RWC 2023: all you need to know

Brendon McCullum’s impact on England and Test cricket as a whole in the past year can’t be overstated – but as the Ashes begins, Rishi Persad is determined to try. I normally take a considered view on the result of the Ashes, primarily for the purpose of a punt on the outcome of the series, but not this summer. This summer I simply want England to win. As a fan of the West Indies since birth, I have always been impartial enough when it came to assessing the relative merits of England and Australia and did so without sentiment. But this year there is something bigger at stake than making a few quid on the correct result.

Strength and conditioning coach Matt Little has worked with Andy Murray since 2007, through the thrilling highs and painful lows and an unlikely renaissance after hip surgery. Henry Beesley asks him how a sporting legend is made.

It’s May 2016 at St Jakob Park in Basel. The final whistle of the Europa League final is moments away. Not only have Jürgen Klopp’s Liverpool been outplayed by Unai Emery’s Sevilla, a side bursting with energy and power, but the travelling Kop have been comprehensively out-sung by their Spanish counterparts. It is Liverpool’s first European final since Athens in 2007 and the stadium is a sea of red scarves and banners, but for one corner. As the drizzle falls, that corner is the only part of the ground you hear. Again and again, chants of Sevilla, Sevilla, Sevilla echo off the tight terraces tumbling down on to the pitch. Spain’s oldest club – their identity writ large in the lyrics of their anthem – offer constant reminders of who they are, why they are here and what they have come for.