A preview of the sporting summer...

With a golfing major already in the bag, this weekend’s Lions opener and Champions Trophy final should accelerate another glorious sporting summer.

The ‘Golden Generation’ may be a title more associated with football, but in Rose, Poulter, Donald and Westwood, English Golf has had an array of talent blunted by a similar shortage of top-level silverware. Rose finally held his nerve on the toughest of courses and – with the world’s best floundering - the stage is tantalisingly set for another English win at the Open.

Cricket’s Champions Trophy has also been distinctive due to its unpredictability, with eight evenly-matched sides taking on each other, plus the weather, in a format blending 5-Day patience with T20 ingenuity. That said, England and India have been the standout sides and a final showdown pitting Jimmy and co. versus Dhawan and co. could prove magnificent.

Squad players Tredwell, Bopara and Buttler have really come to the party, but getting big names – like Anderson and Trott – playing well has been instrumental. Some still lambast Trott for being too slow and selfish, but as he is pretty much the world’s most reliable batsman in both forms of the game, they are plain wrong. He is the sort of doughty, impenetrable battleaxe which all great teams need and he will be just as pivotal as flair players Root and (fit-again) KP if the Ashes are to be won.

Team spirit is so important in sport, and while England lost it last summer they appear to have rediscovered it in some style and it is essential that the Lions display similar togetherness tomorrow in Brisbane.

Like the cricketers the Lions have a mixture of styles: Welsh power, Irish experience and, dare I say it, English flair. The youngsters: North and Vunipola, alongside the grizzled veterans: O’Connell and O’Driscoll. Injuries have hit them hard but they should still overcome Australia, although they will have to be at their absolute best to do so. We must abandon the partisan bias which still clouds message-boards, and get behind every single one of them, as the series could come down to one missed kick or one tackle.

With the Lions and back-to-back Ashes Series, Britain expects a double triumph over its fiercest rivals. As Chris Froome should have too much for Aussie hope Cadel Evans, in the Tour de France we will bag a third (although I suppose the fact that Froome’s principal teammate is Aussie Ritchie Porte does deserve a mention)

At Wimbledon such assumptions are impossible. Books could be written, marriages could be broken and riots could be started over the respective merits of the male contenders. While Djokovic has the best draw, Nadal the best form, and Federer the SW19 pedigree, Murray is looking good and, naively, foolishly and stupidly - I think that it could be his year. Maybe...

Such hopes are for two week’s time however and we must dream about this weekend first. In Miami Basketball star cum NBA winner Lebron James, and Racehorse owner cum Ascot winner the Queen, yesterday threw-up two champions who have probably never previously been compared.

And our Rugby and Cricket teams will require a similarly unlikely fusion of style, culture and strategy if they are to be successful. They will also need team spirit, character, inspiration and humility and, as this gem of a good luck message from one to the other suggests, they are unlikely to be short of that.…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2BSA4I6ePs&feature=youtu.be

Sporting summery of the week:

IN a comeback to rival those of Napoleon, Muhammad Ali and ‘Dirty Den’, Jose Mourinho has returned to the Bridge and, if nothing else, the impending clash of quotes with Ian Holloway is enough to wet the appetite.

Whatever you think about the ‘Special One’ his record speaks for itself, and with City gunning for revenge, United entering a new era, Arsenal with cash to spend, and Liverpool and Spurs keeping hold of their star strikers (OK...the last three won’t happen) next season is already shaping up to be a classic.

For now though we will have to satisfy ourselves with international action, yet with cricket, rugby and football all on the agenda, we shouldn't really complain.

In Football we have yet to shake off the same old problem. While the modern player could dribble into a police station carrying cocaine and come out with possession, England would lose out holding a bag of flour. That said credit where credit is due for a battling performance in Rio, with two good goals and an improvement in the heat which bodes well for the World Cup – if of course, they manage to get that far...

The heat at the Maracana was nothing compared with that in Hong Kong but that was of little concern as the Lions enjoyed a rampant victory. Many British fans find it hard to abandon their partisan bias, but us Englishmen can only revel in having the likes of Phillips, Tipuric and Faletau on our side. In an era where territory has strangled running rugby, and pint glasses have been swapped for protein shakes, you do have to wonder for how long the Barbarians can survive...

In their current form you wouldn’t give England’s one-day cricket team much chance either, as they were bamboozled for the second time running by the resurgent Kiwis. It’s not nice to pick on individuals (cough Dernbach cough) but 50-over bowling is about rhythm and pressure rather than Hollywood balls, while batting is about steady accumulation rather than four dot balls followed by a mad, come-what-may swipe. (cough whole team except Trott).

Over in Paris the prospect of a Nadal-Djokovic showdown is edging ever closer, and is becoming ever more impossible to call. What an effort by Tommy Robredo in winning three matches on the trot from two sets down, and if he continues his pattern against the metronome that is David Ferrer that really will be a story.

In Olympics sports Mo Farah’s winning run finally came to an end, but to place second against top opposition and with a virus is still not bad, and compared to fellow London winners Wiggins and Murray, he can’t be too disappointed. London champion of the week however must be Ben Ainslie, who after carrying the coffin at former teammate Andrew Simpson’s funeral, broke the record for sailing round the Isle of Wight. A true champion.

Post Games year is the time when new names emerge in Olympic sports, and with a ‘Brownlee-esque' domination in Madrid, Triathlete Non Stanford did exactly that. After Cyclist Becky James, she is another new Welsh star in a year that has already been a great one for the valleys. And as the Lions tour warms up this week, we’ll be hoping for more of the same from all their other stars down under...