My drinking duel with George W Bush nearly cost him US presidency, admits John Newcombe

John Newcombe, an Australian former tennis champion, has finally revealed the details of an infamous "drinking duel" with George W Bush that nearly cost the young Texan the presidency.

The drinking bout near the Bush family's Kennebunkport summer home in Maine, in which the two matched each other beer for beer, ended with Bush's arrest for drink-driving, which he then kept secret for 24 years.

But five days before winning his first presidential election in 2000, the story of the arrest broke on United States television, prompting Bush to confess to the travelling press pack that he had been arrested for drink-driving during his "party boy" days.