Mo outdraws Villa tie

ATHLETICS is being battered by bad news at every turn. So it will bring relief to the sport that the Great Edinburgh XCountry last Saturday, in which Mo Farah finished second, drew an audience of 1.3million on BBC1, while the Aston Villa v Wycombe Cup tie, on BT Sport at the same time, was watched by only 316,000.

Meanwhile, presenter Jonathan Edwards faces a double blow. First, UK Athletics’ plan to beat the drug cheats would erase his 21-year- old triple jump world record of 18.29 metres.

Second, the BBC’s Queen Bee Clare Balding is set to displace Edwards as host of the cycling events at the Rio Olympics because they take place in prime time, while the swimming finals — which elevated her reputation at London 2012 — do not. Edwards’s consolation is to present the triathlon.

THE delay in Chris Gayle’s T20 move to Somerset next season has nothing to do with the massively negative reaction to his sexist chat with Big Bash interviewer Mel McLaughlin. Both parties have yet to agree terms, with Gayle not wanting to commit to the entire 2016 NatWest Blast. THE long-running Rugby Writers’ Club awards dinner always used to attract current players in significant numbers. Alas, only a handful of today’s rugby professionals attended this week’s function.

The players’ lack of interest follows the rugby writers’ change of direction — they now prefer a sanitised question-and-answer session, conducted this time by BT Sport’s rugby commentator, Alastair Eykyn. He kindly told rugby’s great and good that your Sports Agenda columnist is the only person in the media who doesn’t know the difference between on and off the record.

The dinner used to be famous for the varying quality of its guest speakers, but Mark ‘Ronnie’ Regan’s famously inappropriate speech two years ago has proved to be the last.