The 2026 Ballon d'Or Winners

I watched the entire Ballon d'Or ceremony last night.

The event - to celebrate the best players in football - streamed live from the London Palladium on DAZN. 

It was the first time I had gone out of the way to watch the annual special. I did so because I had been following the betting for the winner of the men's Ballon d'Or. 

Kylian Mbappe's odds fell in the days leading into the ceremony. That was despite Harry Kane being retained as the favourite with every bookmaker I followed. 

The betting turned out to be accurate. Well, as it pertains Kane. He was declared the winner. Mbappe finished in second place followed by Spain's Lamine Yamal.

Speaking of Spain, and Barcelona for that matter, Alexia Putellas won her third Ballon d'Or Feminin. 

Taylor Bets, Taylor Scores

It's 17:15 on Sunday evening, as I begin writing this post. The Colts versus Vikings is one of the four games on my NFL GamePass Multiview screen. It's the only fixture I'm focused on right now.

I'm sitting here with a smile on my face.

To tell this story, I have to go back a bunch of seasons. It was a Sunday following our clocks having to be moved back and I was sat at my computer a little after 5pm. I received a message from my friend, Vicki, with something along the lines of 'TAYLOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!' 

My first thought was 'what have I done?' so I asked 'yeah?' but - before Vick could reply - I realised my error: the games had kicked off at 5pm instead of 6pm. 

I had missed Jonathan Taylor scoring the first touchdown in the Colts' game.

We reminded each other of that mess up a few times over the years. I recalled it once more on Sunday morning realising there likely won't be another chance for Taylor to score one of those early Sunday touchdowns for the Colts. There's a strong chance he could end up moving to a new team ahead of the trade deadline in a few weeks.

As I thought more about it, over my KFC lunch, I decided I would have a punt on Taylor to score the first TD once I returned to my room.

I fired the laptop up, and headed over to Bet365 to check out the odds. An opening touchdown for Taylor was 17/4. I initially thought I'd gamble a fiver, but - noticing the odds - I had to put £8 on. Why? Well, because that meant £34 profit - the exact amount of our KFC Sunday lunch.

The game started off with the Vikings on offense. The Colts held them. Taylor eventually ran in a thirty-eight yarder in the visitors' opening drive.

What a result. Potentially the last time I'll ever bet on Jonathan Taylor as a Colt. A wager which was many years in the making.

The Vikings went on to win the game 16-10. Taylor was the only touchdown scorer for the Colts.

5 Down

I have just finished reading the fifth novel, in my six-book run through the entire 2026 Booker Prize shortlist.

The Booker Prize Marathon post will go live within the next week. If I keep to my current pace, that is.

(I will keep to that pace)

The winner will be announced a fortnight from tomorrow evening. 

Ole Miss' Trip To Texas Is On Disney Plus Tomorrow Morning

Some good and bad news from today's visit to Disney Plus' menu of college American football games.

The good: the streaming platform is showing the Ole Miss versus Texas game. 

The bad: it kicks off in the early hours of tomorrow morning.

I'm unsure if I'm going to watch it live. The clocks go back at 2:00am tonight, though.

Ole Miss versus Texas has a narrative to it. Texas' starting quarterback - Arch Manning - has a lot of family who played there.

His grandfather, Archie, and father - Cooper - attended the university. The former played quarterback for three years before the New Orleans Saints selected him with the second overall pick in the 1971 NFL Draft . Arch's uncle - Eli Manning - is also a former quarterback for the Rebels.

Ole Miss @ Texas Line and Total

The Longhorns are -3.5 favourites to win this game. Terrible results, over the past fortnight, have seen the 4-2 Texas team fall from number one down to nineteenth in the college football rankings. This truly is a must win game for the home side.

Ole Miss have a 5-1 record and are ranked 7th in the country.

53.5 is the current totals line.

No Longer Willing To Watch Beat Luke Littler

I've kept seeing a Luke Littler darts event advertised on Netflix and it initially had me intrigued. Unfortunately, I no longer am.

The commercials for Beat Luke Littler teased the prospected of '20 amateurs' going up against the professional live a week from tonight.

Netflix revealed the cast of opponents last night.

Not what was written on the tin. At all.

The line-up includes  players who are far off from being amateurs.

Going by the ad, I expected the most random of players attempting to beat Littler and secure a life-changing amount of money. Similar, in ways to how famous darts players from back in the day would tour boozers across the country and square off against locals. 

Is that still a thing?!

I may have been suckered in from the advertising, but I feel more empathy for those people who jetted into the UK to try out for this show and the chance of winning £501,000.

I urge you to look for the advert and see it for yourself. It's a blatant example of a bait-and-switch if ever I saw one.

It should go without saying my interest level has evaporated.

'Stone Cold' Storm Austen

I received the following text from the National Grid yesterday.

The message warned of potential severe weather from today, through to Saturday, caused by Storm Austen.

I genuinely thought we've already had a storm named Austen before this week. Quick research has led me to realise I was incorrect.

The threat of power cuts is worrying. I have always stated that it would take an Act of God to end my twenty-plus year run of continuous blog posts. If it ends because of 'Stone Cold' Storm Austen then so be it.

As for the text? I suppose it's better use of a message system. Especially after the controversial use of the Government's alerts for the wildfires over the summer.

'That's Funny'

I had one of those 'that's funny' moments last night.

To get to the point, in as quick a way as I can take, I have to tell you something quickly. 

The other day, I was browsing through Disney Plus, to see which college American football games are set for this weekend, and I came across the fact that the streaming service has episodes of ESPN Jeopardy for us here in the UK.

I was actually quite stunned at that. I watched an episode immediately and planned to catch additional episodes across the week. I made it to episode two last night.

Here's one of the answers which came up:

With this being a sports version of Jeopardy, the contestant has to 'answer' in the form of a question. ESPN reporter and presenter - Peter Schrager - correctly asked 'Who is Carlie Irsay?' (okay, it's Carlie Irsay-Gordon, but let's not get too pedantic right now!).

I thought 'that's funny,' because - of all days - it was the one when I had written a post about Carlie Irsay-Gordon yesterday after she made the decision to fire Chris Ballard as general manager of the Indianapolis Colts.

ESPN Jeopardy is hosted by sports commentator Joe Buck. I've written many times in the past about Jeopardy, especially the short-lived UK versions, as being one of my favourite game shows. With this being all sport, then I am in a nirvana.

Also found, during my browse through the ESPN content on Disney Plus, is College Gameday (I thought DAZN had the exclusive rights to that show, so haven't watched any of it at all this season!) and Pardon The Interruption (airs at 11:05pm each weeknight. I used to watch it a lot when it was on the cable channels over here).

So good to see the ESPN content available to Disney Plus users. Fair play.