NationalWorld’s sportswriters reveal their favourite sporting moments of 2021

Richie Boon - England bowling India out for 78 at Headingley

While obviously very much a first world problem, the previously taken for granted pleasure of taking in live sport at a packed stadium was something I sorely missed as matches were played behind closed doors amid the peak of the Covid-19pandemic.

Every year since 2001, bar 2020, I’ve gone to watch a day of an England Test match with my Dad. The first of these trips, when I was ten, culminated in me releasing a jet of luminous pink vomit in the car park of a roadside Little Chef, such was the excitement of taking in the Ashes at Headingley.

Flash forward two decades, and my father and I were back where it all began - the cricket ground, not the forecourt of a doomed purveyor of brutally fried breakfast foods on the A168 - as England prepared to take on India in the third Test of a delicately poised series.

We’d lucked out on some pretty ideal seats, the weather was a delight, and what followed was one of the most enjoyable days of Test cricket I’ve ever witnessed.

The legendary James Anderson struck in his first over, removing KL Rahul for a duck, setting the tone for what was to be a vintage display of swing bowling from the 39-year-old.

Wickets fell thick and fast, with every dismissal ramping up the hysteria in a pulsating Western Terrace awash with some dazzling examples of fancy dress - bananas, flamingos, and assorted members of the clergy - who were taking an uncharacteristic interest in the day’s play.

With admirable support from Ollie Robinson and Craig Overton, the host rattled out India’s shell-shocked batting line-up for a mere 78 runs.

That, in itself, was a joy to behold, but England also ran riot with the bat, as Rory Burns and Haseeb Hameed both scored half centuries as they raced to 120-0 by the close of play.

To cap it all off, I even managed to keep my lunch down on the return journey.

Susanna Sealey - The Hundred’s inaugural tournament

The Hundred had its inaugural tournament this summer and, despite some fierce criticism from the traditionalists of the cricketing world, it was a roaring success that drew a new set of fans into the sport.

The women’s games headed the men’s and fans were treated to being able to watch both women and men’s matches on the same ticket and in a very rare occasion in sport, the prize money for both gendered tournaments was the same.

Cricketers from across the world all joined in on the new style of play and some breakout stars emerged as a result.

Jemimah Rodrigues was one such star who bounded onto the radar of cricketing fans thanks to an unbelievable batting feat. Averaging 41.40 for the Northern Superchargers across the tournament, the Indian batter posted the highest score of the women’s Hundred with 92 not out against the Welsh Fire.

The Superchargers were three wickets down after just seven runs with only a 13% chance of winning but 21 year-old Rodrigues stepped up to the mark and guided her team home in style, showcasing just how exciting the game can be.

Those who have claimed to find cricket - or even women’s sport in general - boring could not deny that Rodrigues’ 92 runs off 43 balls was an incredible achievement which ultimately completely reversed the fate of the match.

Fans have described her innings as one of the most underrated in a women’s T20 match and her talent highlights just one example of the plethora of talent available in the women’s game.

With performances like Rodrigues’, cricket organisations around the world, such as the BCCI, will find it hard to hold off on expanding the game for women for much longer.

Perhaps one day we will be treated to achievements like this in a Women’s IPL tournament as well.

Molly Burke - England’s journey to the Final of Euro 2020

During another year of many more lows than highs, sport was one of few highlights that allowed fans to distract themselves from the cruelty of the current day.

My main source of enjoyment was football and it certainly hasn’t been a disappointing one - Euro 2020, Chelsea’s Champions League triumph, Cristiano Ronaldo’s return to Old Trafford. The list goes on.

As a Sunderland fan I haven’t had a great lot to celebrate recently, so to witness England’s journey to the Euro final in the summer was an absolute delight.

While the semi-final against Denmark is a day I will never forget, for me my favourite sporting moment was the 2-0 victory over Germany a week earlier.

It was the first time I had actually managed to book a table in a beer garden during the tournament, it was a beautiful day in Leeds and it was the match that we had all been dreading. We are England and that means we don’t win games like that. We don’t beat teams we shouldn’t beat and it certainly doesn’t happen in the Euros - but it did.

Me and my friends spent a majority of the game drinking beer and singing songs to try and calm the nerves but the atmosphere inside that beer garden went to a whole new level with Raheem Sterling scored the opener - and perhaps even more so when Harry Kane doubled the lead.

The dramatic win over Denmark was definitely the most important as we confirmed our place in the final, however it was a moment of excitement after the statement victory against the Germans that I thought to myself that it could finally be our year.

It shows how much of a hoot the past summer was when my friend informed me that ‘Three Lions’ was her fourth most played song of the year according to Spotify Wrapped. Onto the World Cup!

Martyn Simpson - Scotland ending wait to beat England at Twickenham again

You had to go all the way to 1983 for a Scotland win at Twickenham before this year.

In that almost 40 year period there have been a lot of highs and plenty of lows for Scottish Rugby.

Just two years prior, Gregor Townsend’s side had miraculously fought back from 31-0 down to lead 38-31 at the Home of English Rugby only to be denied in the last play of a game which ended in a thrilling 38-38 draw.

Sporting fans missed plenty of historic moments when they were locked out of grounds at the start of the year but none more so than this one. It was a real coming of age moment for this Scotland side where the individual talent of the players cannot be denied. That was reflected by the eight Scots selected for the British & Irish Lions tour to South Africa in the summer with head coach Warren Gatland directly referring to the win over England as an important factor in his decision making.

Scotland were brave but also composed at Twickenham and, although the match itself was nothing close to the classic of two years prior, the euphoria when Hamish Watson ripped the ball away from the English with the clock in red and punted it high into the stands was unrivalled.

An 11-6 win marked one of the best performances of the millennium for Scotland but the most important thing now is that this squad uses it, and other recent quality showings, as a platform for continued improvement.

Who knows what the 2022 Six Nations will have in store but every time it rolls back around it seems to have Scotland fans entering less with hope and more with expectation.

Jason Jones - England’s Euro 2020 semi-final win over Denmark

At a time when the ravages of the pandemic and an increasingly brazen brand of political ineptitude had left the country exhausted and splintered (the more things change, eh?), Gareth Southgate’s irresistibly likeable squad of lovely lads gifted everybody a balmy month of sun-drenched escapism.

There were joyous moments aplenty - including, of course, that cathartic, hoarse-throated win over Germany in front of a raucous Wembley crowd - but it was the buzz that came with the stoppage time triumph over Denmark in the semi-finals that I find myself wistfully yearning for most often.

A scarcity of tables in Newcastle city centre left me and some mates marooned in the quaint local opposite my flat on the outskirts of town, and in an ill-advised move for somebody with a Premier League transfer roundup to wrangle at 7am the next morning, I acquiesced to using our sizeable deposit as a running bar tab.

The rest of the night is a series of increasingly hazy snapshots. The foreboding silence after Mikkel Damsgaard’s opener, the bullish delirium of the equaliser nine minutes later, the bloke on the table next to us, shirtless and blubbering, as the final whistle blew.

At half-time somebody ordered a bowl of chips and they arrived accompanied by a bottle of banana ketchup. Cue wild chanting for the alchemical fruit condiment every time Jack Grealish touched the ball for the rest of the evening. I still don’t know why.

The eviscerating disappointment of the final would still be to come, and it would be short-sighted and wrong to look back on Euro 2020 without addressing the toxicity and abhorrent racial abuse that marred the immediate aftermath of the tournament. For all of the beauty, there was an obnoxious, entitled ugliness from which we as a country have to learn some particularly uncomfortable lessons going forward.

But on the night of the semi-final - spilling out into the street, celebrating with passing cars, dragging my entirely sober and slightly bemused girlfriend out into the front garden while we took it in turns to hold aloft a purloined bottle of banana ketchup as if it were the Henri Delaunay itself - I don’t think I’ve ever been prouder to be an England fan.