TV VIEW:THE DELUGE began at Silverstone, veered west to Páirc Uí Chaoimh and back again towards southwest London, although the rain actually only stopped play at Wimbledon, proving that Formula One drivers and Gaelic footballers are made of hardier, more waterproof stuff than their tennis-playing peers.

At Silverstone, ITV's Louise Goodman cornered David Coulthard during the drivers' parade and asked, in light of his announcement that he would be retiring at the end of the year, if "your last parade at your home Grand Prix is a poignant moment for you".

"Yep," said Coulthard, "I can feel the water soaking through to my boxer shorts. I'm not sure at my age whether I've actually peed myself or it's the rain."

"Thank you for that, David," Louise probably said, only at that point her microphone drowned in the monsoon.

On to Páirc Uí Chaoimh, where we had sound but no pictures, Michael Lyster telling us the torrential rain was to blame, so heavy was it "there's water coming out the trombone of one of the Artane Boys Band".

Colm O'Rourke, packing away his sunglasses and factor 35, announced he was going home "to start making an ark - that's what we need today".

And with that the pictures went again, only returning once RTÉ's team of scuba divers located the submerged cables.

Over at Wimbledon, the BBC's coverage of the men's final began with The Rafa, Roger and Rudyard Show, Nadal and Federer reading extracts from Kipling's If. Roger was clearly moved by the poem as he delivered his lines, but Rafa's nose wrinkled a touch when he came to the bit about meeting with triumph and disaster and treating those two impostors just the same. "Yeah right," he said to himself.

Anyway, we were all set, revved up, raring to go. And then Sue Barker told us the covers were on. She begged Alex the Weather Man for some good news and he evidently desperately wanted to deliver some. "I'm reasonably hopeful," he beamed, as the torrents of rain falling on his umbrella made their way down his face and into his mouth. "By this evening we should be okay," he gurgled.

"Great," said Sue.

Time, then, for a look again at little English girl Laura Robson winning the Junior Wimbledon title on Saturday. Martina Navratilova, Tracey Austin and Virginia Wade, when asked by Sue for their thoughts on this triumph, all cautioned against mass hysteria, Pat Cash noting, in a "strewth" kind of way, that the men's doubles final had been relegated to BBC2 while Laura had taken centre stage on the main channel.

We shared their concerns for the 14-year-old, so were mightily relieved to see one English Sunday paper responding calmly to her victory: "Glory Laura Hallelujah!"

"God, that fella hasn't aged a day," latecomers to the BBC's coverage might have concluded when they switched over from Páirc Uí Chaoimh expecting to see the 2008 final, only to be greeted by an archival filler-in showing Federer winning junior Wimbledon a decade ago.

And would you blame them for leaving the páirc early?

"It's a joke of a game," said O'Rourke at half-time when Kerry were leading by 1-8 to 0-3, as "rain of biblical proportions" bucketed down on the panel's studio roof.

"The Cork footballers are a damp squib," he said, damp being the word for the day that was in it.

Not that he was too surprised. After all, pre-match he'd predicted, "Cork, a bit like England against Germany in the soccer, will play well, try all day - and Kerry will win."

Joe Brolly (how appropriate), who noted Kerry had filleted their opponents in the first half, was marginally less complimentary to the Cork footballers, "calling into question their integrity, their manliness, their courage, their passion", as O'Rourke put it.

Full time. A chuckling Michael Lyster swivelled in his chair, threw a glance at his beetroot-faced panel and said: "Analyse that!"

"Well . . ." said Joe.

"Well . . ." said Colm. Would you credit it, words failed them.

"We're very, very, very, very sorry," said Joe when the studio linked live to the Cork manager Conor Counihan. "I'm going to resign formally now from RTÉ as an analyst," he said.

"Lads," said Counihan, "if it was performance-related ye'd be gone long ago."

It was a return as sumptuous as any delivered by Rafa and Roger.

Speaking of Rafa and Roger. "Songs of Praise is now on BBC2," read the scrolling message when the pair returned after the rain break. That, of course, meant anyone who had set the video hoping for a blast of All Things Bright and Beautiful from a church in northeast Devon got a blast of tennis godliness from southwest London.

The sun finally came out, in more ways than one.