A Big Weekend for British Sport
The football season may be over, but it is still a big summer of sport for Britain, no more so than over the last few days. The Lions British rugby team played their first match on Saturday against Australia, before the England cricket team played India in the final of the ODI Champions Trophy, which was followed up with the start of Wimbledon yesterday.
Lions Hang on Against Australia
Once every four years, the best rugby union players from England, Ireland Scotland and Wales are brought together to represent the Lions. They then tour a southern hemisphere country, playing against the national team in a series of games.
This time around, they are touring Australia, and after endless warm-up matches, they finally played the first ‘Test' (against Australia's national team) on Saturday. In a topsy-turvy match that turned into a mini-classic, there were stunning tries, ridiculous misses and plenty of big hits. Watch the highlights below:
The Lions came out 23-21 winners after Australia missed two crucial penalties in the last few minutes. In a series of just three matches, winning the first is clearly a massive boost and the Lions' confidence will be high going in to the second test on Saturday morning (11.05am UK time).
England Suffer Against India & Rain in Cricket Final
On Sunday, England played against India in the final of the ODI Champions Trophy at Edgbaston cricket ground in Birmingham. The tournament is one of the biggest international one day competitions and was hosted in England and Wales.
Inevitably, the British ‘summer' has not helped in a sport where rain stops play, and for a long time it looked like the final may never happen thanks to the wet. However, after a long 7 hours of waiting, the rain finally let up enough for the players to come out and make a game of it.
The match was meant to be 50 overs, but was reduced to just 20 (the minimum allowed) thanks to the weather. Despite the delays, the players put on a cracking match that moved one way then the other. England bowled well and India finished on a fairly modest 129 after 20 overs. However, after losing four quick wickets at a vital time in their chase, England ended on just 124 - 5 runs short. Watch the highlights here.
It means that England are still searching for their first international one-day title, but the players will not be too disheartened for the run-up to the all-important Ashes series starting in a just a few weeks.
Wimbledon 2013: Shocks & British Casualties
Monday marked the start of the annual fortnight when tennis takes over London. Wimbledon 2013 started with a bang, with one of the biggest upsets the competition has ever seen.
Two-time winner and current French Open champion Rafael Nadal was dumped out of the tournament in straight sets by world number 135 Steve Darcis. It was the first time Nadal had ever been knocked out of a Grand Slam in the first round, and is a repeat of his early exit at last year's Wimbledon. Watch highlights of the historic match here.
Thankfully, British hopeful and number 2 seed Andy Murray found his first-round match slightly easier going, beating Benjamin Becker 6-4 6-3 6-2. Unfortunately that was the one positive for home players on Day 1, with SIX other Brits all getting knocked out at the first hurdle.
James Ward, Kyle Edmund, Elena Baltacha, Johanna Konta, Anne Keothavong and Sam Murray all suffered defeats, leaving just three other Briton's left in the main singles draws. Laura Robson, Heather Watson and Tara Moore all play today and will be hoping to make sure that Andy Murray is not the only British player left in the second-round draw.
We will be keeping you up-tp-date with all the latest from Wimbledon right here on the blog, hopefully cheering Murray all the way to the final.