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00:00Hello and welcome to Offsiders.
00:24It's been more than three years since Alina Rabachner's surprise Wimbledon win
00:28and the wait for her second Grand Slam title looks set to stretch further
00:32when she found herself three love down in the third set last night in the final
00:37against two-time Australian Open champion Irina Sabalenka.
00:40But somehow the Kazakh was able to flip the switch.
00:51She's got this chance now.
00:58There's the break and we are back on serve.
01:10And it's Rabachner now who hits the front in this final set.
01:19She's dominating.
01:21Oh, no.
01:30Phenomenal.
01:39Rabachner is the champion.
01:41It was a spectacular comeback in the final set.
01:50Three, blood down, and she becomes the champion in Australia.
01:59Good morning. It's a pleasure to have your company.
02:01It's also the pleasure to have the company of our very first panel for the year.
02:05We have host of the tennis podcast, Catherine Whittaker,
02:08the ABC's Winter Olympics correspondent in Erin Masiko-Veterre,
02:11and the ABC's Everything correspondent in Corbyn Middlemass team.
02:15It's so wonderful to have you all here, and it is great to be back for another season.
02:19And Offsiders will be celebrating its 20th birthday coming up,
02:23and you're all invited to the party.
02:24There'll be a special episode coming in the next few weeks.
02:27But it feels like there's a party of sport going on at the moment in Australia.
02:30There's so much to cover.
02:31But, Catherine, we will start with you and the women's final.
02:34Well, I mean, for Rabakina, it was a long wait between Grand Slams,
02:38but she showed her class last night.
02:39Yeah, she sure did.
02:40It was absolutely breathtaking hitting from Elena Rabakina.
02:44And, honestly, my favourite thing about tennis, about any tennis match,
02:48what I'm always looking for is just jeopardy and the result hanging in the balance
02:52right until the very last minute.
02:53And that's what we got from this women's final.
02:55We got a comeback.
02:56She was three love down in that deciding set.
02:59I think the big question is whether Irina Sabalenka, the world number one, blew it,
03:04whether the match was on her racket and hers to lose.
03:06I certainly think she feels that way.
03:08That's her interpretation of the match.
03:10But you cannot argue with the power, the easy power of Elena Rabakina.
03:16She induces gasps from the crowd, the way that she generates power off the racket,
03:21like it's a trampoline.
03:23Like, you can hear the reaction from the crowd in the stadium,
03:25and it rocks you on your heels, and it rocked the world number one on her heels last night.
03:31The stadium might be reacting, she's not.
03:33She celebrated winning her second Grand Slam less than what I would if I won a meat trade, a raffle.
03:38She doesn't give much emotion.
03:39She does have that reputation as an ice queen, but, my goodness,
03:42she seems to have that emotion under control.
03:44Yeah, we really saw two completely different characters out on court last night.
03:49Irina Sabalenka doesn't leave anything to the imagination as to how she's feeling,
03:54and she's always looking at her box and very demonstrative, throwing her racket,
03:58which is great drama.
04:00And Elena Rabakina is just, she just kept it all in check.
04:04She doesn't give anything away.
04:06I'm not sure if her emotions are going up and down.
04:09Is it a facade, or is that just her character?
04:13She is just very cool, and she just doesn't get caught up in the emotion of a point or the moment.
04:20Yeah, I think tennis players can train themselves not to demonstrate their emotions.
04:27I mean, Roger Federer was famously very, very fiery.
04:30He used to throw rackets in the juniors, and it was a coach that kind of got a handle on him
04:34and said, hey, Roger, this is hurting you.
04:37And, you know, he was always...
04:38I think so many people forgot about that later in his career,
04:41that he was always this gentleman, but in the start he was fiery.
04:44Exactly, so it's kind of different folks, different strokes.
04:46I'm always wary of feeling, you know, assuming there's not emotion going on there
04:50just because somebody's not showing it.
04:53But it is extraordinary.
04:54On the penultimate point when Rabakina went to serve,
04:57there was a really loud shout from the stands, sort of as the ball was in the air,
05:01and I think anybody else would have caught that ball toss and restarted the service motion.
05:06And given daggers.
05:07Everybody in the stadium heard it, except seemingly for Elena Rabakina,
05:12who was just totally in her own zone.
05:14And I think the question coming out of last night is also about Sabalenka
05:17and whether or not she does keep getting to these finals,
05:20and she is undoubtedly the best player in the world,
05:22but seemingly just isn't coming away with the win when she needs to.
05:25Yeah, so now four and four in slam finals for Elena Sabalenka.
05:29And again, it goes to speak to what a great champion we've got.
05:32I mean, we've got a champion here in Elena Rabakina,
05:34who's now won ten in a row against top ten players.
05:36It's an incredible record.
05:37She had to beat three top six seeds from the quarterfinal stage onwards to get it done.
05:42And the mental fortitude that she showed last night,
05:45I mean, she's in the possession of an awesome game,
05:47a huge power game, which Catherine outlined.
05:50And then also the fact that she was so clutch,
05:53as we like to say in sporting, the big-time moments.
05:55I mean, to fall three left behind in the third set,
05:57having taken the first, there had to have been scarring.
06:00There were at least some thoughts to, hang on, I've been here before.
06:02It's the same setting, 20-23 finals, she was a set-up and lost.
06:06She comes back from three left down to win six of the last seven games
06:09against the best player on planet Earth.
06:11So, yeah, super impressive.
06:13And it goes to show what a great champion we've got in Australia for 2026.
06:16And it was a wonderful match, and it was so fitting of a Grand Slam final.
06:19But in the lead-up to the last night, and in the lead-up to the semifinals,
06:22we were wondering whether or not we were going to see a decent five-setter
06:25in the men's side of the tournament.
06:26But goodness, didn't we get two epic men's semifinals?
06:29Now, Corbyn, you were there in the stadium.
06:32What was the atmosphere like when you've got a match that goes for five-and-a-half hours?
06:36Well, I did the second match, not the first one.
06:38You were there for Novak.
06:39So I was there planning to do the second match between Novak and Yannick,
06:44and obviously ended up broadcasting that on ABC Sport.
06:47But in the third set, I thought, I was in the cafe,
06:49and I thought, this is going to be over any minute.
06:50I'd better walk over and sit in the back of the box for the first match.
06:53Sure enough, I was sitting on what turned out to be like a crate in the back of the box
06:57or whatever for two-and-a-bit hours watching the end of this Elkaraz-Zverev.
07:01You know, unbelievable match.
07:03And I think that's the thing that's probably forgotten in retrospect.
07:05Carlos was two points away twice in the third set from getting off the court.
07:10In the end, he loses the third set in a breaker,
07:12loses the fourth set in a breaker, ends up going five-and-a-half hours.
07:15He's a breakdown in the fifth set
07:17where Sasha Zverev had the chance to try and serve for the match,
07:20and then Carlitos wins the last four games and gets out of it from that position.
07:24So just an absurd day of tennis.
07:26And, I mean, Catherine, you follow this all year round.
07:29Immediately, you try not to be, you know, the latest, the greatest and everything else.
07:33But it's hard to think of a set of semifinals quite like that in recent memory.
07:37Yeah, look, I've never experienced a men's semifinals day like that.
07:41In my tennis-watching history, it was incredibly special.
07:45And all the more so, given we'd had, let's be honest, 12 days of, you know,
07:49there was some high-quality tennis.
07:51But in terms of drama and jeopardy...
07:53The tournament really needed it.
07:54It was playing on the ground.
07:55The fans really needed it.
07:56It was like it was condensed all into one day, or maybe one weekend,
08:00given the women's final that we had yesterday.
08:02But, you know, if you'd told me after that Alcaraz-Zverev match,
08:06five hours, 27 minutes, these absolutely just pulsating scenes,
08:12if you'd told me that that wasn't going to be the lead story on our show that night,
08:16I would have laughed in your face.
08:18But Novak Djokovic, as is so often the case, had other ideas.
08:23But, I mean, this, for me, Djokovic was the story of the day and this was the match of the day.
08:30It was Shakespearean, this Alcaraz-Zverev match.
08:33It was a three-act play and another act of escapology from just the most engaging 22-year-old in sport, I think.
08:43And the crowd was really along with him.
08:45He was really drawing on them and getting them up at the start of the set.
08:50The way he takes a crowd with him on his journey is like nothing I've ever seen before.
08:55And he manages not to be obnoxious about it.
08:57Yes, he's still likeable and yet he's like, get on board.
09:00He's a breakdown in the deciding set.
09:02He's just held serve and he's sitting there at the change of ends,
09:06like with his arms aloft, appealing to the crowd to come with him.
09:10It's like a dialogue between him and the crowd.
09:12And he manages not to annoy his opponent, not to be obnoxious.
09:16It's an art.
09:16It is. It's a gift. It really is.
09:19You say he manages not to annoy his opponent.
09:21Zverev was pretty angry when he received treatment for cramp.
09:23I'd use some choice words that I'm not going to say in morning television.
09:27But this is one of those strange things about tennis where there's grey lines about whether or not you can receive treatment.
09:32Zverev, again, post-match, was saying he was filthy about this.
09:36Is it within the rules?
09:37Was anything done that was wrong here?
09:39Look, the rules are subjective.
09:42Officially, the headline rule is you can't receive a medical timeout for cramp.
09:46But then there is a provision in the rules that if the cramp is related to heat stress or partially induced by heat stress, then it is allowable.
09:54Ultimately, it's the call of the physios.
09:57You can see here giving treatment to Carlos Alcaraz.
09:59I don't think Carlos Alcaraz did anything sinister.
10:02He said at the time that he had the medical timeout, he didn't know it was cramp.
10:05He just felt something in his adductor, said, help me, please.
10:08But equally, I understand Zverev's grievance.
10:12The rules are you can't receive treatment for cramp.
10:14His opponent received treatment for cramp.
10:17You know, that's I understand the grievance there for sure.
10:21But are we asking too much of the medics, though, in the moment?
10:24You know, these are independent staff who come in, a player who's not their patient.
10:28They don't know.
10:29There's a bit of a language barrier.
10:31They've got to assess really quickly.
10:33Is this a muscle tear or strain or is it a cramp?
10:36I mean, it's really tough.
10:38And should cramp be treated this way?
10:40Should cramp be treated this way in the rule books?
10:42It's treated as a loss of condition.
10:44Well, look, it can be a loss of condition.
10:47But I think that's a very blanket way of treating a very complicated thing.
10:53I mean, Yannick Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz are two of the fittest guys on tour.
10:58And I think that you can have a predisposition to cramp.
11:04It wasn't a particularly hot day either.
11:07It was warm, but it wasn't the 45 degrees that we saw.
11:09I think anything's warm out throughout the five and a half hours.
11:11They were probably feeling the heat.
11:13And look, I think in Alcaraz's case, the instances where he's cramped in the past,
11:17it's been very stress-related.
11:19Yes.
11:19And cramp can be very stress-related.
11:21The links between the mental and the physical are being increasingly understood, I think.
11:26And it's tricky because his variables say, look, I had a physical advantage in that moment.
11:32And yeah, he did.
11:33Training yourself to not cramp is a valid thing to do.
11:38But equally, was that a loss of condition for Carlos Alcaraz?
11:42I'm not sure I see it that way.
11:43Well, you mentioned that Sinner is one of the other fittest players on the tour.
11:47And we also were all thinking maybe this is going to be a Sincaraz final.
11:50Not the case.
11:51Novak Djokovic got the job done at 38 years young.
11:54He's soon to be 39, Corbin.
11:56Again, you called this match.
11:57And I love that when he got to the net after the match, he said, thanks for letting me have
12:00one because I really needed this.
12:03He is ever young, isn't he?
12:05But it would have helped him that leading into this match, there were a few forfeits and a
12:09few games that really meant that he had a lighter schedule.
12:11Yeah, he was two sets down and got the retirement in the quarterfinal.
12:15He didn't play the fourth round at all, given he got a walk over there against Jakob Menzik.
12:19It is hard to overstate to people that are casual tennis fans how significant this is.
12:24And it's even harder to explain that, given the fact that he's a 24-time champion.
12:28So you think, oh, yeah, sure, the sports guy on TV is trying to tell me about, yeah,
12:31the 24-time champion has caused a major boil over to win a semifinal.
12:35But that's exactly what he's done.
12:37I mean, if you put all the elements into it, the story of men's tennis at the moment is
12:41how do we bridge the gap?
12:42And we're about to talk about Alex Dimonor.
12:43That's his narrative.
12:44It's the same narrative for Ben Shelton, for Taylor Fritz, for Sasha Zverev, for everybody
12:48else.
12:49How do they close the gap to the top two?
12:51And the gap between, we've said it all tournament, the gap between two and three in the rankings
12:54is actually wider, between three and 1,000.
12:58There are more ranking points that separates them.
13:01So this is so clearly, they're almost a de facto league, what Sinner and Elkaraz have done.
13:06They won eight of the top nine points halls last year.
13:08They've shared the last, I think, eight slams, or the last two calendar years.
13:14I think it actually goes back longer than that, to the last 11.
13:16So these guys are so clearly the top two players.
13:20And at 38 years of age, Novak Djokovic winds back the clock and takes down Yannick Sinner
13:25in that kind of fashion at 1.30 in the morning.
13:27So, I mean, there's that great Toby Keefe line, which always gets rolled out in US sporting
13:31terms.
13:32And it's a great one where he says, I'm not as great as I once was, but I'm not as great
13:35I'm as great once as I ever was.
13:37And Kobe Bryant certainly lived up to that in what he did in his final match.
13:41He scored 60 points.
13:42He wasn't the same version late in his career, Kobe, as he was obviously in his prime.
13:47And that's my only concern for tonight.
13:49Is that what we saw from Novak the other night?
13:52Did we get the one special effort at the advanced age?
13:55Can he do that twice in three nights?
13:57And then the extra element, which is baked into this mouth-watering legacy final, is Carlos'
14:02health, which we just discussed as to, is there any hangover from that?
14:05And one thing we know about Novak is that history means a lot to him.
14:08The stats and what he has on his plate to be able to achieve this evening does mean a lot
14:12to him.
14:12But so does the support of the Australian crowd, which he mentioned after that blockbuster
14:16semi-final.
14:17I love our passionate relationship.
14:20Every year is something different, you know?
14:24And tonight has been one of the, if not the best night, atmosphere-wise, support-wise,
14:31I ever had in Australia.
14:33For sure.
14:35Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
14:37He does have a lot of support here, but I'd have to say tonight, you'd think there'd be
14:41more Alcaraz fans in the crowd.
14:43I mean, look, that's the case wherever Carlos Alcaraz goes.
14:48Like, he takes people with him, even if you don't walk...
14:50You can't not like him.
14:50If you don't walk into the stadium, a Carlos Alcaraz fan, you walk out of the stadium,
14:54a Carlos Alcaraz fan, right?
14:55It's an incredible gift.
14:57But Novak Djokovic here in Australia, the fans that he does have, and he has a lot
15:04of them, they are vocal and they are vociferous and they show up for him.
15:08They really, really show up for him.
15:10And there's obviously an incredible Serbian community here.
15:13I don't know how they get all the tickets, but they somehow managed to get tickets to
15:17all his key matches and they're there with their flags and they're there when they need
15:21him.
15:22And he has this incredible ability to pick out specific pockets of people in the crowd
15:27and sort of develop a bit of...
15:29Engage with them, yes.
15:29Exactly.
15:30And they fuel one another.
15:32And I would expect sort of volume-wise tonight, maybe for it to feel quite equal, even if numbers-wise,
15:39Alcaraz has it.
15:40So we've got Novak going for slam number 25.
15:43And for Alcaraz, this is his chance to finally complete, because the Aussie Open is the one
15:47that he hasn't conquered yet.
15:49What are you expecting this evening?
15:50I hate to ask for a tip, but I'd love your tip.
15:53Well, either way, I mean, I don't think I've ever known a Grand Slam final where, no matter
15:58what the outcome, it's going to be historic, totally historic.
16:04Carlos Alcaraz would become the youngest man ever to complete the career Grand Slam.
16:09And I asked him the question in press the other night, if I offered you this Australian
16:12Open and that record of becoming the youngest man, or all of the other three this year, which
16:18would you take?
16:19And he said, I'd take this one over the other three.
16:21That's how much he wants it.
16:23So he's not shying away from the history on the line.
16:26But then it's Novak Djokovic, 24-time Grand Slam champion.
16:30We saw him defy...
16:31At his favourite Grand Slam too.
16:33Exactly.
16:34A night session at the Australian Open.
16:36He hasn't lost a night session here since 2018.
16:39You've got these, it is the unstoppable force and the immovable object.
16:43Yes.
16:43Logic tells me, go with the 22-year-old, world number one.
16:47And I think I am edging Carlos Alcaraz for all the reasons Corbyn brilliantly laid out.
16:55But there'll always be the thing in the back of my mind saying, but it's Novak Djokovic
16:58at the Australian Open.
17:00And I don't think he'll get a better chance than this.
17:03I really don't.
17:04I think...
17:05And even recent history like the Olympics in big matches, these two, it still can go
17:09either way.
17:10We cannot wait.
17:11We'd better move on because we could do a whole episode on tennis at the moment.
17:14But we are going to talk about Alex Dimonor, who had an astounding Australian Open, making
17:19the quarters with ease, but he couldn't get past that man, Carlos Alcaraz.
17:22So the question for his team now is, how does he lift his game further?
17:26And Corbyn, he has identified what it is.
17:29And he essentially said, it's power, it's revs, and I'm going to have to do something
17:32a little bit different.
17:34And he has made adjustments to his game to try and improve that.
17:37And he's trying to close the gap like everyone else is on tour at the moment.
17:40I mean, the guy I think of all the time with Alex Dimonor is David Ferrer, who, for
17:44a period of time, and it feels like an unfair comparison, because people look back and think,
17:49oh, but David Ferrer never got there.
17:50It's like, yeah, but he had a great career for a long period of time.
17:53He regularly held down a spot, top 10 in the world.
17:55But when it came to the very best players on tour, he didn't quite possess, you know,
17:59the same artillery and the weapons as them to be able to do it.
18:02But he put himself in the position over and over and over again.
18:05And eventually he made it through to a Roland Garros final and gave himself the chance that
18:09on any given day, you know, maybe the other guy's a little bit off.
18:12He's right on.
18:13He plays some kind of a career match or has a career day, and it all comes together for
18:17him.
18:17So I think it's extremely admirable to keep putting himself in that position over and
18:22over again.
18:22And if that only amounts to quarterfinals, appearances at a Grand Slam and top six in
18:26the world, then all power to him.
18:28We'll take it.
18:28All power to him.
18:29I also think it would be different if he couldn't identify what part of his game you need to
18:33have growth.
18:33But you can tell, and he's training hard for it.
18:35And we love watching him.
18:36We love the way that he goes about it.
18:38And having never lost to someone ranked below him at the Australian Open is a wonderful stat.
18:42So we're definitely, we're all, we're all aboard the Dimonor train to see what he can
18:45do this season.
18:46But one of the big talking points from a player's perspective from this tournament has been
18:51their right to privacy.
18:52The debate was sparked by Coco Goff, who smashed her racket after losing her quarterfinal.
18:57Now, she wasn't happy.
18:58This footage you're about to see made it to air.
19:00And other players did come to her defense saying, well, where do we get a chance to
19:05let out our frustration?
19:07Let's have a listen to what she had to say.
19:09I tried to go somewhere where they wouldn't broadcast it.
19:13But obviously they did.
19:15So yeah, maybe some conversations we can be had.
19:17Because I feel like at this tournament, the only private place we have is the locker room.
19:22Are we tennis players or are we like animals in the zoo where they are observed, like even
19:29when they poop, you know, so.
19:31Iga Schwantek, they're not missing her words, making it known that they do feel like sometimes
19:35that they are animals in a zoo.
19:37But Craig Tiley's come out and said that we'll take this on board.
19:40But don't fans love the access?
19:41Yeah, the theater of it all makes for great viewing from home.
19:45I think Coco Goff was really embarrassed because this is pretty out of character for her.
19:50And she didn't want to do it on the court.
19:52And she didn't want to do it in front of her team or her opponent who she just lost to.
19:56But those areas under Rod Laver Arena, they're not private.
20:00There are staff milling around at all hours of the day and night.
20:04And the actual locker room is private.
20:07And the players are pretty insulated.
20:10Aside from when they're out on court, maybe as a fan, you might see them on an outside court
20:15practicing.
20:16You certainly don't see them walking around Melbourne Park.
20:18You can't really get close to them.
20:20The top players are in the stadiums practicing pre-tournament as well.
20:23This is the little insight we get into how they're really feeling and such a human moment
20:29and maybe a bit embarrassing for her.
20:31But it was great television.
20:34Yeah, and great television is part of what goes towards paying their prize money, right?
20:38Which isn't small.
20:39Absolutely.
20:41And I think sometimes players, there is a bit of a disconnect there with them sort of understanding
20:45that the media access is what broadcasters are paying for.
20:48And those broadcast rights fees are a big part of prize money.
20:51I think where I come down on it is there should be a space available to players where they know
20:57they can be guaranteed privacy for this kind of a moment.
21:01Like, I do think there have just been the odd moment where the intrusion has crossed the line.
21:05I think Carlos Alcaraz's phone screen was zoomed in on.
21:09There was nothing sinister on there.
21:10I think he was looking at Yannick Sinner's Instagram story.
21:14And look, I...
21:15But even that, that feels like a reality TV show more than a pre-sport, right?
21:19I lap up this content, you know.
21:21I'm there on social media.
21:22It's being fed to me.
21:23And I'm like, God, this is great.
21:25But I'm like, should I be allowed to enjoy this?
21:27Does he know this?
21:27I feel a bit...
21:29I feel quite conflicted about it.
21:32So...
21:32But I do...
21:33I think where I come down ultimately is there is a...
21:35Maybe just a fractional rowing back here to be had
21:39and just a designated space maybe available to players.
21:43A soundproof booth, maybe.
21:45And just scream.
21:45We can still get footage, but we can't hear or see you, ideally.
21:48If you go to media as well, that would be great.
21:49We could go in, have a scream, have a nap.
21:52Have a cry.
21:52I think what we do know is the Australian Open has always been great
21:55at listening to the players
21:56and wanting it to be the happy slam that it is.
21:58And it's been an overwhelming success.
22:00They're going to break attendance figures
22:01and we cannot wait to see the result of the final as well tonight.
22:04But we will move on because to cricket...
22:06And Pakistan smashed Australia overnight in the T20 men's side by 90 runs.
22:11And now we know that the team won't have Pat Cummins
22:13for the T20 World Cup.
22:15Corbyn, how much weight do we put on this?
22:18How much weight do we put on this result?
22:18And should we be concerned?
22:20So Australia were 17-4 leading into this series
22:23since the last T20 World Cup.
22:25So in a way, our T20 team had never looked better.
22:27It was well balanced.
22:28The middle order was loaded the whole way through.
22:30I actually thought, and still do,
22:32that the Australians are a really good chance
22:34to upset India and lift the title in the upcoming World Cup,
22:37which starts next week.
22:39This does rock me a little bit,
22:40particularly the second of the two results.
22:42The first one, only five of the 11 that Australia fielded
22:45were actually in their World Cup squad.
22:47There was only two, actually, yesterday
22:48that aren't going to be part of the World Cup squad playing.
22:50So this is most of what Australia have.
22:53There'll be a few changes here and there.
22:54The likes of Tim David and Nathan Ellis and Josh Hazelwood
22:57all passed fit and ready to go.
22:59So it's not the perfect lead-in,
23:01but you've got to remember in the group stage,
23:03in a 20-team tournament,
23:04Australia still play games against Oman,
23:06against Ireland, against Zimbabwe.
23:08You'd think we'd be OK.
23:10I think they'll treat those games almost as warm-up games.
23:13So in the past, you'd be using this series as,
23:15right, we need to get our cricket legs under us
23:17and be fully ready to go.
23:18They'll have the luxury of doing that
23:19in the early part of the tournament.
23:21So I wouldn't rule out the Aussies being a title contender
23:23based off that alone.
23:24And we did have some other cricket news in the week
23:26with Sophie Molyneux announced as the Australian women's captain.
23:28Now, Corbyn, it might have been a surprise for some,
23:31given that Tali McGrath had been filling in
23:33on the odd place as captain,
23:34but she's a very popular appointment.
23:35She is. There's no doubt about that.
23:37She's a brilliant player.
23:38The issue for Sophie is that she hasn't been there.
23:41So in the T20 and Test version,
23:43she hasn't played since 2024,
23:44and the only cricket she's played for Australia
23:46in 12 to 15 months is four ODIs.
23:49So that's not a lot of cricket for the woman
23:51who's now appointed as the captain.
23:52I just hope the other contenders have had it explained
23:55to them very clearly why they missed out.
23:57I probably understand Tali McGrath being overlooked.
23:59She hasn't been in great form anyway,
24:01so it's hard to lead from a marginal position.
24:03The one that I feel for is Ash Gardner,
24:05and I'd love to know a reason as to why in particular
24:07she didn't get the nod.
24:09While Molyneux's hardly been playing,
24:10she's been Australia's best player.
24:12She's won two of the last four Belinda Clark medals.
24:14She was the runner-up in another.
24:15So I hope there's a, you know,
24:17at least she understands, hey, you know,
24:18why it's not me, because otherwise, you know,
24:20that can cause friction in a dressing room.
24:22And if people are at home going,
24:24Soph Molyneux, what's a moment I really remember
24:26from Soph Molyneux?
24:27It has to be this, surely.
24:28Dancing on stage with Katy Perry.
24:30And everyone remembers she just decided to take this on.
24:34There she is, number 23, if you don't mind.
24:36So she's a personality.
24:37That's the thing.
24:38And maybe you speak about Ash Gardner.
24:39I think there might be...
24:41Soph doesn't mind taking centre stage.
24:45She's so likeable.
24:46I mean, she's so popular with her teammates.
24:48Yes, she'll do a great job, I'm sure.
24:52I just hope she can play some regular cricket.
24:54And I think it caught us all by surprise a little bit
24:56because of, yeah, her absence in the last 12 to 15 months.
25:00Well, from cricket to the Winter Olympics,
25:02which is in start in less than a week.
25:04And our ABC's correspondent, Erin, as we mentioned,
25:07you actually head this evening to Milan.
25:09So you've got your big suitcases, you're ready to go.
25:12I've got a huge suitcase pack, snow jackets and snow pants
25:14and, you know, all-weather shoes and everything.
25:17I'm expecting the worst.
25:19It's about minus 10 or so overnight in Livigno,
25:22where I'll be based.
25:23So not the temperatures we saw in Beijing four years ago.
25:26It was about minus 35 on the mountain,
25:29so thankfully avoided that.
25:31But, yes, heading off tonight
25:32with the opening ceremony next week.
25:35Oh, none of us are jealous.
25:36We don't want to go to Milan.
25:36It's fine. It's absolutely fine.
25:38But let's have a look,
25:39because it is a bit of a logistical challenge, right,
25:41to hold a Games of this scale in Milan,
25:43like with the travel that you have
25:45and also for the teams to make sure
25:46they have the right athletes in the right places.
25:48Yeah, that's right.
25:49So this will be the most spread-out Olympics
25:52that's ever been staged.
25:53So you can see the locations there on the map.
25:55So the opening ceremony
25:57and some of the indoor ice events,
25:59the figure skating, ice hockey,
26:00that will be in Milan.
26:02Cortina hosted the Olympics 70 years ago,
26:05but it's too small of a place to host an Olympics
26:08as it is now,
26:09with the number of athletes and countries involved.
26:11They will host the sliding events.
26:14So that's the bobsleigh and the luge and the skeleton,
26:16which we all love.
26:18And I'll be based in Lavigno,
26:20which is where the freestyle skiing
26:21and the snowboarding will take place,
26:23which is where the majority
26:24of our Australian medal hopes will be.
26:27So we've got so many
26:29that I can't even run you through them all.
26:31We've had Australians on top of the podium
26:33on the World Cup circuit,
26:35all Northern Hemisphere winter,
26:36and across a lot of different sports as well.
26:41We love Aussie gold.
26:42We'll take it in any way.
26:44If it's cold, we don't mind at all.
26:45But I guess,
26:46when are we going to have to be getting up
26:48as Australian viewers to watch our chances?
26:50Because as we said,
26:50it is one of our strongest teams
26:52we've ever sent to a winter games.
26:53Yeah, the time difference is difficult
26:55in this part of the world.
26:56So you'll either be staying up quite late
26:59and a bit bleary-eyed the next day
27:00or setting your alarm pretty early.
27:04There are some finals
27:05that will take place in the day
27:07and there are some finals
27:07that will take place in the night Italian time.
27:10So there is a bit of a variation.
27:12You've got to be a bit strategic,
27:13plan it out,
27:14look through the schedule
27:15and check, you know,
27:18which mornings you're going to sacrifice.
27:20We're looking forward to chatting to you
27:21when you're over there as well
27:22because there are so many athletes
27:23to keep an eye on.
27:24But one of those has to be Jakara Anthony.
27:26She's our defending gold medalist
27:28and she is a hot chance of going back-to-back
27:30given that she's our most successful
27:32Australian World Cup skier of all time.
27:35She's won her 26th title in the Moguls,
27:37if you don't mind.
27:38Yeah, and she has just come back.
27:41She missed most of last season
27:42with a broken collarbone.
27:44She's come back this season
27:45and just has not missed a beat.
27:47She is just full of confidence,
27:50quiet confidence.
27:52She's got a lot of pressure on her.
27:54She is trying to become the first Australian
27:56to win back-to-back gold medals.
27:58We've had a number of gold medalists,
27:59but no-one has been able to come back four years later.
28:02And she is in the box seat.
28:04She's ranked number one after this winter season
28:06that she's just been competing in.
28:08So she is absolutely right up there in contention.
28:12Now, someone else to keep an eye on
28:14is Scotty James,
28:15who everyone might be familiar with.
28:18This is his fifth Olympics.
28:20So he debuted when he was only 15 years old,
28:22just a baby face,
28:23but he is a veteran of the team now.
28:24A lot of people have watched the boy
28:24from Morrindyke go up, haven't we?
28:26Yeah, so he this season
28:29has chosen to really focus on his training
28:33and lifting his difficulty
28:34rather than competing a lot.
28:36But what we have seen of him in competition
28:38has been phenomenal.
28:40He claimed his fifth consecutive X Games gold medal,
28:43equaling the great Shaun White.
28:45And he's got his bronze medal,
28:47he's got his silver medal from previous Olympics.
28:50He desperately, and he's not shy about it,
28:52he desperately wants that gold this time around.
28:53You mentioned Scotty James and how old he was
28:55when he made his debut.
28:57Britt Cox is another one that we saw quite young.
28:58So we're quite used to seeing teenagers really star.
29:01But there's something about Indra Brown
29:03that has experts just so pumped about what she can achieve.
29:06Because she's the best in the world and she's 16?
29:08She just turned 16 a couple of days ago.
29:11So she's kind of come from nowhere.
29:12This has been her debut senior season.
29:15She made it to the podium in her first three events,
29:18which is record equaling in the free ski half pipe.
29:22She's very young but doesn't seem bothered at all
29:26by the level that she has to match it with
29:28and she goes in ranked number one in the world.
29:30So hopefully we have a record medal haul.
29:32It has been such a jam-packed program
29:34that we don't have time for observations.
29:35But I'll observe that it's lovely to be back
29:37and it's lovely to see you all.
29:38Best of luck for those with the tennis tonight.
29:40It'll be great.
29:41And that's your program for today.
29:42But we will leave you with some GOAT news.
29:45Last year, 23-time Grand Slam champion Serena Williams
29:48re-entered the tennis drug testing protocol,
29:51sparking speculation that the greatest of all time
29:54might be making a comeback.
29:55Well, she was asked directly about her plans
29:57on American TV this week and here's what she had to say.
30:00Thanks for watching.
30:01I'm just having fun and enjoying my life right now.
30:04Okay, but that's not a yes or a no.
30:05That's not a yes or a no.
30:07I don't know.
30:07I'm just going to see what happens.
30:09That's a maybe to me.
30:10That's not a maybe.
30:12Well, I'll see what happens.
30:15It's not a no.
30:16Listen, I can't discuss this.
30:19Okay, but I'm just saying
30:21that if you wanted to put it to bed,
30:23this would be a good moment
30:24to put the retirement rumors to bed.
30:27I want to go to bed.
30:28Okay, all right.
30:31Okay, all right.
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