Sport Style Guide

Feb 17 2010

Sport style

Achilles tendon: Cap A.

All-square

All England: No hyphen. The home of Wimbledon tennis is the All England Club. One of badminton’s top events is the All England championships.

Back-pass

Backhand, forehand

Bogey: One over par in golf

Boxing: One word for flyweight, welterweight, heavyweight, middleweight etc, but super-middleweight

Break point: In tennis

By-line

Check-out: In darts. Hyphen

Claycourt (grasscourt, claycourt): One word as an adjective e.g. the claycourt tournament, but two words as an adjective and noun e.g. the slow clay courts

Comeback

Contractions: Are NOT acceptable in sport, just as they are not in news, except in quotes. So don’t should be do not, should’ve should be should have etc.

Coolly

Cricket, fielding positions: Extra cover, first slip, gully (no ‘e’ in the cricket fielding position), third man, leg slip, long-off, long-on, mid-on, mid-off, mid-wicket, square leg (two words, but hyphenate as an adjective as in square-leg umpire)

Roles: All-rounder, left-arm spinner, leg-spinner, off-spinner, wicketkeeper, wicketkeeper-batsman

Crowd: Takes a singular verb

Danger man

Defeat: One team is defeated BY another, not TO another

Distances: In athletics, swimming etc express distances as 400m hurdles/400m freestyle. Kilometres are abbreviated to km

Double fault: Two words in tennis

Drop-kick

Drop shot: Two words in tennis.

Europa League: (not Cup – formerly the Uefa Cup)

Extra time (but added time): Two words in the game went into extra time, but hyphen in an extra-time victory

Fast bowler (or pace bowler: Two words in cricket.

Fifa: Cap up initial only and use as singular noun eg Fifa said it would...

Fightback

Focused: Not focussed

Football positions: Goalkeeper (or keeper), right back, full back, centre half, wing back, right midfield, centre forward (no hyphens, to keep simple)

Formula One

Free kick: Two words

Front-man: (As in striker) takes a hyphen

Full time

Goalline

Goal-fest

Grand Prix: Cap in the title of a race e.g. Monaco Grand Prix, but lower case generally e.g. won his first grand prix. The plural is grands prix

Grand slam: Lower case tennis and rugby

Half marathon

Half-time

Hardman

Hat-trick: Hyphenated

Injury time: No hyphen (see extra time)

Joint leaders: No hyphen in Chelsea are the joint leaders, but joint-leaders Chelsea

Judoka: Someone who plays judo

Kick-off: Hyphenate in 3pm kick-off, but the game kicks off at 3pm

Ladies 200m freestyle: Not ladies’ 200m. It is the 200m for ladies, not the 200m of the ladies

Leaderboard: One word in golf

Like/such as: Like means similar to, such as is used when offering examples. e.g. players such as Torres and Ronaldo have increased in value following Portugal’s success, but bowlers like Andrew Flintoff, who put a lot of pressure on their leading leg, are at particular risk of a stress fracture

Line-up

Lineout: One word in rugby

Man of the match: Never hyphenate

Match point: Two words in racket sports

Medal: Do not use as a verb. Competitors win medals, they do not medal

Parsons Green Bowls Club: No apostrophe

Player of the year: Lower case as in Hanwell player of the year

Play-off

Quarter-final

Queens Park Rangers: No apostrophe

Record: Not new record which is tautological. Any record must be new. He broke the world record or set a world record

Repechage: Contest between runners-up usually for a place in the final, especially rowing

Rugby positions: Tighthead/loosehead prop, second row, No 8, scrum half, fly half, inside/outside centre, full back (no hyphens, to keep simple)

Scoresheet, scoreboard

Semi-final

Set point:  Two words in tennis

Shoot-out: Penalties

Side-footed

Sin bin: But he was sin-binned

Spot-kick

Super sub

Team-mate

Team names: Are used as plural nouns, e.g. Arsenal ARE expected to sign a keeper. BUT, club is singular, e.g. the north London club IS expected to sign a keeper

Test:  Test match (capped) in cricket and rugby union

The Beautiful Game: Cap in the football sense

Tiebreak: One word in tennis

Time: In athletics, swimming etc 2hrs 3mins 5secs or 3mins 43.76secs (can abbreviate to 2.03.05 or 3.43.76 after first use)

Top scorer: No hyphen

Try-line

Uefa: Cap up initial only and use as singular noun eg Uefa said it would

U16s A: Not U16 As

V: Use versus in copy but abbreviate to v (no full stop) in fixture list