SATURDAY FOOTBALL Hanover 96 v Bochum.
Setanta Sports, 6.30-8.30am. Bundesliga.
RUGBY Wales v Canada.
Fox Sports 2, 6.30-8.30am. Test match.
BASKETBALL Bulleen v Sydney University.
ABC1, 2.30-4pm. WNBL.
BASKETBALL Detroit Pistons v Los Angeles Lakers.
ESPN, 2.30-5pm. NBA.
GOLF Third round.
Ten HD, 3.30-8.30pm. Singapore Open.
FOOTBALLABC1, 4-6pm. W-League. Sydney v Newcastle.
FOOTBALL Central Coast v Adelaide.
Fox Sports 1, 7.30-9.30pm. A-League.
MOTOR SPORT Semi-finals. From Shanghai.
Fox Sports 2, 7.30-9.30pm. Super X Series.
TENNIS
Fox Sports 3, 8pm-1am. ATP Masters Cup.
LEAGUE First semi-final. England v New Zealand.
Channel Nine, 8.30-10.45pm. World Cup.
FOOTBALL Bolton v Liverpool. Arsenal v Aston Villa, Blackburn v Sunderland, Fulham v Tottenham, Manchester United v Stoke or West Ham v Portsmouth (viewer's choice) from 2. West Bromwich Albion v Chelsea from 4.30. Setanta Sports, 2-4am. Scottish Premier League. Rangers v St Mirren.
Fox Sports 1, 11.30pm-6.30am. English Premier League.
RUGBY England v Australia. Fox Sports 2, 1-3am. Test match. France v Pacific Islands. Fox Sports 3, 1.30-6.30am. Test matches. Scotland v South Africa. Ireland v New Zealand from 4. So Al Baxter has responded to the barrage of ridicule he has been greeted with in England by saying that it's "actually really nice" to arrive in a country where scrums are "actually talked about". That's an excellent point - you don't hear enough conversation about scrums these days. Twenty, 30 years ago you could amble over to the pub in your silly pork-pie hat and be guaranteed at least a good two hours of discussion about different techniques of packing down, but today - nothing. Not even the slightest suggestion of a joke about binding techniques will be tolerated. For instance, we tried starting a conversation about scrums the other day, and it came to nothing. "Seen any good scrums lately?" we inquired while drinking down at the pub with one of our mates. There was silence. Sure, this was mainly because we were sitting in an empty room and the "mate" happened to be a paper cup that we call "Murray", but is that really the point? We don't think that's the point. Until this country can develop a decent vocabulary for talking about scrums - for articulating its hopes and fears and frustrations and aspirations for scrums - our rugby team will remain at the mercy of the Andrew Sheridans of the world, forever destined to be sat on our arses like a bunch of wheezing, bring-us-water-before-we-die fatties whenever there's the minor matter of a World Cup quarter-final to be negotiated. Here are some tentative first suggestions for ice-breakers that might help us build towards that vocabulary. "I saw a great scrum the other day - the front row really crouched and held and stuff. Then they paused, touched and engaged, and a tough but fair competition for possession of the ball ensued. It was actually pretty cool." "How long have you been passionate about scrummaging for?" "Do you want to scrum with me?" "Hey - cool scrum!" And finally: "Has anyone ever told you you're a really hot scrummager?" Further suggestions can be sent to: HRH the Prince of Wales, Clarence House, London, SW1A 1BA, UK.
Channel Ten, 1-3.30am. Test match.
AND ON RADIO … Racing.
2KY, noon-midnight. SUNDAY FOOTBALL
ESPN, 6-8am. Spanish Primera Liga.
TRIATHLONFinal round.
Channel Seven, noon-2pm. Noosa Triathlon.
GOLF
Ten HD, 2-7pm. Singapore Open.
CRICKET South Australia v Western Australia. From Kevin Pietersen's switch hit to Gray-Nicholls's recent unveiling of the double-sided bat, the world of cricket is suddenly awash with exciting new playing possibilities. And it's the next generation that is leading the charge. Over the past week, On The Box has had the privilege of googling the words "cricket" and "new stuff that's going on, like, what young players are doing and stuff", which has given us unique, unfettered access to the transcript of an ABC story about Hansie Cronje from 2000 and a few bad music videos on YouTube. But that obscures the larger point - with the advent of Twenty20, the game is changing - and fast. Already Gray-Nicholls is reportedly working on a full-body willow suit, which will allow players to "middle it" with a simple thrust of the pelvis, even as they are being hit in the soft ones by a 150kmh beamer. MRF, meanwhile, have introduced a bat that includes a touch phone, MP3 player, cheese plate (quince paste optional) and fully operational shark net. In many respects, we have moved beyond the bat. As Jean Baudrillard probably didn't once say, we're all post-bat now. In many of the more advanced circles, there's even talk of moving beyond limbs - arms, legs, and so on - as the major means of scoring runs. Some visionary young grade-level batsmen have already pioneered the use of a football-style header, counteracting the hostility and pace of short-pitched bowling via the judicious use of their heads to deflect, cut and sweep the ball towards the boundary, even as they themselves succumb to the effects of severe concussion and brain damage. What the batsmen lose in consciousness, the spectators gain in entertainment: it's a win-win situation. In Queensland, a trend has emerged among private school under-9 teams to not use a bat at all: instead, batsmen stride to the centre with nothing but gloves and a single pad on, deflecting deliveries for quick singles and crafting pulls with nothing but their bare hands. Some of the forms of batting under observation in the Tasmanian high school competitions are closer in spirit to contemporary dance than "batting" in the traditional sense, with pirouettes, kick-ball-changes, star jumps, grapevines and jazz hands all being deployed to at times quite devastating effect. One school has even followed the lead of the Melbourne Storm by bringing in outside expertise to assist with technique: however, whereas the Storm brought in a wrestling coach, this school has imported a Bangkok traffic cop to help choreograph on-field dance moves. We have seen the future of cricket in this country, and it is this: a man in an all-willow body suit, prancing around in the outfield like a ginned-up moron while he gets battered in the head to the beat of some imagined Thai traffic code. Bring on New Zealand. This country is ready for cricketing greatness once more.
Fox Sports 2, 2-10pm. Ford Ranger Cup.
TENNIS Final.
Fox Sports 3, 7-10pm. ATP Masters Cup.
LEAGUE Second semi-final. Australia v Fiji.
Channel Nine, 8.30-10.45pm. World Cup.
FOOTBALL Ajax v PSV.
Setanta Sports, 10.30pm-12.30am. Dutch Eredivisie.
FOOTBALL Everton v Middlesbrough. Hull v Manchester City from 3. ESPN, 1-3am. Italian Serie A. Milan v Chievo Verona. Setanta Sports, 1-3am. Scottish Premier League. Hamilton v Celtic. Wonderful news: Diego Maradona could be on the verge of quitting as coach of the Argentine national team just two weeks after accepting the job. The sticking point, apparently, is the choice of Maradona's assistant; the world's poster child for Cuban socialism and stomach stapling is pressing for his former national teammate Oscar Ruggeri to be given the job, but this is vehemently opposed by Argentina Football Association president Julio Grondonna. "I don't like his face," Grondonna reportedly said of Ruggeri earlier this week. "It's a personal thing." While it's true that only a certain type of face is qualified to be the assistant coach of the Argentine national football team, it's important to recall at this point that Tottenham Hotspur are experiencing an extremely encouraging revival under the tutelage of a man who has made his name as the big, ugly, fat but affable working-class bloke in a string of critically acclaimed Mike Leigh films about the depressed industrial north of England. But even though Timothy Spall might not get all that much credit for his looks, he's doing a mighty fine job of managing Tottenham. There's a lesson in this for all of us, we feel: Grondonna should open his heart to a guy with a bad head, and we should stop drawing long-shot, no-one-really-understands-what-we're-talking-about comparisons between minor British character actors and Harry Redknapp.
Fox Sports 1, 12.30-5am. English Premier League. Valladolid v Real Madrid. Setanta Sports, 6.30-8.30am. Italian Serie A. Palermo v Inter.