Waterlogging!

We have the first jumps action of the week up at Sedgefield today but the stable does not have any runners.  There are three flat meetings at Haydock, Southwell and Lingfield and in Ireland they have their unique flat card on the beach at Laytown this evening.  I keep seeing the fixture advertised and I would love to go once just to say I have been!  The card gets underway at 4.30pm with three races over 6 furlongs and three over 7 furlongs and all races will be shown on Sky Sports Racing.  The first race is a claimer and all horses are eligible to be claimed for 5,000 Euros and the meeting is well supported but Ireland's top jockeys and trainers.

There was due to be racing at Salisbury today but that meeting was abandoned yesterday due to waterlogging.  It is hard to believe after such a dry summer we have now lost a meeting because it is too wet!  We have had a fair bit of rain at Pond house in the last week and while it is nice to see the grass turning from brown to green again it has not really touched the sides with getting into the ground and changing the going underfoot.  However, racecourses like Salisbury who have been racing all summer and have been watering to ensure nice safe ground are now affected by the rainfall which is very heavy at times.  I was watching Chepstow earlier this week and similar comments can be applied to their ground.  Salisbury lost this fixture twelve months ago would you believe and they are looking to reschedule what would have been their feature race of the day to their next meeting.  I think there still needs to be quite a lot more rain coming to help ensure safe ground at the jumps tracks for when the racing really starts to get going next month.

Last night I enjoyed watching the first Vitality Blast cricket quarter final match.  The Northamptonshire Steelbacks are the first team through to Finals Day after beating Surrey is a shortened over game caused by the weather delay.  It was a high scoring game for just a 14 over a side match and it was a close and entertaining match.  Today, England return to action for a One Day match against South Africa at Lords and they need to bounce back from a disappointing display the other day.

There is world Cup qualifying football matches this evening as the Premiership takes an International break.  Wales and Northern Ireland are in action, both away with Wales travelling to Kazakhstan at 3pm and Northern Ireland play in Luxemburg this evening.  

We now know the US Open semi-final match line ups after Jannik Sinner easily beat his fellow countryman in straight sets and there was a great game between Alex de Minaur and Felix Auger-Aliassi with the latter coming out on top over four close sets.  The semi-finals for both the men and the women will take place tomorrow.

What do you call a zombie that doesn't joke around?

Dead serious.

Have a great day!