A year ago, Amanda Anisimova was doing her best to avoid thinking about Wimbledon after failing to qualify for the main draw. Now she has a final to prepare for.
The American stunned world number one Aryna Sabalenka – and herself – to reach Saturday’s showpiece, with a 6-4 4-6 6-4 win.
The 23-year-old will face Poland’s Iga Swiatek in her first Grand Slam final after fulfilling the potential she had shown as a teenager several years ago before taking a lengthy break to look after her mental health.
“To be honest, if you told me I would be in the final of Wimbledon I would not believe you. Especially not this soon,” Anisimova said.
“It’s been a year’s turnaround. To be in the final is just indescribable, honestly.”
After losing in the third round of qualifying while ranked 191st in the world, this time last year she was relaxing with her friends and family to take her mind off Wimbledon.
“Every time I’m out of a Grand Slam or a tournament, I take a few days off. I don’t turn my phone off, but I don’t really follow [what is going on],” she said.
“I like to just relax and spend as much time with whoever I’m with. That’s what I was doing [last year].”
Watched on Centre Court by her sister Maria and nephew Jaxson, who was celebrating his fourth birthday, and her best friend and fellow player Priscilla Hon – who had cancelled a training session to be there – Anisimova was surrounded by her loved ones for different reasons on Thursday.
Delivering the type of big-hitting performance that she had shown six years ago in a breakthrough year when she reached the French Open semi-finals, she put herself one win away from a first major title.
She is only the second player in the Open era to reach a women’s singles Grand Slam final after losing in qualifying at the previous year’s event. The only other woman is Bianca Andreescu, who won the US Open in 2019.
CAPE TOWN, South Africa — One of the most complex current issues in sports can be traced back to a track meet in Germany in 2009, when an unknown 18-year-old from South Africa blew away a field of the best female runners on the planet to win the world title. The teenager was hardly out of breath when she flexed her muscles at the end of it.
What quickly became clear is that sports faced an unprecedented dilemma with the arrival of Caster Semenya.
Now a two-time Olympic and three-time world champion in the 800 meters, the 34-year-old Semenya has been banned from competing in her favored event since 2019 by a set of rules that were crafted by track authorities because of her dominance.
They say her natural testosterone level is much higher than the typical female range and should be medically reduced for her to compete fairly against other women.
Semenya has refused to artificially alter her hormones and challenged the rules claiming discrimination at the Court of Arbitration for Sport court in Switzerland, then the Swiss Supreme Court and now the European Court of Human Rights.
South Africa’s Caster Semenya, center, answers reporters with lawyers Gregory Nott, left, and Shona Jolly KC after Semenya won a partial victory at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France, on Thursday.Antonin Utz / AP
A ruling Thursday by the highest chamber of the European court — Semenya’s last legal avenue after losing at the other two — found that she was denied a fair hearing at the Swiss Supreme Court.
It kept alive Semenya’s case and reignited a yearslong battle involving individual rights on one hand and the perception of fairness in sports on the other, with implications across the sporting world.
A complex issue
Semenya is not transgender and her case has sometimes been inaccurately conflated with that of transgender athletes. She was assigned female at birth, raised as a girl and has always identified as female.
After years of secrecy because of medical confidentiality, it was made public in 2018 that she has one of a number of conditions known as differences of sex development, or DSDs. They are sometimes known as intersex conditions. Semenya was born with the typical male XY chromosome pattern and female physical traits. Her condition leads to her having testosterone levels that are higher than the typical female range.
World Athletics, the track governing body, says that gives her an unfair, male-like advantage when racing against other women because of testosterone’s link to muscle mass and cardiovascular performance. It says Semenya and a relatively small number of other DSD athletes who emerged after her must suppress their testosterone to below a specific level to compete in women’s competitions.
The case has transcended sports and reached Europe’s top rights court largely because of its core dispute: Semenya says the sports rules restrict the rights she has always known as a woman in every other facet of life and mean she can’t practice her profession. World Athletics has asserted that Semenya is “biologically male.”
How the rules work
Track and field’s regulations depend on the conclusion that higher testosterone gives rise to an athletic advantage, though that has been challenged in just one of the many complicated details of Semenya’s case.
To follow the rules, DSD athletes must suppress their testosterone to below a threshold that World Athletics says will put them in the typical female range. Athletes do that by taking daily contraceptive pills or using hormone-blocking injections and it’s checked through regular blood tests.
South Africa’s Caster Semenya during a heat in the women’s 5000-meter run at the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Ore., in 2022.Ashley Landis / AP file
Track first introduced a version of its testosterone regulations in 2011 in response to Semenya and has made them stricter over the years. The current rules require athletes affected to reduce their testosterone for at least two years before competing and throughout competitions, effectively meaning elite DSD runners would be constantly on medication to stay eligible for the biggest events like the Olympics and world championships.
That has troubled medical experts and ethicists, who have questioned the “off-label” use of birth control pills for the purpose of sports eligibility.
Semenya is not alone
While Semenya is the only athlete currently challenging the regulations, three other women who have won Olympic medals — Francine Niyonsaba of Burundi, Margaret Wambui of Kenya and Christine Mboma of Namibia — have also been sidelined by the rules.
The issue came to a head at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, when Semenya, Niyonsaba and Wambui won the gold, silver and bronze medals in the 800 meters when the rules were temporarily suspended. Supporters of the ban cited that result as evidence they had an insurmountable advantage over other women.
World Athletics is now considering a total ban on DSD athletes like Semenya. Its president, Sebastian Coe, said in 2023 that up to 13 women in elite track and field fell under the rules without naming them.
What Thursday’s decision means
Track’s DSD rules became a blueprint for other sports like swimming, another high-profile Olympic code that has regulations. Soccer is considering testosterone rules in women’s competitions.
Sex eligibility is a burning issue for the International Olympic Committee and new president, Kirsty Coventry, who was elected in March. It was brought into urgent focus for the IOC after a sex eligibility scandal erupted at last year’s Paris Olympics over female boxers Imane Khelif of Algeria and Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan.
Most sports will watch the direction of Semenya’s case closely as it is sent back to the Swiss Supreme Court, and possibly to sport’s highest court, even though that could take years. The ultimate outcome — whether a victory for Semenya or for World Athletics — would set a definitive precedent for sports because there has never been a case like it.
Pakistan white-ball coach Mike Hesson has dismissed rumours suggesting he advised Babar Azam to take up wicketkeeping in order to regain his place in the national T20I team.
The 30-year-old Babar was left out of Pakistan’s squad for the upcoming T20I series against Bangladesh later this month.
Following reports that Hesson had recommended Babar keep wickets, several former players – including Rashid Latif, Basit Ali, Mohsin Khan, Moin Khan, and Sikander Bakht – voiced criticism.
“They are being very unfair with Babar, (Mohammad) Rizwan and Shaheen (Afridi) but I can assure you these three will be back soon,” Basit said.
However, Hesson clarified that no such conversation took place and reaffirmed that if Babar returns to the T20I side, it would be as an opener.
“No discussion took place with Babar where I suggested he also keep wickets. He has never kept wickets in his entire career and you suggest he keeps wickets. This is not the way to treat a former captain and senior,” Hesson told the reporters, PTI reported.
Hesson also denied reports claiming he told players that anyone not batting with a strike rate above 150 would be dropped from the team. He clarified that no such conversations have taken place. However, he emphasised that Pakistan’s batters need to improve certain aspects of their game to meet the demands of modern-day T20 cricket.
“I have also not told the players that if they want to keep their places in the team they have to bat at strike rates of over 150. We are working on some things in this direction,” Hesson added.
He further stated that he is currently working closely with the selectors to develop a young T20 side built around a specific approach suited to the format.
“We are looking at players who are ready to float in the batting order and perform multiple roles but that does not mean there will be no spot for specialist players,” Hesson added.
Pakistan’s T20I series against Bangladesh starts on July 20 with all matches scheduled to take place at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur.
As the countdown to the World Athletics Championships Tokyo 25 continues, we shine a spotlight on some of the podium sweeps that have lit up past editions of the global showpiece.
This five-part series launches with a look back at Ethiopia’s dominance in the women’s 5000m in Helsinki in 2005.
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The 2005 World Athletics Championships in Helsinki, Finland, holds particular significance in the history of sweeps. Not only were podium sweeps achieved in three events, but in two of those – the women’s 5000m and the men’s 200m – the top four spots were secured by athletes from the same nation: a feat never before achieved at the World Championships.
After leading an all-Ethiopian podium in the women’s 10,000m, Tirunesh Dibaba returned to head the first ever women’s World Championships 1-2-3-4 in the 5000m. At the age of 19, she became the first woman to complete the 5000m and 10,000m double.
As well as making history with its ‘foursweep’ and Dibaba double, the women’s 5000m featured one of the best rivalries in women’s international long-distance running. While notable Ethiopian women came before and after Dibaba and Meseret Defar, their legacies carry weight in the country today as thousands of young women began running after seeing their success on television or hearing about it on the radio.
After winning her first world 5000m title as a 17-year-old in Paris in 2003, Dibaba eyed the double in Helsinki. First up was the 10,000m final on 6 August, which she won ahead of her compatriots Berhane Adere and Ejegayehu Dibaba, Tirunesh’s older sister. Many, however, were more excited for her face off against Defar in the 5000m. Defar wanted to claim the world title in her Olympic gold medal event, and Dibaba wanted to become the first woman to prevail in both the 5000m – for which she had a wild card entry as the defending champion – and the 10,000m.
The early stages of the race were conservative, with China’s Sun Yingjie leading the charge. The field passed through 3000m in 8:52.62 and 4000m in 11:52.40. Conserving their energy, the four Ethiopian athletes in the race began to break away from the rest of the pack throughout the last kilometre. Defar took the lead with 400 metres to go, and Tirunesh unleashed a final kick over the last 150 metres to win in a championship record of 14:38.59. Defar finished second in 14:39.54, Ejegayehu Dibaba in third in 14:42.47 and Meselech Melkamu in fourth in 14:43.47.
This top four sweep did more than just cement Ethiopia’s women’s distance runners as a dominant force. It also paved the way for the Defar-Dibaba rivalry to ramp up even further in the following years. In 2006, the two met seven times. Tirunesh won four of them, but Defar led the overall count at that point and beat her rival for the Golden League victory. In Ethiopia, houses and neighbourhoods became divided as the country’s athletics fans watch the two duel it out on a frequent basis. Defar set the first of her two world 5000m records in 2006 and a few years later, Tirunesh lowered it to 14:11.15 – a mark that stood for 12 years.
The two would go on to win several more world and Olympic medals, and ultimately faced each other 32 times in their careers – Defar winning 19 times to Tirunesh’s 13.
While fierce rivals, they collectively – together with the other women who joined them on multiple major podiums – cemented Ethiopian women’s running as a deep force to be reckoned with on the global stage.
Growing up, seeing women’s football on TV was a rarity for Crnogorčević. As a result, role models were few and far between.
More recently, though, things have changed astronomically.
During her time as a player for FC Barcelona, the 34-year-old was part of two record-breaking games; the first in front of a crowd of 91,553 in March 2023, before bettering that the following month as 91,648 piled into the Camp Nou.
“After [those games], I went to a men’s Barcelona game, and you could just see young kids, young girls, young boys, walking around with a jersey [with the] name of a women’s player,” she said in an interview, according to Star News.
“I couldn’t imagine that even five years ago, that wasn’t the case.
“I think this is something very special; it’s so amazing, and for young people around the world, it’s huge that they can look up to a women’s player.”
Not only can they now look to women’s football for inspiration, but they can look to Crnogorčević in particular.
On a stage like the European Championships, held on her home soil, there is no time like the present to be exactly the kind of role model she wanted as a young girl.
After the adrenaline-filled experience of filming F1 The Movie, Brad Pitt recently realised another dream by getting behind the wheel of a fully-fledged Formula 1 car on home soil in the United States.
Between appearing on the red carpet for the film’s premiere and speaking to the world’s media on a promotional tour, Pitt headed to Austin’s Circuit of The Americas to meet up with McLaren racer Lando Norris.
There, Norris offered Pitt a few tips and tricks before the Hollywood star was let loose at the United States Grand Prix venue in the 2023-specification MCL60 – an experience that left him shaking with excitement.
The cameras were there to capture every twist and turn, including Pitt’s thoughts before and after his outing, insight from McLaren team members and, of course, the unforgettable track run in all its glory.
Hit go on the video player above to watch how the day unfolded.
Now playing for Rayadas Monterrey Femenil in Mexico, Seoposenwe continues to lead by example, even as she prepares to step aside. Her desire is to pass the baton to the next generation—young talents like Bonolo Mokoma and Ronnel Donnelly, the latter of whom she shared the pitch with on Monday (7 July), just as others did for her.
But before the former SC Braga forward passes the torch, there is one final goal: defending the WAFCON title in Morocco.
South Africa got their campaign off to a winning start against Ghana, a game in which Seoposenwe scored a superb goal to help Banyana Banyana to a hard-fought 2-0 win in Group C.
On Friday (11 July), a win over Tanzania could secure their place in the quarter-finals, bringing the fairytale ending well within reach.
Whether or not that dream is fulfilled, Jermaine Seoposenwe will walk away a legend — a woman who dared to chase ambitions once thought out of reach, and who fought not just for herself, but for an entire generation.
Now, as she prepares to bow out, it’s her teammates’ turn to fight — for her. One last time.
Ireland international Curtis Campher has become the first male player to take five wickets from five balls in a professional match.
The all-rounder, 26, did so for Munster Reds in their Inter-Provincial T20 Trophy win over the North-West Warriors in Dublin.
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The Warriors were chasing 189 but collapsed from 87-5 to 88 all out thanks to Campher’s sensational spell.
The Reds captain’s first wicket came when he bowled Jared Wilson with the penultimate delivery of the 12th over. Graham Hume was then trapped lbw to conclude the over.
Returning in the 14th, the South Africa-born pace bowler completed the hat-trick when his Ireland international team-mate Andy McBrine was caught at deep mid-wicket.
Robbie Millar was then caught behind before Josh Wilson was bowled for the final wicket.
Campher, who previously took four wickets from four balls against the Netherlands at the 2021 T20 World Cup, was playing his second match since returning from a a finger injury that caused him to miss Ireland’s ODI and T20 series against West Indies this year.
Zimbabwe Women all-rounder Kelis Ndhlovu previously took five wickets in five balls in a domestic under-19 T20 last year.
