My Sporting Weekend normally addresses what is going on… not what’s not, but this weekend I’m kicking off with Aberdeen postponed.
Now Aberdeen is a city I adore.
It’s where I grew up through four years at university while I returned in my mid-20s.
To work as a sports writer and cover the local favourites, Aberdeen FC, the Dons.
Aberdeen’s Pittodrie Stadium backs on to the Aberdeen Links golf course and seagulls clack above you when you sit in the stands.
It is the first all-seater stadium in the UK and is a fulfilling experience.
Except when the Dons lose which is a lot more regularly when I covered them.
And they were the unchallenged second best team in the land, behind Rangers.
The Granite City
So just why a number of their players were in a bar after the match and contracted COVID-19 is beyond me.
Because the legends from Alex Ferguson’s teams of the Eighties which conquered Europe would have gone home and hidden.
In a dark room if they had been beaten by Rangers.
Today’s scheduled game with St Johnstone has been postponed.
Which I hope will give the players some time to think about how they have let their club down.
Neigh Dublin Horse Show this year
The summer highlight in the exclusive Dublin 4 area of the Irish capital is the Dublin Horse Show.
Out of rugby season (the only winter game in this part of town) it’s all about the Horse Show, sponsored by Stena.
Now to say that Stena put on a show for their friends is selling them short.
Because after being wined and dined and schmoozed you’ll be as floaty as their ferries.
While there’s nothing like getting up close and personal with those wonderful horses and seeing them leap over those huge fences and skyscraping wall.
This might seem like a refusal at a fence just now but surely we’ll get some movement for next year.
Snooker, a longer cue
And in a former life too I was a snooker writer.
I annually covered the Rothmans Grand Prix and the local Reading scene in the south of England.
In those days in the Eighties the snooker world was smaller, British and white Commonwealth countries.
Asia was beginning to embrace the game with James Thaiphoon Wattana the standard-bearer.
The game has exploded in the Far East since and it is surely only a matter of time until we have an Asian world champion.
Which will be a bit like the game coming home as it was India where it was born.
Golf, but no galleries
You’re the man: Vegas
The USPGA Championship is being played out in front of only the birdies at the TPC Harding Park, San Francisco.
San Fran is a city I had intended to visit for the first time this summer.
Having ticked off West Hollywood and LA last summer when I joined the galaxy of stars and Star Wars with Visit California.
And I reckon I have game too which I showed in Las Vegas.
No crowds means no crush although you only really appreciate the contours of a green when you get to the course.
But you are spared a fat polo-shirted and shorted balding guy shouting ‘You the Man’ from behind the tee.
I’ll just have to do it from the sofa instead.
