🗞 Australia's Oldest Olympian

June 08, 2021

G'day sports fans,

Classic Quote: "Baseball statistics are like a girl in a bikini. They show a lot, but not everything." - Toby Harrah.

In todays edition of Sport Journal:

✍🏼 Trade rumours

🏉 Trbojevic even better now

🏃🏻‍♀️ Australia 's oldest Olympian

🇦🇺 AFL

Joel Selwood is not a big celebrator of milestones but even the Geelong captain admits he and his brothers breaking the combined family games record is special.

When the 33-year-old leads the Cats out against Port Adelaide on Thursday night, it be the 753rd AFL appearance by a member of the Selwood family.

The combined games tally for Joel, twin brothers Adam and Troy, as well as youngest sibling Scott, will pass the VFL/AFL mark set by the famous Daniher clan of Terry, Chris, Neale and Anthony. (RAS)

MOST VFL/AFL GAMES BY BROTHERS

Selwoods (752* combined games) - Joel (Geelong, 321*), Adam (West Coast, 187), Scott (West Coast and Geelong, 169), Troy (Brisbane, 75)

Danihers (752) - Terry (South Melbourne/Sydney and Essendon, 313), Anthony (Swans and Essendon, 233), Chris (Essendon, 124), Neale (Essendon, 82)

Maddens (710) - Simon (Essendon, 378), Justin (Essendon and Carlton, 332)

🙋🏼‍♂️ Matt Rowell is set to return from injury this week to face Fremantle, per (@7AFL

❌ Sydney Swans great Adam Goodes has knocked back an offer to be inducted into the AFL Hall of Fame.

Goodes' decision to turn down a hall of fame honour stems from the ugly ending to his 372-game playing career, which the AFL confirmed today in a statement.

✍🏼 Collingwood will join Essendon in the race for Coleman Medal leader Harry McKay if he remains unsigned.

✍🏼 West Coast will commence contract discussions with Jarrod Brander’s management in the coming weeks (Trade Whispers)

🏉 NRL

Zac Bailey and Todd Balym bring you the latest from Townsville after Maroons coach Paul Green and Blues coach Brad Fittler speak for the final time ahead of State of Origin I

🗣 Queensland legend Billy Slater has hosed down fears over the State of Origin opener being marred by the milking of penalties, suggesting players will be too afraid of "taking a dive" as so many eyeballs watch on. (nine)

❌ Powerhouse Storm front-rower Nelson Asofa-Solomona will miss Sunday's clash with the Warriors after tonight being found guilty at the NRL judiciary.

⭐️ James Tedesco claims Tom Trbojevic shapes as a more dangerous prospect for NSW in 2021 than when he scored a State of Origin hat-trick in 2019. (RAS)

⚽️ Football

👋🏼 Western United FC announced the Club and Head Coach Mark Rudan have mutually agreed to part ways.

“On behalf of Western United FC and our supporters, I’d like to thank Mark for his leadership and dedication to the Club over the last two seasons,” - Chairman, Jason Sourasis.

🏟 Melbourne City's game against the Jets, originally scheduled for May 29, will now be played at Netstrata Jubilee Stadium on Thursday, kicking off at 7:05pm (AEST), behind closed doors. (SBS)

🙋🏻‍♂️ Ange Postecoglou's expected move to Scottish powerhouse Celtic shapes as a game-changer for Australian coaches and players, according to Socceroos great John Aloisi.

💰 Chelsea have opened talks with Borussia Dortmund over a possible £170m move for Norway striker Erling Braut Haaland, 20, and England forward Tammy Abraham, 23, could be part of the deal. (Mail)

💰 Tottenham Hotspur want at least £150m in a cash-only deal for England striker Harry Kane, if the 27-year-old is to leave the club. (Sun)

🎾 French Open

⏭ Slovenian Tamara Zidansek reached her maiden Grand Slam semi-final with a hard-fought victory over Spain's Paula Badosa at the French Open.

World number 85 Zidansek, who had never previously been beyond the second round of a major, won 7-5 4-6 8-6.

Ten years after reaching her first Grand Slam quarter-final, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova made it through to the last four for the first time to set up a clash with Tamara Zidansek.

Now: Stefanos Tsitsipas v Daniil Medvedev in French Open men's quarter-finals

The winner will face Alexander Zverev in semi-finals after German beats Alejandro Davidovic Fokina 6-4 6-1 6-1

🌍 World Sport

⛳️ Premier Golf League: Revolutionary AU$400m series scheduled to begin in 2023

A Formula 1 style global competition is scheduled to begin in January 2023 and would include 18 tournaments targeting the top 48 male players in the world.

A dozen of those events would be staged in the United States with the others "chasing the sun" around the world.

Each competition would be worth US$20m with $4m going to the winner and last place picking up $150,000.

There would be a team element with team principals choosing which scores from individuals from the four-man line ups would count.

There are also plans to involve the leading women's tours and to plough 50% of the spoils back into "the golf community".

🏃🏻‍♀️ Tokyo 2020: Marathon runner Sinead Diver will become Australia's oldest-ever Olympian at age 44

For proof that Olympic dreams can be realised later in life, one need only look at the Australian marathon team for this summer's Tokyo Games.

The squad's three female members boast a combined age of 118 with the eldest, Sinead Diver, set to make her Olympic debut at 44.

Diver's achievement is certainly remarkable.

The Irish-born runner is poised to become Australia's oldest ever Olympic competitor.

🥇 29 athletes to represent refugee team at Tokyo Olympics. The 29 — a rise from 10 in the inaugural refugee team at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics — are originally from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Congo, Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria and Venezuela.

🚒 Munster (Ireland) quartet CJ Stander, Damian de Allende, RG Snyman and Mike Haley have been injured after one of the players "threw petrol on a fire".

A Munster statement said De Allende and Snyman had suffered "substantial" burns to their legs, hands and face in a "fire pit accident" at the weekend.

"We were just sitting around the fire and one of the boys threw a bit of petrol over the fire and then it caught his hand and he just tried to put it down on the floor and then the whole thing caught alight and exploded," - De Allende told SuperSport.

👋🏼 Peter Siddle has ended his latest Essex spell for personal reasons. The seamer will return to Australia having claimed 20 wickets in five LV=Insurance County Championship fixtures

🐴 Racing

💰 Lindsay Park is poised to part ways with one-time Melbourne Cup favourite Constantinople with the imported stayer set to be sold this week.

The Tom Dabernig and Ben Hayes-trained gelding is on the market at the latest Inglis Digital online sale with bidding reaching $25,000 at lunch time on Tuesday.

🏇🏻 Vega One will have a chance at Stradbroke Handicap redemption after drawing favourably at Tuesday night’s barrier draw.

After starting from the car park in 2020, Vega One is set to jump from barrier three on Saturday with third emergency Blazejowski drawing inside him.

Key rival Wild Planet has drawn off the track in 15 before any emergencies are scratched. (racenet)

Peter V’landys was instrumental leading both racing and rugby league through the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic and that work has unsurprisingly attracted plenty of attention.

🗞 Back on Friday!

Stat of the Day: None of the eight teams still alive in the NBA playoffs has won a championship since the postseason expanded to 16 teams in 1984, and just three of them (Sixers, Bucks, Hawks) have ever won the title.

📺 Live sport 👇🏼

TODAY

⚽️ 07:00 - WC Qualifier - Ecuador v Peru (BeIN Sports)

⚽️ 08:30 - WC Qualifier - Venezuela v Uruguay (BeIN Sports 2)

⚽️ 09:00 - WC Qualifier - Colombia v Argentina (BeIN Sports 1)

⚾️ 09:05 - MLB - Pittsburgh Pirates v Los Angeles Dodgers (Sky Sports 3)

🏀 09:30 - NBA Conference Semifinals - Philadelphia 76ers v Atlanta Hawks (ESPN 1)

⚽️ 10:30 - WC Qualifier - Paraguay v Brazil (BeIN Sports 2)

🏒 11:00 - NHL Conference Semifinals - Colorado Avalanche v Vegas Golden Knights (ESPN 2)

⚽️ 11:30 - WC Qualifier - Chile v Bolivia (BeIN Sports 1)

⚾️ 11:40 - MLB - Oakland Athletics v Arizona Diamondbacks (Sky Sports 3)

🏀 12:00 - NBA Conference Semifinals - Utah Jazz v Los Angeles Clippers (ESPN 1)

🎾 20:00 - French Open Women's Quarter-Final, Day 11 (GEM, Nine or Stan Sport

🏉 20:10 - State of Origin - Queensland v New South Wales (Nine)

🎱 21:00 - World Pool Championship (Fox Sports More)

🎾 22:00 - French Open Women's Quarter-Final (GEM, Nine or Stan Sport)

🎾 00:00 - French Open Men's Quarter-Final (GEM, Nine or Stan Sport)

THURSDAY

⚾️ 09:05 - MLB - Baltimore Orioles v New York Mets (Sky Sports 3)

⛹🏻‍♀️ 10:00 - WNBA - Chicago Sky v Indiana Fever (SBS on Demand or SBS Viceland)

🏀 11:30 - NBA Conference Semifinals - Phoenix Suns v Denver Nuggets (ESPN 1)

⚾️ 11:38 - MLB - Los Angeles Angels v Kansas City Royals (ESPN 2 or Sky Sports 3)

⚽️ 19:05 - A-League - Melbourne City v Newcastle Jets (Fox Sports)

🇦🇺 19:40 - AFL - Port Adelaide Power v Geelong Cats (Fox Footy or 7mate)

🏏 20:00 - Test Match - England v New Zealand (Fox Cricket)

🎾 21:00 - WTA Nottingham Open, Round 2 (BeIN Sports 1)

⛳️ 21:00 - European Tour, Scandinavian Mixed (Fox Sports)

🎾 23:00 - French Open Women's Semi-Final (Nine or Stan Sport)