1. IPL. The auction is an amazing thing with no logic. How can you pay over a million for Riley Meredith, two million for Jhye Richardson and then $400K for Steve Smith. Not sure what Ponting was doing there as the franchise coach. A little disrespectful to Smith to be honest. Not sure Ricky would have coped silently in his day. To then leave Alex Carey with no contract is staggering. Basically, you need to be an all rounder to make money - or have extreme pace.
THE AUSSIES PURCHASED IN THE IPL AUCTION:
Glenn Maxwell $2.52m (Royal Challengers Bangalore)
Jhye Richardson $2.48m (Punjab Kings)
Riley Meredith $1.42m (Punjab Kings)
Nathan Coulter-Nile $885,000 (Mumbai Indians)
Dan Christian $850,000 (Royal Challengers Bangalore)
Moises Henriques $743,000 (Punjab Kings)
Steve Smith $390,000 (Delhi Capitals)
Ben Cutting $132,750 (Kolkata Knight Riders)
2. Sheffield Shield. A terrible Shield loss by NSW to Victoria. Paper thin batting again and they had the Test bowling attack. We need new fast bowling stocks. No excuses either. The GOAT did well (10 wickets), but Test bowlers should dominate at this level. They have had a few weeks off. Surprised to see Starc bowling so soon actually. Great win by QLD. Apart from Marnus, not a lot of consistent batsmen. Burns, Khawaja got runs, but I would be looking closely at Jordan Silk.
3. Indigenous All Stars v Maori. Good to see footy back on the screen, Some players looked razor sharp already - David Fifita is an awesome player. James Fisher-Harris, Josh Kerr and Blake Ferguson excelled. Plenty of niggle and push and shove throughout the whole night! Andrew Fifita still runs across field too often. Some big defence. Not sure as a coach I'd like this type of trial. No golden point stumped them too. 10-10 was a fair result. An amped up trial really.
4. Cameron Smith. Please, how ridiculous. Cameron is now moving into that territory where people think less of one who is so talented and revered. Heaven help the club that may land him. It is starting to look like it is all about Cameron. A circus and late in the pre-season.
5. Naomi Osaka. A crushing semi final victory v Serena and Jennifer Brady was never beating her in the final. Four Grand Slams now edges her up the pole. She is one short of Hingis and Sharapova who both have five Grand Slam wins. Her limitation is the hard court surfaces and needs to play clay and grass as well.
6. Novak Djokovic. A fake injury? No winning a popularity contest. A crushing forehand... on the cusp of yet another title. Interestingly, not a word from Kygrios who may now be 18 Grand Slams behind Novak now. Novak should crush Medvedev eventually. He is right too...there are lots of talented blokes (Zerev, Thiem, et al), but they don't put the work in to be better. Right now with the 'big three' still in operation, you need to work harder than ever before in the history of tennis!
7. Waratahs. It looks like a long and cold winter ahead. Do the fans care or have they given up? No one wants to go searching for a Super Rugby game to watch. The product is on the nose. Interesting to see Andrew Mehrtens praising Coach Rob Penney as a hit worth investing in. Hopefully.
8. Bulldogs. Every year this joint finds controversy. Adam Elliott has some explaining to do. The drink does strange things to people as well all know. Is there a reason why sex addiction is only diagnosed when someone is caught?
9. EPL. It's all over. The chances of Man City being run down are near none. It is a rare day to see West Ham hunting for a top four finish. A great effort. Liverpool, Tottenham and Arsenal all need a miracle this year... and maybe a new manager is on the horizon for all - as hard as that is to believe for Klopp.
10. A-League. This competition slides on through again, providing the fill for broader sports streaming services. Central Coast sitting pretty and got severely dudded this week. Sadly, for football to takeover in Australia, they need to straighten out a lot of things. There is as much chance of it being a huge success nationally in Australia as Dustin Martin playing for the Swans!
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