 2016 Olympian, and came to notice in Rio when her uniform was stolen before a match ... and then her clothes during it. Lynch also has two Commonwealth Games gold medals, and has coached young, aspiring goalies across the country, hoping to inspire the next generation of kids to don the padding and have hard, plastic balls whacked at them. Beyond hockey, the 31-year-old works as a nurse in neuro rehab at Fiona Stanley Hospital in Perth, and serves as an ambassador for…