Whether the then Times Athletics Correspondent, Neil Allen, still believes it was “the outstanding British athletics performance of all time” is something I will have to ask him on the next occasion our paths cross.  But what can be safely said, 47-years to the day after the performance in question, is that David Hemery’s achievement in winning 400 metres hurdles gold at the Mexico City Games of 1968, in a world record of 48.12sec, is a diamond that will always adorn Olympic history.

It’s all about rugby at the moment, and the whole world is watching.

The world’s top squash players must feel they are beating their heads against a wall - which of course is precisely what they do with the ball.

There was something rather surreal about sitting in the sun in our idyllic excuse for a press tribune at last weekend’s beach volleyball World Tour Finals in Fort Lauderdale, checking our phones every five minutes to be reminded of the misery unfolding four thousand miles away as England crashed out of their own World Cup with a humiliating and resounding defeat to Australia.

“Now I think about it,” chortled one sympathetic American journalist afterwards. “You English really are rather useless at sport.”

Events have taken place this weekend to mark World Mental Health Day - an annual opportunity to focus on mental health education, awareness and advocacy.

Each year the day shines the spotlight on a particular aspect of mental ill health and the theme for this year is Dignity in Mental Health. It is very important that we continue to draw attention to this area - which historically hasn’t received much profile compared with other areas of health and wellbeing.

Football is supposed to be the beautiful game, but the side we have seen of the sport of late has been anything but.

Corruption, scandals and crisis are words that have become entwined with the everyday lexicon associated to football at a time where the global reputation of the game has been consistently dragged through the mud by the likes of FIFA President Sepp Blatter and UEFA head Michel Platini.

From my name, you might think me as Welsh as a laverbread breakfast. But I’m not, so I have been able to observe the recent Welsh sporting resurgence with cool, objective detachment.

Yea verily, we are at the epicentre of significant sporting activity. Even as we speak. ( Even though we are not actually speaking. But you get what I mean.)  

What a way it was to start the World Boxing Championships.

Not a single punch had been thrown in Qatar’s capital when International Boxing Association (AIBA) President C K Wu announced the news at a press conference here which had each and every one of the journalists present knocked for six; that being the impending arrival of eight-weight world champion, Manny Pacquiao.

As the AIBA World Boxing Championships begin in Doha this week one illustrious name is missing. Instead he will be making boxing history in Manchester.

For some strange reason, I didn’t receive much sympathy when I told friends I would be unable to see them this weekend because I had been sent on a last-minute trip to Florida for the beach volleyball World Tour Finals.

It may have been something to do with the chance to see some top level athletes compete in one of the last big tests ahead of next year’s Olympic Games. Or, perhaps, it was something to do with a sport which stirs excitement levels probably more than any other, not to mention the prospect of 30 degree-plus heat as temperatures plummet back in Britain…

We’ve seen enough over the last 17 days to suggest England’s premature exit from their home Rugby World Cup at the hands of arch-rivals Australia in brutal fashion at Twickenham Stadium won’t be a terminal blow to the overall momentum of the tournament.

Since the 1970s with the introduction of the first reliable drug test and full-scale testing of athletes at the Summer Olympics in Munich, identifying dopers and imposing sanctions has evolved from traditional urine and blood tests to include proactive investigative techniques.

The football world is agog over a CHF 2 million (£1.3 million/$2.1 million/€1.8 million) payment made by governing body FIFA to Michel Platini, the man who aspires to be its next President, in 2011 – for work completed in 2002.