I have mentioned how big cricket is here. Huge. Not just big. Monstrous.
A big match will stop traffic. If I see 50 guys from the subcontinent massed outside an electronics store, jostling as they try to peer in the window, the odds are about 100-to-1 they are trying to see a cricket match. (World Cup […]

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Many of us in North America, in particular, have no expertise in various major sports competitions in other parts of the world. But we have a vague idea of them. The Copa Libertadores is big in South America. The UEFA Champions League is huge in Europe. So is the Euro Cup. The specifics may be […]

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Just did something I hadn’t had the courage to try since May. Maybe even April.
I took a half-hour walk. Outside. In Abu Dhabi. On purpose.
What passes for fall is arriving … or I’m about to jinx us all and we will be back into 110-plus days by Monday.

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While researching the concept of “great sports venues” in Asia, it was deeply impressed upon me how enormous was the scope of the topic. Daunting, even.
How to know about that grand old place in what is now Kazakhstan? Or the charming race track in Mongolia? Or whatever it is that Nepal, Uzbekistan, Georgia or Armenia […]

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To celebrate the addition of “cricket” to my categories, I have decided to give you some cricket “game story play-by-play” from this morning’s editions of The National.
Remember, hundreds of millions of people understand this. Completely. And for those of you who don’t get it … go ahead and read. If just for the comedy of […]

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We at The National are selecting — and writing about — the planet’s best places to see a sports event.
Stadiums, arenas, race tracks (horse and motors), even a “Gulf.”
This was the idea of Robert Mashburn, the sports editor here, who had a brainstorm a few months back to rank the top 10 venues in the […]

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