1. “Everything I did in life, until now, was just for tennis. Nothing else mattered. That’s why it became too much, maybe. That’s why I suffered,” Simona Halep says intently on a midwinter afternoon in Bucharest. We sit in a corner of a restaurant where the clinking of cutlery provides a refined backdrop to the raw immediacy of a rare interview with the world No 1.”
Simona Halep gives an insightful interview to The Guardian’s Donald McRae.
2. No active player has thrown more touchdown passes than Drew Brees. He throws them when his teams are good—he led the NFL in touchdowns during New Orleans’s 2009 Super Bowl season—and he throws them when his teams are bad, like when he led the league in 2012 on a 7-9 Saints team. He has already broken the record for career passing yards and will almost certainly break Peyton Manning’s touchdown record next year. (He’s 19 behind Manning’s 539; Tom Brady, at 517 touchdowns, might also break Manning’s mark.) Brees has thrown touchdowns to 66 different players—17 more than Manning and five more than Brett Favre. He has 32 touchdown passes this season while leading New Orleans to the no. 1 seed in the NFC. The Saints host the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday in the divisional round, and are the favorite to win the Super Bowl. On his list of career touchdown targets, you’ll find stars like Marques Colston (72 TDs), Jimmy Graham (51 TDs), and current teammate Michael Thomas (23). There are also lesser-known players on that list, to whom Brees has thrown just a single touchdown pass. It’s in that group that Brees’s brilliance reveals itself.
The Ringer’s Kevin Clark introduces us to the Members of Drew Brees’s Very Exclusive Touchdown Club.
3. The volley is superb: low, hard and right in the backhand corner. You couldn’t have placed it any more awkwardly with your two hands. And so Andy Murray doubles back in retreat. Without so much as a glance, he lashes a backhand down the line, past his startled opponent, onto the line for a clean winner. “Oh, yes,” Andrew Castle purrs on the BBC commentary. Centre Court whoops and gasps. The year is 2017, the skies over Wimbledon are blue, and the top seed Andy Murray is about to go a set and a break up against Sam Querrey in the Wimbledon quarter-final. It’s also the beginning of the end.
The Independent’s Jonathan Liew pays tribute to the soon-to-be-retired Andy Murray.
4. Nobody realistically doubts that Manchester United’s game against Tottenham on Sunday represents a new level of challenge for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer but equally it would take a particularly cussed soul – or Nemanja Matic – not to acknowledge the change of mood he has already enacted.
Writing for The Guardian, Jonathan Wilson looks at the influence Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has had since becoming Manchester United manager.
5. When the Baltimore Ravens selected Lamar Jackson in the draft last spring, Ozzie Newsome was surprised by the response he received from former players and current players. They all wanted to reach out to Jackson.
Newsome recalls being at a function with Cam Newton, the quarterback for the Carolina Panthers.
“The first thing he did was say, ‘Here’s my number, give it to Lamar and tell Lamar to give me a call.’ ”
With millennials in general, and pro athletes in particular, portrayed as totally about self, this sort of reaching out is heartening, especially from a veteran black quarterback to a rookie.
The Undefeated’s William C Rhoden looks at ‘The Thriving Fraternity of Black Quarterbacks’.
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Chris Farrell is power of strength in the centre – let’s hope he plays as well as the MOTM performance from last year’s six nations (without the injury).
@Con Cussed: he wasn’t injured in that match only in training afterwards
Good to see Schmidt acknowledging that farrell was the right choice, nothing to do with henshaw. He’s dead right too, once ringrose was out go with the guy who’s been training in the position and hungry to get out there. I’m expecting a big game from farrell and I’ve every faith in him to deliver.
@Jim Demps: Same. It helps that he’s feckin huge as well.
@Jim Demps: Where does he acknowledge that Jim?
@Jim Demps: it is to do with Henshaw. Farrell would not be starting were it not for Henshaws injury
@Luke walkee: “ once Garry Ringrose was ruled out it was going to be about trying to keep some little continuity as best we can in a short space of time. You’ve got Chris farrell sitting in the wings massively motivated to do his best. So it’s a great opportunity to get him in and give him a run. “
@Jim Demps: That’s not what he acknowledged. Itching for a row today?
@Eddie Hekenui: It’s not even the right choice if you are using Jim’s criteria
@Eddie Hekenui: no row, genuinely think he made the right choice. Pick the guy who plays in the position. If it doesn’t work out then that’s on farrell.
@Jim Demps: That’s fair enough and I’d agree about picking Farrell ahead of Henshaw at 13 if both fit but Schmidt doesn’t acknowledge Farrell was the right choice, regardless of Henshaw. He says Henshaw might’ve played if it wasn’t for the knock
@Eddie Hekenui: my reading of his quote would be different but fair enough, don’t mind either way and I think the right decision was arrived at. The prospect of facing farrell is far more daunting for Scotland than Addison or henshaw I think.
@Jim Demps: Henshaw is a far better player than Farrell especially defensively
@Eddie Hekenui: surprised he didn’t actually say ‘carrying a bit of a niggle’, which is usually the code for being dropped.
Tom Farrell has put in two stellar seasons and this one he seems to of kicked on again,
he partners the only other fit first team center at provincial level (aki) and has clocked up huge minutes at 13.
injuries to 2 first line centers coupled with ; Chris Farrell (albeit a fantastic option) has played a handful of games since this time last year and a lot of these were not 80 min showings so you’d have to presume he is slightly under cooked.
With all these factors and his impact out west you would really have to question , how will he ever get a cap when the set of circumstances just listed still don’t allow for a look in.
I’m admittedly bias towards Tom Farrell as personally I think he is excellent but it must be hard argue against him having no chance to play his way in.
I am really worried about Henshaw`s injury problems he has not played three consecutive games since connacht won the pro 12.
@Michael Colleary: Reading between the lines it sounds as if Henshaw was dropped rather than unavailable since Schmidt said he could have played and he has form for citing the reason of a players exclusion as injury/fitness/minutes rather than a selection call.
He also suggested in the press conference he wasn’t planning to bring Rob Kearney back in this week but the cohesion was so poor last week he felt he had to, indicating disappointment with Henshaw.
@Rochelle: he literally says Henshaw would have played but he took another knock. You Munster fans are nuts, you believe Joe when it looks good on a Munster player, but he is taking BS when it comes to a Leinster player. If it was all about form C Farrell would have been 3rd choice
@Michael Colleary: That’s just not true. What a weird thing to make up.
@Rochelle: well said.