1. The Everest - Ka Ying Rising v Tempted. An incredible victory by Tempted ($7M) to knock over the much more fancied (21 straight wins) of the champion Ka Ying Rising ($2.9M). A really tough barrier (11) but a poorer ride than usual from Zac Purton. Another ten metres and it wins. Another ten metres and it is not The Everest! Interesting that third place gets $2M as well. Forth place? ($1.5M) and fifth place $1.2M. This is more than most races on the calendar, even if you come fifth.
2. Wallabies - Rugby Australia. The work this weekend of Rugby Australia is some of the dumbest for a while. To schedule your premiere game (home Bledisloe Cup) at the exact time of the largest horse racing event in Sydney all year - The Everest - is terrible. Sure, 73,000 at the ground, but the wrong demographic and TV ratings would have been low. Out of touch and arrogant. Why could it not have been played at night?
Then to play how they played reminds us of how far rugby has slipped. Les Kiss started well against the third rate teams and the Springboks third team, but to go down by thirty or forty at half time is one of the worst efforts by a Wallabies team on record. A drubbing. The kiss of death.
All the viewers of the future were at the Everest in Randwick!
3. Rugby League World Cup. Australia had a strong, but in some ways lucky win v New Zealand, but Tom T and Latrell were a bit off the pace. It must be hard recharging for a post season tournament. Reece Walsh took every opportunity and played really strongly.
The Pacific Islands provide most of the NRL players and they are largely indestructible. Very few knee and joint injuries. An incredible growth in talent over the years. Once upon a time there were no Pacific islanders playing the sport outside of Olson Filipaina, who played for Balmain, Roosters and North Sydney.
Not sure how NRL coaches feel about the rep season... but a great honour for the players to represent their country. It involves so many players these days.
4. MLB. The American League final (best of seven) between Cleveland v Guardians is locked up at 2-2. The records keep tumbling...Travis Bazanna hit the first post season home run by an Australian ever in the loss to the Tampa Bay Rays today. An incredible improving talent.
The winner of the best of seven games plays the Milwaukee Brewers for the World Series. The Brewers amazingly crushed the well fancied LA Dodgers 4-0 in their series to clinch the National League.
5. Australian Cricket. Playing the pace of Rabada will be a new Test for our batsmen. The seaming St George, Port Elizabeth deck has seen Boland take Nathan Lyon's place. The Aussies won the toss and elected to bowl. Nic Maddison will be breathing easier. Rain is about and the deck will be a batting test! Travis Head is overdue. A terrific test by Renshaw (270 runs, 2 wickets, a catch). A career highlight!
6. EPL Man City. They have won seven games from seven...undefeated, even though the salary cheating allegations escalate and punishment calls get stronger. Erling Haaling scored another two goals v Ipswich so leads the golden boot stakes with six goals.
Lucas Herrington was benched at half time for Hull in their 0-1 loss to Fulham. A bad loss!
7. Nick Blakey. And so it is that Blakey was not in the original Swans issue and got called off the bus at the last moment to become one of the Pullman Five. Sounds like some dobbing occurred which alienated him from others, hence the move. He felt thrown under the bus and has gone to North Melbourne. They will need him.
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