Having come down like a ton of bricks - to spectacular effect - on international football, United States lawmakers are now training their sights on doping.

VAR is the latest acronym to join sport's already overcrowded lexicon. Soon it will be as much in common usage as LBW, KO or even IOC. But those three new characters are already changing the very nature of the games we play and watch.

I enjoyed my first-ever World Cup match on Saturday (June 16) and even witnessed footballing history in the form of the first goalscoring incident affected by VAR (Video Assistant Replay) technology, in France's 2-1 victory over Australia.

It is fair to say that the main purpose of the Oceania National Olympic Committees (ONOC) and Pacific Games Council (PGC) holding their General Assemblies in Samoa was to provide a flavour of next year's edition of the continental event.

There is no doubting that the headline claim from last week’s official debrief on the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympics, held in Beijing, was that the Games had achieved a multi-million dollar surplus.

It fell to Robbie Williams to launch Russia 2018 in Moscow. The opening chords of Tchaikovsky's piano concerto segued into "Let Me Entertain You" as the Brit strode onto the stage for what turned out to be a very short opening.

Five minutes was not enough then.

Remember the last time the eyes of the world were glued on Singapore?

"He wasn't quite quick enough." These are words I never thought we would hear from a sports commentator about Usain Bolt.

Thomas Bach’s election as President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) was still a few hours away on September 10 in 2013 the last time a successful referendum was held on an Olympic and Paralympic Games bid.

Comments from two very different athletes caught my eye over the past week, with both stories providing food for thought.

Legendary American basketball star Michael Jordan once urged the world to "always turn a negative situation into a positive situation" in one of his trademark philosophical soundbites.

Afghanistan's Test match debut against the mighty Indian team in Bangalore next week will be a crowning moment for Afghan cricket, but it might never have happened without one of the darkest episodes in the nation's history.

It takes quite a lot for us to take notice of stories that break late on a Saturday afternoon, given the deluge of live sporting events inevitably facing us at the time.