From The Sidelines

Christians prepare for the celebration of Christmas during the season of Advent.  In an increasingly secular Australia, the faithless...

Before we know it the summer season of tennis will begin in Australia. Both Djokovic and Kyrgios, along with the World’s No.1 female...

Happy Birthday Mr. President!  Joe Biden is 82 today.  He is busy trying to carve out his lame duck legacy, even strolling away from the...

Get used to hearing much more about Grover Cleveland! Rarely mentioned amongst the pantheon of American Presidents, Cleveland served as...

Imagine a tennis match where two old combatants are preparing to recontest the final, having contested it four years before. Suddenly,...

So, the world keeps producing its jolts. The unrelenting reminders of change and mortality. Ethel Kennedy, Robert Kennedy’s widow, dies...

It probably is a shock to all other than the most ardent of tennis fans that the US Open starts next Sunday with its qualifying rounds....

Today, 110 years ago, World War One begun. Arguably the defining moment of modern history, the Germans thought they could reach and...

Well, well, well. The inevitable has occurred. Joe Biden has succumbed to the relentless logic of politics. His party do not believe he...

Does anyone go to work on a Friday anymore? In this post-Covid world the relative absence of foot and car traffic at the end of a...

Last weekend I was treated to time in Adelaide, the capital of South Australia.  An underrated city, often overlooked by being in the...

Tasmania is Australia’s smallest and only island State within the Federation. The nation’s smallest State, it is close in the size to...

In 1948 George Orwell wrote an ominous novel predicting the destinies of citizens in the post-War world. In the same year photo-finish...

A spoiler warning: the following comments are not designed to offend. Please read in the cause of commentary not controversy. Sometimes...

I suspect many would agree that the current world is one where the practice of old certitudes has never been less guaranteed. Be it the...

Reluctant as I am to use contemporary expressions that may not be understood by all, may I begin by offering the following ‘spoiler...

The Australian Open has six days to run and the openings for Australian success have closed in the Men’s and Women’s draws. Yesterday’s ...

Isn’t it remarkable that, notwithstanding all that has come before, the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve generates a collective...

For my sins, but with constant delight, I have taught Australian students for over 30 years about the structures and processes of its...

The Christian season of Advent is nearly upon us, beginning on 3rd December, and marks the promise of something new and beginning with...

It is the fear of every tennis player to lose a set six games to love. If a player loses a traditional best of three sets match 0-6 0-6,...

Tomorrow in Australia at 4.49 p.m. is the spring equinox in the southern hemisphere. After then, days south of the equator will have more...

“Speaking of Serena, America’s Coco Gauff, fresh from an indifferent summer won the Women’s title at Cincinnati. Often touted as...

The forthcoming first day of September in the southern hemisphere is heralded as the first day of spring, whilst for Americans it is the...

So, another Wimbledon is about to begin! How it can be two years since Roger Federer played his final match on Centre Court, let alone...

We are told there are very few certainties except the oft quipped duo of death and taxes. For what seems the living memory of most the...

Halley’s comet have many across our stars once every 76 years. Its next scheduled appearance will be in 2061. Down here on earth there...

After the self-serving outpourings of Harry and Meghan and Novak Djokovic’s demonstrative implosion after the Australian Open Men’s...

As a new year beckons, it is inevitable that individuals and societies consider what their destiny may be in the months ahead....

This week Canada scored its first goal in World Cup history in Qatar and won its first ever Davis Cup in tennis in Malaga. The World Cup...

Was it only eighteen months ago that the world was living in a state of Covid anxiety without a war in Ukraine, England’s Queen was...

In one of the final scenes of the movie, The Queen, her late majesty is seen encouraging Tony Blair to conduct their weekly audience...

Well, the last thing I should have thought was that the 2022 US Open might be another predictable chapter in the game’s history. Too many...

Can you have two epiphanies in a week when writing about politics and tennis? As we prepare for the beginning of the final Grand Slam of...

Wimbledon starts tonight. All eyes of tennis fans will turn to its famous Centre Court whose flawless grass surface, only played on in...

Few probably realise that the French Open has provided Central America with its first ever Grand Slam champion. Marcelo Arevalo from El...

When, in a fortnight’s time, the finals of the French Open are played the respective champions will be awarded their trophies because...

Some days you remember more than others. 21st August 1983 is one of those days. In peaceful, democratic Australia, the newly elected...

With less than two weeks until polling day in Australia, we can be more certain about events after the election than its outcome. We know...

The political terms left and right wing were coined when what became known as the Tennis Court oath was taken during the French...

The question is, would the character played by the much loved and recently departed Sidney Poitier in his 1963 movie be more welcome to...

It just keep’s happening! A new year and the overlap of politics, world affairs and Grand Slam tennis continues. One of my holiday reads...

It says something about the potent ubiquity of Covid-19 that it continues for most to be the only topic in town as we begin the third...

So, the tennis year is officially over, well apart from the Davis Cup which has become such a desiccated version of its one great self,...

It is just over a fortnight since the end of the US Open. Former English Prime Minister Harold Wilson famously quipped that “a week is a...

Sometimes, you just cannot believe the timeliness of events and poignancy of words. Tonight, (Australian time) the US Open commences. All...

Start spreading the news I'm leaving today I want to be a part of it New York, New York And If I can make it there I'll make it...

Even the most ardent Republican tennis fan living in the southern hemisphere must acknowledge the fortuitous nature of the Queen’s...

So, is some of the world is returning to normal? Qualifying rounds at Roland Garros start tomorrow, with the tournament proper starting...

Countries are never entirely at peace with themselves. There are always social, economic and political fault lines that are shifting and...