Five sports wishes for a happy 2023
A packed Sports Hub calendar, a Masters breakthrough for Rory McIlroy and a Covid-19 vaccine for Novak Djokovic are high on the wish list.
Lee U-Wen
THE sporting gods certainly outdid themselves over the past 12 months, blessing fans with countless memorable moments and talking points than we could have dared to expect. One thing’s for certain, the world of sports certainly has a tough act to follow if it is to come anywhere near to matching the drama and excitement of what we witnessed in 2022.
We may be seven days into the new year, but it’s definitely not too late to make some last-minute wishes for what you would like to see in your favourite sports. Here, in no particular order, are five of my wishes:
More world-class action at the Sports Hub
This is a wish I make at the start of every year. The Singapore Sports Hub in Kallang began 2023 in a new era, with Sport Singapore taking over the project last month and handing it over to a new entity called Kallang Alive Sport Management to manage.
I think I can speak for many fans in Singapore in hoping for more and better sports events at the Sports Hub this year. It looks like the entertainment line-up is pretty full for the coming months (the likes of Westlife, Blackpink and Harry Styles are all confirmed), but let’s have some more world-class sports action too.
There’s the ABL Invitational basketball tournament this weekend and the Singapore Smash table tennis event in March, but I’d sure like to see the popular International Champions Cup football tournament come back in July, or perhaps a top-tier tennis competition. There’s a huge appetite on these shores for live sports, especially after these events were scrapped for nearly two years due to the pandemic.
Get the jab, Novak
Earlier this week, it was announced that tennis star Novak Djokovic, perhaps the most famous unvaccinated athlete in the world today, will miss two big tournaments in the US in March – Indian Wells and the Miami Open – due to his refusal to get the Covid-19 jab.
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It’s extremely disappointing – both for Djokovic and tennis fans – that he won’t get to play a full season because of reasons other than injury.
The Indian Wells and Miami events are among the biggest outside of the four Grand Slams, and Djokovic is doing himself a disservice by forgoing these precious ranking points and making it difficult for him to reclaim the No 1 spot on the ATP Tour. It would be a dream match if Djokovic and the current top player, Carlos Alcaraz, meet in a Grand Slam final this year.
The Singapore Lions should roar again
If Singapore had managed at least a draw against Malaysia on Tuesday, the Lions would be playing in the semi-finals of the AFF Mitsubishi Electric Cup on Saturday night (Jan 7) at the National Stadium. Alas, it was not to be as a limp Singapore team crumbled to their Causeway rivals in Kuala Lumpur, and tumbled out of the tournament in the process.
Acting Football Association of Singapore president Bernard Tan noted after the crushing 4-1 defeat that a post-mortem needs to be done.
This is the fourth time in the last five editions of the regional tournament where Singapore did not make it out of the group stage. One can blame everything from the numerous injuries to key players, a fairly new coach in charge, or even the artificial turf at the Jalan Besar Stadium, but let’s hope the Lions can rediscover their form somehow and bounce back quickly.
Rise of the underdogs
Everyone loves a good underdog story, and we saw that unfold at last month’s Fifa World Cup in Qatar when the unfancied Morocco somehow went all the way to the semi-finals by beating Belgium, Spain and Portugal.
As things stand, we might crown new champions in the English Premier League and Italy’s Serie A, if current leaders Arsenal and Napoli can maintain their strong form until May.
The tennis Grand Slam season starts later this month with the Australian Open, and it’d be great to see more of the younger talents step up to the plate and give the current top-ranked male and female players – Alcaraz and Iga Swiatek – a run for their money.
The Green Jacket for McIlroy
He’s 33 years old and doesn’t have many more years at the top level, so one wonders if this will finally be the year that British golfer Rory McIlroy gets to put on the Green Jacket. The world No 1 player will hope the Masters Tournament at the Augusta National Golf Club in the US – the first of the men’s four major golf championships – will be where he goes the distance.
He’s definitely not short on confidence, having finished second last year as he shot a final-round 64 to push the eventual champion Scottie Scheffler all the way.
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