Murray’s more menacing than Tiger Tim

I seem to have spent the last weekend in June of every year of my life listening to people telling me: “I really do think he’s going to do it this year.” It can’t have been that long, but the aspirations and disappointments of and for Tim Henman have left their mark on me, as they have on us all. Ah, well, it was a wonderful ride, and who’s to say that the teasing, tantalising and ultimately frustrating nature of Tim’s quest didn’t add to its vividness, its meaning and importance?

But now it seems that Henman was only preparing the way for one greater. Andy Murray is less loveable than Tim, and all the more impressive for that. His second-round victory over Ernests Gulbis was a thing of menace and beauty.

Gulbis had criticised Murray for exaggerating or faking an injury. Like Roy Keane, another Celt similarly accused, Murray had his vengeance. Now he moves into his third-round match against Viktor Troicki, a Serb with a power game wonderfully suitable for being picked apart by Murray’s backhand slice. Murray was in frightening mood this week; now we will see if he can extend it.

Look away now and fear for the Lions

I don’t know what was more predictable in the Lions international against South Africa last weekend. Was it the necessarily half-baked nature of the the touring team’s loose agglomeration of talents or was it the Springboks’ cockiness? The demolition job on the Lions scrum was frightful to behold; the South Africans do love to show themselves as some kind of invincible machine.

But a touch of low humour was added to the occasion by the South Africa players’ assumption of an easy victory. Smirking with triumph, they took off most of their best players and were damn near swamped by a Lions comeback. So now we move into the second international today and it seems to me that the only hope for the Lions lies in the hubris of the South Africans.

The Lions have brought Adam Jones and Simon Shaw into the pack, but really I fear for them. The South Africans will be keen to demonstrate that the last 20 minutes of the previous match were an aberration, one that can be erased only by the most crushing victory in history. Looks like a behind-the-sofa job to me.

Super showjumping is money in the Bank

Hickstead is one of the great secrets of British sport, a wonderful venue that provides great sport in a great setting year after year. And this weekend, the showjumping is fizzed up with the Jumping Derby, which is one of greatest spectacles in sport. The Derby Bank provides one of the great tests of nerve, agility and balance. Both horse and rider must pass this test. Being timid at the top is no good: one step back and you are instantly penalised. But too much boldness — the kind that comes from losing your head — won’t do, either. If you lose control on that slope, you will miss the jump at the bottom. You must instead scrabble and slither down, rider keeping the horse under perfect control. If you are not both still in balance, that obstacle that awaits you is down.

It is a clear and vivid test of horsemanship. Errors are made more clear on this bank than in any other showjumping obstacle. What it requires above all is a kind of keyed-up calm, an athletic stillness. It is in these contradictions that the Bank can be negotiated. After that, the rest of the deeply imposing obstacles lie before you.