First the world; then England!
People dallied with the early season notion that a fixture pile up and a deficit to make up on Liverpool might count for something. It didn’t. Manchester had the best manager, the best team, and they won an 18th title at a similar canter to the one United employed for the World Club Cup.
Too good to go down.
Tottenham Hotspur have seemingly made a lie of the claim that no side is too good to go down if it plays badly enough. Two points from eight games, and three from nine a match later, should have made relegation a formality. Still languishing well into the New Year they employed some champions league qualifying form, a proven new manager, and surprising depth to their post transfer window squad to secure their top flight status with seventeen points to spare.
Not too good to go down.
Newcastle United have seemingly proven the truth that no side is too good to go down if it plays badly enough. At one time apparently safe under the much hated Joe Kinnear, his dodgy ticker, an inexcusably weak squad, and an unproven but otherwise much loved new manager secured their Championship status with a final day whimper.
What goes up must come down…
…Unless what goes up is from Stoke or Hull. Hull earned almost all of their points before collapsing half way through the season. Stoke muddled through with a bit of bite, some old fashioned launching tactics, and the signing of the season in James Beattie.
What goes up must come down…
…and go up again. And come down again. etc. Poor West Brom must despair that their sensible business planning, cautious but sound transfer dealings, and commitment to play football without cynicism - has made them consistently better than the Championship but never as good as the Premier League.
Arsenal can splash the cash after all.
But apparently only when they are about to lose everything they hold dear. Arshavin was the big money signing that the Gunners need five of to even consider competing with United next season. Alas they only seem willing when one will save them from losing their Champions League gravy-train ticket. Lets hope he doesn’t go the way of Nasri and vanish after an initial glorious impact.
Good manager + time = results.
While Chelsea screw their aging team up by changing managers every time the owner sneezes, Everton and Aston Villa know better. Moyes and O’Neil have been given time to build their teams. They have been allowed set-backs without the sack. And they have been trusted to use their somewhat different budgets as they see fit. They may not have achieved the highest prize in English football, (a top four finish). But they are each the best of the rest.
Things can always get worse.
Blackburn Rovers were much despised for their violent game under Mark Hughes. Their willingness to kick and jab their way through 90 minutes of football each week was barely tolerably despite occasional good passing play. With Big Sam now in place, the passing turned to punting down field, while dirtiest side around kept their reputation and added some rather adept diving to their repertoire.
One thing we didn’t learn.
As yet no one knows quite why the season went on into late May, and how it is we have passed the bank holiday without an FA Cup winner crowned. This campaign had no more games than any other year but has left fans wearily waiting for it all to be over weeks after we normally start spending sunny days with our families. Or at least rainy ones at the cricket.
And one thing we should have learned years ago
While no one should have learned this, I fear many people will have. Roy Hodgson is a phenomenal manager.
Without cheating or gouging or diving or punting, his teams have always thrived, except of course when they haven’t been given time to. A low injury rate at a club that year after year sells prized assets and never goes down, he has taken Fulham to Europe where many a foreign fan will see his name listed and knowingly recognise a tough team to beat.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Managing the game away – Margin
As the football season finally creeps to its infuriatingly late conclusion, there is growing support for a return to a fairer league structure and wider distribution of television and sponsorship money. Sadly though, this comes at a ludicrous price.
With May now almost over the people who run football can soon cast off the irritating distraction of fans and football so as to discuss what really matters. Money! As such this is a dangerous time for fans. The 39th Game was shelved not binned last year, but for now we face another threat.
New proposals would see the Premier League extended to two divisions. This would create something akin to the historic English league that presently languishes in the third and fourth tier of our national game. Alone it is a positive suggestion and might even set a trend that returns us to the simple unified four division league structure of days gone by.
However, while there is even political pressure from Parliament for better distribution of wealth within the game, this move is attached to an awful idea that should be blocked. You see, for some god-awful reason that has been adequately explained to absolutely no one, the change would include the loss of over 100 matches per season for the affected clubs.
This is not a joke. This is not a flippant remark meant to raise a smirk about the silly ideas that men with money come out with. This is a serious proposal. You see, the Premier League would be expanded to include 36 teams across two divisions.
That would mean each top flight team loses four matches, while a whopping twelve games are taken from each second tier side.
This is clearly an awful idea. Football is very very popular. Fans like watching their team play football matches. And most of the money that clubs make comes directly or indirectly from playing football.
Yet despite all that, most of the clubs concerned may approve of the move.
Among the 36 clubs involved there are sixteen who arrive at the table as non-Premier League teams. For them any chance to climb aboard the greatest money-spinning gravy train in world sport would be embraced at almost any price.
Then there are thirteen of the top-flight twenty who have at some stage experienced life outside of the Premier League. They understandably fear that fate returning one day. As such most, if not all, would welcome the safety net of a second tier of Premier League cash. Indeed their anxieties will be all the more acute right now after seeing recent top flight regulars Charlton and Southampton financially imperilled and plunging into the third tier this season.
And so to the permanent members of the Premier League.
The present top eight, excluding Fulham in seventh, make up the permanent members of the Premier League. And they don’t see relegation as a serious concern. Indeed this season has shown why. Spurs suffered the worst ever start to a Premier League season. They were still bottom three weeks into the January transfer window. Yet few expected they would go down. They splashed the cash, bought in a good manager, and they may yet qualify for Europe.
These teams have no interest in the second tier of English football unless a gem of a youngster turns up there. Indeed they somewhat resent sharing TV and sponsorship money with the rest of the current Premier League. Only Newcastle United among the rest can compete with them for interest among television audiences. Adding a lot more little watched sides will not drive up commercial contracts very far. But it will mean spreading the cash more thinly.
Of course we should not ignore the years of whining from Fergusson, Wenger and numerous less lasting managers about there being too much football in England. They have complained long and hard that what football needs is less football. Apparently players tire and clubs can’t compete in Europe while playing in three domestic competitions.
Fortunately that argument is defunct.
The Premier League once had 22 teams, not 20. FA Cup ties could run to countless replays rather than jump to penalties after 120 minutes. The league Cup had rounds with two legs and even required teams playing in Europe to start in round two rather than round three. Football has been more than adequately cut now and everyone knows it, especially after Manchester United’s expansive and successful year.
Instead those top clubs will note that they sell out of high priced tickets regularly, and that the loss of two home games would cost millions in lost revenue.
So it seems that those seven clubs, which form something of a ruling minority within the game, should block proposals for all the wrong reasons. And that is a good thing. Not because fans don’t want a fairer league format, but because we love football and don’t deserve to have yet more of it taken away from us.
With May now almost over the people who run football can soon cast off the irritating distraction of fans and football so as to discuss what really matters. Money! As such this is a dangerous time for fans. The 39th Game was shelved not binned last year, but for now we face another threat.
New proposals would see the Premier League extended to two divisions. This would create something akin to the historic English league that presently languishes in the third and fourth tier of our national game. Alone it is a positive suggestion and might even set a trend that returns us to the simple unified four division league structure of days gone by.
However, while there is even political pressure from Parliament for better distribution of wealth within the game, this move is attached to an awful idea that should be blocked. You see, for some god-awful reason that has been adequately explained to absolutely no one, the change would include the loss of over 100 matches per season for the affected clubs.
This is not a joke. This is not a flippant remark meant to raise a smirk about the silly ideas that men with money come out with. This is a serious proposal. You see, the Premier League would be expanded to include 36 teams across two divisions.
That would mean each top flight team loses four matches, while a whopping twelve games are taken from each second tier side.
This is clearly an awful idea. Football is very very popular. Fans like watching their team play football matches. And most of the money that clubs make comes directly or indirectly from playing football.
Yet despite all that, most of the clubs concerned may approve of the move.
Among the 36 clubs involved there are sixteen who arrive at the table as non-Premier League teams. For them any chance to climb aboard the greatest money-spinning gravy train in world sport would be embraced at almost any price.
Then there are thirteen of the top-flight twenty who have at some stage experienced life outside of the Premier League. They understandably fear that fate returning one day. As such most, if not all, would welcome the safety net of a second tier of Premier League cash. Indeed their anxieties will be all the more acute right now after seeing recent top flight regulars Charlton and Southampton financially imperilled and plunging into the third tier this season.
And so to the permanent members of the Premier League.
The present top eight, excluding Fulham in seventh, make up the permanent members of the Premier League. And they don’t see relegation as a serious concern. Indeed this season has shown why. Spurs suffered the worst ever start to a Premier League season. They were still bottom three weeks into the January transfer window. Yet few expected they would go down. They splashed the cash, bought in a good manager, and they may yet qualify for Europe.
These teams have no interest in the second tier of English football unless a gem of a youngster turns up there. Indeed they somewhat resent sharing TV and sponsorship money with the rest of the current Premier League. Only Newcastle United among the rest can compete with them for interest among television audiences. Adding a lot more little watched sides will not drive up commercial contracts very far. But it will mean spreading the cash more thinly.
Of course we should not ignore the years of whining from Fergusson, Wenger and numerous less lasting managers about there being too much football in England. They have complained long and hard that what football needs is less football. Apparently players tire and clubs can’t compete in Europe while playing in three domestic competitions.
Fortunately that argument is defunct.
The Premier League once had 22 teams, not 20. FA Cup ties could run to countless replays rather than jump to penalties after 120 minutes. The league Cup had rounds with two legs and even required teams playing in Europe to start in round two rather than round three. Football has been more than adequately cut now and everyone knows it, especially after Manchester United’s expansive and successful year.
Instead those top clubs will note that they sell out of high priced tickets regularly, and that the loss of two home games would cost millions in lost revenue.
So it seems that those seven clubs, which form something of a ruling minority within the game, should block proposals for all the wrong reasons. And that is a good thing. Not because fans don’t want a fairer league format, but because we love football and don’t deserve to have yet more of it taken away from us.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Test cricket can be boring, and England defeats depressing, but I’m always glad it exists - Wooley
The size of the crowds has been far more worthy of mention than the cricket on display at the Riverside this week. A mediocre England side faced a dispirited West Indies on a wicket sapped of any life, as the Durham board tried to guarantee five days of advertising revenue, and in the process ensured that whatever happened in between those ad breaks resembled cricket in only the loosest possible sense.
I won't test your patience by explaining at length why the ECB needs to ensure pitches conspire to provide some element of a contest, or why £30-£60 is too much to charge someone to sit in the open air and have the skin on their face eroded by fearsome gales. If the ECB loses money on this game, they only have themselves to blame - contempt for one‘s audience has rarely scaled to these heights since Lou Reed made his fans pay for ‘Metal Machine Music‘.
Anyone who attended the Riverside on Friday, only to sit through hours and hours of lashing rainfall (at least those of us watching in our local pub got to enjoy ‘highlights’ of an equally dull 2007 version of this fixture on Sky Sports) can console themselves with one thought - at least they weren’t at Lords. I say this having turned up for the season opener at the self-styled cradle of cricket a month or so ago, fully aware that sitting and watching the rain fall was a distinct possibility, and was told that no refunds would be offered for lost play. The MCC believe, even when you watch no cricket at all, that the mere use of their plastic seats for an afternoon merits a £15 charge.
And yet I love test cricket. Its sad to think that through mismanagement, arrogance and over-indulgence, the five-day game may genuinely be under-threat. Was it really only five years ago that England won seven consecutive home tests in front of packed houses? Was it only ten years ago when sell out crowds were a given, even to watch England (about to be ranked the worst team in the world) lose to New Zealand (the team relieved of that dubious honour)?
When the music paper Melody Maker closed earlier in the decade, John Peel observed that it was something he felt an enlightened Government should preserve, if only for the good it had done in the past. I feel the same about test matches.
It has actually been a while since I last watched test match cricket in the flesh. I have always meant to take this activity up again, but for various reasons not unrelated to the size of my student debt, I haven’t cheered England on in person since 2001. In fact by splitting the cost of a ‘member and friend’ two-person season ticket for the St Lawrence Ground, I have spent less to watch the entire 2009 season of country cricket than some spent watching Alastair Cook nudge his way to three figures on Thursday.
Frankly, Andrew Strauss might be quite glad of that as in the past I’ve hardly been a good luck charm. Although England had already lost the 2001 Ashes by the time I decided to go to the Oval test, some pride had been rescued as Mark Butcher’s impish 173 not out inspired a fourth-innings run chase at Headingley . And besides, this was the venue where Phil Tufnell had shuffled in to take eleven Australian wickets four years earlier.
This time, alas, he was playing in what was to be his final test and was tonked for 174 runs out of an Australian total of over 600. On the final day, however, I was still confident that England (who had made over 400 themselves on first innings) would bat out for the draw. Ramprakash was in form having scored a hundred in the first innings, and he would surely see us through. He didn’t, of course. As Aristotle once wrote, when Ramprakash be top scorer, defeat shall surely follow. McGrath and Warne saw to it that the wise old owl wasn’t wrong, and we were in the car and on the way home by mid-afternoon.
Why was I so optimistic? Madness is the only possible answer. After all, two years earlier, in 1999, I turned up to the Oval expecting England to salvage their reputations and chase down a challenging (but not that challenging) total on the final day of the summer’s last test. Instead, as soon as Atherton and Thorpe were out, England meekly rolled over.
Some of you will remember this game as the one which ended with a baying mob of angry England fans booing Nasser Hussain as he was interviewed by Channel 4 on the balcony. I’d like to say that I was part of that mob (bit of history and all that), but the truth is that we were so let down that we’d already packed the thermos and sandwich-cooler into the car boot and were negotiating the Kennington traffic.
And yet, on both occasions I enjoyed the test match experience. Mexican waves were embraced, overpriced burgers were consumed and fawning, uncritical programme notes were read. There was even good natured banter with opposition fans (something you’re not likely to enjoy watching England at Wembley or Twickenham), and an Australian couple even passed round a selection of cheeses to console our spirits.
Of course, despite the prospect of pass-the-cheeseboard, the rowdy test match crowd is not a place for those of a more delicate disposition. A couple in front of me sipped Champagne throughout the day’s play, placated their very, very bored offspring and, after lunch, announced to the friends they’d bought a Surrey membership simply so that ‘we can sit in the Pavilion when we come to the Test next year’. I suppose, for some people, even a cheeseboard does not console one from having to sit near a fat man sunbathing with his top off.
A test match ground is also not the place to be if you want to watch the cricket. The best place for that, obviously, is at home, where you see the day’s play in intricate detail on television. So why do we come? Sometimes, its impossible to say. Yet, if someone now offered me the chance to attend a test this summer, I would probably go . Although, having said that, in my ticket-less state, I’m glad that the £60 I don’t really have, I still don’t have, rather than having even less than that.
You may have noticed that I’ve yet to mention the obvious elephant in the room - Twenty 20 and, specifically, the Indian Premier League. Surely, these don’t need to be a threat to test cricket. The presumption that cricket fans are going to choose to watch the Indian domestic league ahead of their own teams is not grounded in fact. Given that there has been room for six home tests and ten one-day internationals each summer since 1998, there is room for both tests and shorter games now.
India loves cricket, probably more even than England loves football, and has been crying out for a genuinely competitive domestic format, which they now finally have (although hosting the event in South Africa every time they hold a general election is surely unsustainable). The Indian board want to earn as much as they can, and clearly have an eye on football Premier League television revenues. The players, too, are eager to earn as much as they can, and clearly have their eye on Premier League salaries.
But will the IPL organisers be stupid enough to pay future Kevin Pietersens so much before they know for certain they will help their teams win? I doubt it. Chris Gayle may wish he was still in South Africa, but I’m sure Owais Shah (whose stint as a non-player on the IPL bench cost him his England place) hopes he will never have to go back.
I haven’t been watching the IPL, for two reasons. First, its on Setanta, which I don’t have . And second, it’s the Indian league - I’m from Kent. To enjoy sport, I need to care who wins. I want to have my mood lifted when my team wins and to be able to act like a spoilt primary school pupil when it doesn’t (that’s part of the fun). I’m sure the IPL is high quality, and I’m sure that the players are taking it seriously, but (much as was the case when I watched Real Madrid v Barcelona or Inter v AC Milan), the obvious talent on display didn’t mean that the results of the games actually mattered to me. But, I’m glad for the Indian fans, who will care, and deserve a reward like the IPL for decades of rampant enthusiasm.
Back in England I’m hoping (just like like Premier League season ticket holders pray that Scudamore doesn’t move the key fixture deciding their season to Bahrain) that clear heads prevail within the ECB. Cricket fans want test cricket to survive, cricket boards want test cricket to survive, cricket journalists want test cricket to survive and (give or take the odd big-hitting all-rounder) players want test cricket to survive.
To finish, I’ll quote Gideon Haigh (just as I did in my last article, but then he remains the finest of all writers on the game, and he has a new book out, which you should buy) - “the same boneheads who insist that they must ‘give the people what they want’ are seldom if ever around when the people actually want something”.
We all want test cricket to survive. If it doesn’t, Giles Clark and Latit Modi will have a lot to answer for.
I won't test your patience by explaining at length why the ECB needs to ensure pitches conspire to provide some element of a contest, or why £30-£60 is too much to charge someone to sit in the open air and have the skin on their face eroded by fearsome gales. If the ECB loses money on this game, they only have themselves to blame - contempt for one‘s audience has rarely scaled to these heights since Lou Reed made his fans pay for ‘Metal Machine Music‘.
Anyone who attended the Riverside on Friday, only to sit through hours and hours of lashing rainfall (at least those of us watching in our local pub got to enjoy ‘highlights’ of an equally dull 2007 version of this fixture on Sky Sports) can console themselves with one thought - at least they weren’t at Lords. I say this having turned up for the season opener at the self-styled cradle of cricket a month or so ago, fully aware that sitting and watching the rain fall was a distinct possibility, and was told that no refunds would be offered for lost play. The MCC believe, even when you watch no cricket at all, that the mere use of their plastic seats for an afternoon merits a £15 charge.
And yet I love test cricket. Its sad to think that through mismanagement, arrogance and over-indulgence, the five-day game may genuinely be under-threat. Was it really only five years ago that England won seven consecutive home tests in front of packed houses? Was it only ten years ago when sell out crowds were a given, even to watch England (about to be ranked the worst team in the world) lose to New Zealand (the team relieved of that dubious honour)?
When the music paper Melody Maker closed earlier in the decade, John Peel observed that it was something he felt an enlightened Government should preserve, if only for the good it had done in the past. I feel the same about test matches.
It has actually been a while since I last watched test match cricket in the flesh. I have always meant to take this activity up again, but for various reasons not unrelated to the size of my student debt, I haven’t cheered England on in person since 2001. In fact by splitting the cost of a ‘member and friend’ two-person season ticket for the St Lawrence Ground, I have spent less to watch the entire 2009 season of country cricket than some spent watching Alastair Cook nudge his way to three figures on Thursday.
Frankly, Andrew Strauss might be quite glad of that as in the past I’ve hardly been a good luck charm. Although England had already lost the 2001 Ashes by the time I decided to go to the Oval test, some pride had been rescued as Mark Butcher’s impish 173 not out inspired a fourth-innings run chase at Headingley . And besides, this was the venue where Phil Tufnell had shuffled in to take eleven Australian wickets four years earlier.
This time, alas, he was playing in what was to be his final test and was tonked for 174 runs out of an Australian total of over 600. On the final day, however, I was still confident that England (who had made over 400 themselves on first innings) would bat out for the draw. Ramprakash was in form having scored a hundred in the first innings, and he would surely see us through. He didn’t, of course. As Aristotle once wrote, when Ramprakash be top scorer, defeat shall surely follow. McGrath and Warne saw to it that the wise old owl wasn’t wrong, and we were in the car and on the way home by mid-afternoon.
Why was I so optimistic? Madness is the only possible answer. After all, two years earlier, in 1999, I turned up to the Oval expecting England to salvage their reputations and chase down a challenging (but not that challenging) total on the final day of the summer’s last test. Instead, as soon as Atherton and Thorpe were out, England meekly rolled over.
Some of you will remember this game as the one which ended with a baying mob of angry England fans booing Nasser Hussain as he was interviewed by Channel 4 on the balcony. I’d like to say that I was part of that mob (bit of history and all that), but the truth is that we were so let down that we’d already packed the thermos and sandwich-cooler into the car boot and were negotiating the Kennington traffic.
And yet, on both occasions I enjoyed the test match experience. Mexican waves were embraced, overpriced burgers were consumed and fawning, uncritical programme notes were read. There was even good natured banter with opposition fans (something you’re not likely to enjoy watching England at Wembley or Twickenham), and an Australian couple even passed round a selection of cheeses to console our spirits.
Of course, despite the prospect of pass-the-cheeseboard, the rowdy test match crowd is not a place for those of a more delicate disposition. A couple in front of me sipped Champagne throughout the day’s play, placated their very, very bored offspring and, after lunch, announced to the friends they’d bought a Surrey membership simply so that ‘we can sit in the Pavilion when we come to the Test next year’. I suppose, for some people, even a cheeseboard does not console one from having to sit near a fat man sunbathing with his top off.
A test match ground is also not the place to be if you want to watch the cricket. The best place for that, obviously, is at home, where you see the day’s play in intricate detail on television. So why do we come? Sometimes, its impossible to say. Yet, if someone now offered me the chance to attend a test this summer, I would probably go . Although, having said that, in my ticket-less state, I’m glad that the £60 I don’t really have, I still don’t have, rather than having even less than that.
You may have noticed that I’ve yet to mention the obvious elephant in the room - Twenty 20 and, specifically, the Indian Premier League. Surely, these don’t need to be a threat to test cricket. The presumption that cricket fans are going to choose to watch the Indian domestic league ahead of their own teams is not grounded in fact. Given that there has been room for six home tests and ten one-day internationals each summer since 1998, there is room for both tests and shorter games now.
India loves cricket, probably more even than England loves football, and has been crying out for a genuinely competitive domestic format, which they now finally have (although hosting the event in South Africa every time they hold a general election is surely unsustainable). The Indian board want to earn as much as they can, and clearly have an eye on football Premier League television revenues. The players, too, are eager to earn as much as they can, and clearly have their eye on Premier League salaries.
But will the IPL organisers be stupid enough to pay future Kevin Pietersens so much before they know for certain they will help their teams win? I doubt it. Chris Gayle may wish he was still in South Africa, but I’m sure Owais Shah (whose stint as a non-player on the IPL bench cost him his England place) hopes he will never have to go back.
I haven’t been watching the IPL, for two reasons. First, its on Setanta, which I don’t have . And second, it’s the Indian league - I’m from Kent. To enjoy sport, I need to care who wins. I want to have my mood lifted when my team wins and to be able to act like a spoilt primary school pupil when it doesn’t (that’s part of the fun). I’m sure the IPL is high quality, and I’m sure that the players are taking it seriously, but (much as was the case when I watched Real Madrid v Barcelona or Inter v AC Milan), the obvious talent on display didn’t mean that the results of the games actually mattered to me. But, I’m glad for the Indian fans, who will care, and deserve a reward like the IPL for decades of rampant enthusiasm.
Back in England I’m hoping (just like like Premier League season ticket holders pray that Scudamore doesn’t move the key fixture deciding their season to Bahrain) that clear heads prevail within the ECB. Cricket fans want test cricket to survive, cricket boards want test cricket to survive, cricket journalists want test cricket to survive and (give or take the odd big-hitting all-rounder) players want test cricket to survive.
To finish, I’ll quote Gideon Haigh (just as I did in my last article, but then he remains the finest of all writers on the game, and he has a new book out, which you should buy) - “the same boneheads who insist that they must ‘give the people what they want’ are seldom if ever around when the people actually want something”.
We all want test cricket to survive. If it doesn’t, Giles Clark and Latit Modi will have a lot to answer for.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Excitement in Spain – by mimitig
So here we are again. Two weeks since Formula One graced our screens, one week since MotoGP failed to make any inroads in the mainstream sports media, and only a matter of days since Barcelona hogged the headlines.
Now, although only a part-time football fan, I did follow the Chelsea v Barca game and was astounded at the reactions of the losing side. Compared to other sports that I follow, Drogba’s behaviour really did appear to be beyond the pale. There seems to have been a generally negative reaction to his antics – provoking a debate about how to win or lose gracefully.
Well you need go no further than MotoGP. Valentino Rossi won his first race of the season last Sunday in Jerez. After qualifying off the front row (in fourth place), Rossi had it all to do, and did it with flair and skill. He beat local favourite, Pedrosa and Stoner and paid tribute to his rivals after the race.
Neither Stoner or Dani had a bad word to say about the man who had made them look ordinary. This is grace in victory and defeat. Admittedly Rossi was in a class of his own last weekend in the race. He diced a bit with the Aussie but caught and passed him in style. He had a tougher opponent in Dani Pedrosa, but a mixture of Dani’s fitness (the poor boy is still suffering from pre-season surgery and crashes) and Valle’s experience and determination ensured the result of the race was pretty secure with not more than a third of the distance to run. It didn’t make for a dull race though – with Rossi gunning for a win there’s always fun in wondering how he will celebrate his win. It was a visit to the Portaloo again this time. Maybe not as much fun as the first time he did this, but it shows he still has great joy in winning.
In the 125cc race last weekend there was great excitement for supporters of British Motorcycling, as young Bradley Smith took his first win in the top rank of his racing. He is just 18 years old and a very very bright hope for the future.
For fans of bike-racing, it is particularly rewarding to see Smith cutting the mustard because our only representative in the premier class, James Toseland, double world champ in Superbikes, is not delivering the sort of results that promise another championship. Our hopes for a British winner sometime in our lifetimes rest with the young pretender.
That was the bikes and the focus of motorsport moved to The Circuit de Catalunya. The F1 Teams arrived in Spain with a myriad of changes to their cars. All wondering how to do better than the top dogs – Brawn GP and Red Bull. Everyone arrived thinking they had a special part or idea to beat the Championship leaders, but it didn’t work.
In qualifying Button snatched a last-second pole, Vettel continued to show Red Bull’s class with second, and Barrichello took third. These drivers, along with their teams, have set up a great race.
While the motor-fired peddlers were doing their stuff in Spain, my favourite sportsman was doing the business in Italy.
Mark Cavendish – there are no superlatives good enough for this young man. Having won Milan-San Remo already this season, Mark is on fire and keen to improve on last year’s tally of 19 wins. With his team, Columbia, Mark took the first stage of the Giro d’Italia and he thereby becomes the first Briton ever to wear the Maglia Rose.
Here is a possible example of how not to lose gracefully: Mark’s key opponent is the Flemish rider Tom Boonen. A World Champion, but a man who has not taken opposition well. Facing Cav this season, sadly Tom has chosen a disappointing path in his career and for the second time in three years has tested positive for a class A drug.
It is such a shame that on the day when the headlines should have been all about Mark, they were all about Tom. Although this story is not about performance-enhancing drugs rather it is about the poor choices made by a man who is seemingly unhappy and disturbed, it adds to the shadow hanging over pro-cycling. It would appear that for every stride forward that transparently clean teams like Columbia and Garmin take, there is an individual in cycling determined to drag the sport down again.
On Sunday the Giro continued and although Cav was edged out of the sprint win by Alessandro Petacchi, Manxman Mark will wear the Pink Jersey tomorrow.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/cycling/8042846.stm
So to the motorsport event of the day.
Historically the Barcelona F1 race has been a snooze-fest with the previous eight pole-sitters going on to win the race and very little over-taking going on. Also in the 18 years of running the race, the Safety Car has only been deployed some four times at the Circuit de Catalunya, so it could have been a seamless lights to flag cruise for the boy Button.
Mercifully for spectators the race turned some of those statistics on their heads. Barrichello made a demon start and led Button in to the first corner. Massa, Ferrari’s only chance in this race for any points after Raikkonen and his engineers had somewhat fumbled in qualifying and the Finn hadn’t even made it to Qually 2, was a rocket off the line and jumped Vettel in to third. Further behind Webber reminded us of what a fine driver he is by making the move of the day on Alonso, and behind them, mayhem.
Rosberg edged Trulli off the track, and as the Italian returned, he speared in to Force India’s Adrian Sutil (who had been on his own little off-track manoeuvre) and the subsequent chaos took out both Toro Rossos. A racing incident said former F1 Team Principal and current BBC pundit Eddie Jordan, but one which will have cost tens of thousands of pounds for the teams involved.
The “incident” brought out the safety car and when it pulled off, it was game on again for the leaders. The Brawns had to keep the KERS-enabled Ferrari of Massa behind them, which they did with coolness and team driving.
From then on, Brawn was in control. And that meant not just the drivers but head honcho Ross Brawn. He called the strategy shots which ensured his boys ended up with a race 1-2. It could have been Barrichello but for one poor stint which saw Rubens’s times tumble and Jenson’s accelerate. For the fourth time this year, Our Jense (as the meeja have taken to dubbing him) took the chequered flag and extend his lead at the head of the table. Brawn GP sit atop of the Constructors’ Championship.
It is ironic that this is a position familiar to Ross – for years at Ferrari he held the key to winning. Now he is doing it for himself and Ferrari are minnows struggling at the back and shooting themselves in the foot with poor reliability and increasingly poor decision-making.
Mark Webber consolidated his fine drive with a podium finish meaning that the British engineering excellence of Adrian Newey and Ross Brawn continues to rule the roost.
Far be it from me to indulge in schadenfreude – oh go on, Davies, you know you love it! – but the sight of Massa’s Ferrari running out of gas on the closing lap, with Schumacher in the garage, was a precious gem.
All in all, I would call this a satisfactory week and weekend of sport. Cav in pink – historic. England wiped the Windies in three days – dodgy win, but great. Valle stamped his mark all over MotoGP with Brad Smith playing the second hand and Button proving to the world that he has what it takes.
Next week we’ll be back with the bikes, in the interim the Giro goes on and another Test Match starts on Thursday. I think there’s a bit of football as well. What a treat for sports fans.
While we are waiting, there’s no better way to spend time than with the Pixies – I highly recommend this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6WuB-QgRjw&feature=PlayList&p=41847CCEA0438048&index=5
Levitate me – that’s what sport does.
Now, although only a part-time football fan, I did follow the Chelsea v Barca game and was astounded at the reactions of the losing side. Compared to other sports that I follow, Drogba’s behaviour really did appear to be beyond the pale. There seems to have been a generally negative reaction to his antics – provoking a debate about how to win or lose gracefully.
Well you need go no further than MotoGP. Valentino Rossi won his first race of the season last Sunday in Jerez. After qualifying off the front row (in fourth place), Rossi had it all to do, and did it with flair and skill. He beat local favourite, Pedrosa and Stoner and paid tribute to his rivals after the race.
Neither Stoner or Dani had a bad word to say about the man who had made them look ordinary. This is grace in victory and defeat. Admittedly Rossi was in a class of his own last weekend in the race. He diced a bit with the Aussie but caught and passed him in style. He had a tougher opponent in Dani Pedrosa, but a mixture of Dani’s fitness (the poor boy is still suffering from pre-season surgery and crashes) and Valle’s experience and determination ensured the result of the race was pretty secure with not more than a third of the distance to run. It didn’t make for a dull race though – with Rossi gunning for a win there’s always fun in wondering how he will celebrate his win. It was a visit to the Portaloo again this time. Maybe not as much fun as the first time he did this, but it shows he still has great joy in winning.
In the 125cc race last weekend there was great excitement for supporters of British Motorcycling, as young Bradley Smith took his first win in the top rank of his racing. He is just 18 years old and a very very bright hope for the future.
For fans of bike-racing, it is particularly rewarding to see Smith cutting the mustard because our only representative in the premier class, James Toseland, double world champ in Superbikes, is not delivering the sort of results that promise another championship. Our hopes for a British winner sometime in our lifetimes rest with the young pretender.
That was the bikes and the focus of motorsport moved to The Circuit de Catalunya. The F1 Teams arrived in Spain with a myriad of changes to their cars. All wondering how to do better than the top dogs – Brawn GP and Red Bull. Everyone arrived thinking they had a special part or idea to beat the Championship leaders, but it didn’t work.
In qualifying Button snatched a last-second pole, Vettel continued to show Red Bull’s class with second, and Barrichello took third. These drivers, along with their teams, have set up a great race.
While the motor-fired peddlers were doing their stuff in Spain, my favourite sportsman was doing the business in Italy.
Mark Cavendish – there are no superlatives good enough for this young man. Having won Milan-San Remo already this season, Mark is on fire and keen to improve on last year’s tally of 19 wins. With his team, Columbia, Mark took the first stage of the Giro d’Italia and he thereby becomes the first Briton ever to wear the Maglia Rose.
Here is a possible example of how not to lose gracefully: Mark’s key opponent is the Flemish rider Tom Boonen. A World Champion, but a man who has not taken opposition well. Facing Cav this season, sadly Tom has chosen a disappointing path in his career and for the second time in three years has tested positive for a class A drug.
It is such a shame that on the day when the headlines should have been all about Mark, they were all about Tom. Although this story is not about performance-enhancing drugs rather it is about the poor choices made by a man who is seemingly unhappy and disturbed, it adds to the shadow hanging over pro-cycling. It would appear that for every stride forward that transparently clean teams like Columbia and Garmin take, there is an individual in cycling determined to drag the sport down again.
On Sunday the Giro continued and although Cav was edged out of the sprint win by Alessandro Petacchi, Manxman Mark will wear the Pink Jersey tomorrow.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/cycling/8042846.stm
So to the motorsport event of the day.
Historically the Barcelona F1 race has been a snooze-fest with the previous eight pole-sitters going on to win the race and very little over-taking going on. Also in the 18 years of running the race, the Safety Car has only been deployed some four times at the Circuit de Catalunya, so it could have been a seamless lights to flag cruise for the boy Button.
Mercifully for spectators the race turned some of those statistics on their heads. Barrichello made a demon start and led Button in to the first corner. Massa, Ferrari’s only chance in this race for any points after Raikkonen and his engineers had somewhat fumbled in qualifying and the Finn hadn’t even made it to Qually 2, was a rocket off the line and jumped Vettel in to third. Further behind Webber reminded us of what a fine driver he is by making the move of the day on Alonso, and behind them, mayhem.
Rosberg edged Trulli off the track, and as the Italian returned, he speared in to Force India’s Adrian Sutil (who had been on his own little off-track manoeuvre) and the subsequent chaos took out both Toro Rossos. A racing incident said former F1 Team Principal and current BBC pundit Eddie Jordan, but one which will have cost tens of thousands of pounds for the teams involved.
The “incident” brought out the safety car and when it pulled off, it was game on again for the leaders. The Brawns had to keep the KERS-enabled Ferrari of Massa behind them, which they did with coolness and team driving.
From then on, Brawn was in control. And that meant not just the drivers but head honcho Ross Brawn. He called the strategy shots which ensured his boys ended up with a race 1-2. It could have been Barrichello but for one poor stint which saw Rubens’s times tumble and Jenson’s accelerate. For the fourth time this year, Our Jense (as the meeja have taken to dubbing him) took the chequered flag and extend his lead at the head of the table. Brawn GP sit atop of the Constructors’ Championship.
It is ironic that this is a position familiar to Ross – for years at Ferrari he held the key to winning. Now he is doing it for himself and Ferrari are minnows struggling at the back and shooting themselves in the foot with poor reliability and increasingly poor decision-making.
Mark Webber consolidated his fine drive with a podium finish meaning that the British engineering excellence of Adrian Newey and Ross Brawn continues to rule the roost.
Far be it from me to indulge in schadenfreude – oh go on, Davies, you know you love it! – but the sight of Massa’s Ferrari running out of gas on the closing lap, with Schumacher in the garage, was a precious gem.
All in all, I would call this a satisfactory week and weekend of sport. Cav in pink – historic. England wiped the Windies in three days – dodgy win, but great. Valle stamped his mark all over MotoGP with Brad Smith playing the second hand and Button proving to the world that he has what it takes.
Next week we’ll be back with the bikes, in the interim the Giro goes on and another Test Match starts on Thursday. I think there’s a bit of football as well. What a treat for sports fans.
While we are waiting, there’s no better way to spend time than with the Pixies – I highly recommend this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6WuB-QgRjw&feature=PlayList&p=41847CCEA0438048&index=5
Levitate me – that’s what sport does.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Referee outclassed by two modern stars - Margin
Fans were nearly robbed of the Champions League final we all wanted. Worse still we were nearly given the one final most likely to make us watch something else that night. So it is a sad feeling to have to credit referees for our good fortune.
While the result would always carry interest, most of us have the sense not to watch another Chelsea-United finale. The FA Cup Final was awful. Last season’s European equivalent was even worse. And it is hard to see why this season’s version might have been different.
I know that will be especially hard for Chelsea fans to read. Manchester United were equally to blame for those finals. But United were always going to outclass a much inferior Arsenal over two legs. Indeed only bad refereeing in the first leg kept that semi-final alive until the start of second, and it died as a competition soon after. So Chelsea had to be sacrificed.
Not that I’m claiming conspiracy against a repeat final. Four overlooked but plausible penalty claims, two of which were actually nailed down certainties, might signal some sort of bias. But I’m not keen on such talk. Instead consider this my cathartic effort to resolve my relief at the result with my displeasure at its manner.
As I say, the Norwegian in the middle last night had four big penalty calls and got at three of them wrong.
I’ll forgive him the first as the foul started outside the box. Besides, I don’t think running into a defender and flopping to the floor in hope of a penalty, even if you have previously been hindered, is the same as being bought down.
And I’ll forgive him the second. Not because it wasn’t a penalty. It definitely was. But I’ll forgive him the second because it was Drogba, and everyone with an ounce of common sense assumes it is a dive when Drogba hits the deck. Refs would simply get far more decisions right than wrong by assuming he’s cheating every time.
That said I can’t forgive him or his linesman for the third. It was a clear handball, and even if I were generous enough to the defence to suggest it was unintentional, it would still be a penalty.
And I won’t forgive him the fourth, which I can only imagine he bottled because it was so late in the game. He had a clear view, an arm went up, it was struck by the ball, and it was in the box. He panicked and Ballack was understandably incensed.
But to overcome conspiracy arguments lets not forget two rather large decisions that went the other way over the two legs.
One was a second awful sending off in two days, which thanks to idiotic Uefa rules will now see two players miss out on deserved cup final places. It was simply not a foul. Anelka ran by Abidal, cut across him, and having broken clear he clumsily tripped himself up rather than running on to score. It was a sad moment that cost Chelsea dear, but not because of the ref.
The other came long before that, and in fact long before kick off. That decision was not to give Barcelona a clear cut penalty when Henry was pulled down as he attempted to shoot in the box. It is easy to forget how much better Barca were in the first leg, and how much they deserved a goal. But that also means it is easy to overlook how easy a second leg they might have had with a 1-0 advantage.
Were Chelsea forced to throw men forward, Barca, like ManU at the Emirates, might have done what they do best. Hit fast and hard on the counter attack and run rampant as a result. We saw that game plan work the night before, and though there is no guarantee the same would have happened last night, it is hard not to draw lessons from watching Barca do just that to so many teams over the course of this season.
So claims of conspiracy, as comforting as they might be for Blues fans this morning, are a little weak to say the least.
Instead we should enjoy the two real moments of absolute class that separated the sides.
Essien and Iniesta are by far and away my favourite two players at the two clubs they play for. They are to my mind their sides’ Paul Scholes – the players without whom the entire team simply functions less well right across the park.
I don’t know exactly what it is about each of them, as different as they are to each other. But to see their influence and class rewarded with two such stunning goals was wonderful.
Essien’s was all about the energy and enthusiasm with which he attacks any ball or space at any stage of any game. And the power of his quickly hit volley was breathtaking.
Iniesta’s was all about his enduring composure. In the dying seconds and with everything riding on one touch, he calmly stood, awaited the ball, picked his spot, and stroked the ball home from the edge of the box. Refusing to be rushed is his trademark.
So hopefully when tempers calm and the replays of ranting players stop, people will remember that Essien and Iniesta gave football two fine moments of inspiration last night.
While the result would always carry interest, most of us have the sense not to watch another Chelsea-United finale. The FA Cup Final was awful. Last season’s European equivalent was even worse. And it is hard to see why this season’s version might have been different.
I know that will be especially hard for Chelsea fans to read. Manchester United were equally to blame for those finals. But United were always going to outclass a much inferior Arsenal over two legs. Indeed only bad refereeing in the first leg kept that semi-final alive until the start of second, and it died as a competition soon after. So Chelsea had to be sacrificed.
Not that I’m claiming conspiracy against a repeat final. Four overlooked but plausible penalty claims, two of which were actually nailed down certainties, might signal some sort of bias. But I’m not keen on such talk. Instead consider this my cathartic effort to resolve my relief at the result with my displeasure at its manner.
As I say, the Norwegian in the middle last night had four big penalty calls and got at three of them wrong.
I’ll forgive him the first as the foul started outside the box. Besides, I don’t think running into a defender and flopping to the floor in hope of a penalty, even if you have previously been hindered, is the same as being bought down.
And I’ll forgive him the second. Not because it wasn’t a penalty. It definitely was. But I’ll forgive him the second because it was Drogba, and everyone with an ounce of common sense assumes it is a dive when Drogba hits the deck. Refs would simply get far more decisions right than wrong by assuming he’s cheating every time.
That said I can’t forgive him or his linesman for the third. It was a clear handball, and even if I were generous enough to the defence to suggest it was unintentional, it would still be a penalty.
And I won’t forgive him the fourth, which I can only imagine he bottled because it was so late in the game. He had a clear view, an arm went up, it was struck by the ball, and it was in the box. He panicked and Ballack was understandably incensed.
But to overcome conspiracy arguments lets not forget two rather large decisions that went the other way over the two legs.
One was a second awful sending off in two days, which thanks to idiotic Uefa rules will now see two players miss out on deserved cup final places. It was simply not a foul. Anelka ran by Abidal, cut across him, and having broken clear he clumsily tripped himself up rather than running on to score. It was a sad moment that cost Chelsea dear, but not because of the ref.
The other came long before that, and in fact long before kick off. That decision was not to give Barcelona a clear cut penalty when Henry was pulled down as he attempted to shoot in the box. It is easy to forget how much better Barca were in the first leg, and how much they deserved a goal. But that also means it is easy to overlook how easy a second leg they might have had with a 1-0 advantage.
Were Chelsea forced to throw men forward, Barca, like ManU at the Emirates, might have done what they do best. Hit fast and hard on the counter attack and run rampant as a result. We saw that game plan work the night before, and though there is no guarantee the same would have happened last night, it is hard not to draw lessons from watching Barca do just that to so many teams over the course of this season.
So claims of conspiracy, as comforting as they might be for Blues fans this morning, are a little weak to say the least.
Instead we should enjoy the two real moments of absolute class that separated the sides.
Essien and Iniesta are by far and away my favourite two players at the two clubs they play for. They are to my mind their sides’ Paul Scholes – the players without whom the entire team simply functions less well right across the park.
I don’t know exactly what it is about each of them, as different as they are to each other. But to see their influence and class rewarded with two such stunning goals was wonderful.
Essien’s was all about the energy and enthusiasm with which he attacks any ball or space at any stage of any game. And the power of his quickly hit volley was breathtaking.
Iniesta’s was all about his enduring composure. In the dying seconds and with everything riding on one touch, he calmly stood, awaited the ball, picked his spot, and stroked the ball home from the edge of the box. Refusing to be rushed is his trademark.
So hopefully when tempers calm and the replays of ranting players stop, people will remember that Essien and Iniesta gave football two fine moments of inspiration last night.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Bahrain and Motegi – more motorsport from mimitig
As the Formula One circus relocated from China to Bahrain last weekend, so the MotoGP cavalcade moved in the opposite direction, swapping the deserts of Qatar for the shores of Japan and Honda’s backyard – the Motegi Twinring Racetrack.
All things being equal, this should have been a weekend with weather taking a back seat. Fears about a fierce sandstorm that had kept Baghdad airport closed for two days were proven unfounded for the four-wheelers in Bahrain. Practices and qualifying played out under perfect (though extremely hot) conditions while in Japan, guess what? There was, as the commentators would say, rain of biblical proportions! Saturday qualifying was quite literally washed-out for all three classes and grids were set from Friday’s practice times.
Sunday morning dawned – here in Scotland it was misty and a bit dreich. In Bahrain it was outstandingly hot and in Japan – well, there was a bit of morning rain, but nothing to worry about.
What I had to worry about was how I could watch all the racing and get to my work without missing anything. In theory I could have got up at 6am for the bikes and watched live, but – it may surprise my readers to know this, I have a social life. Not getting to bed til when gone midnight on Saturday meant that the bikes had to be taped.
Rising late on Sunday morning, my mission was to avoid any sports news results. This was achieved and I settled down for the first part of the F1 race – knowing that I would miss the end as I had to go to work at 2pm. That first hour was truly exciting. Overtaking off the line, and all through the first lap reminded me of how racing used to be.
Toyota had bagged the front row but they had done it by running very light on fuel in the final session of qualifying. Behind them were cars, notably Sebastian Vettel’s Red Bull and Jenson Button’s Brawn that were due to run much deeper into the race before pitting for tyres and fuel.
Button simply stormed the start. Some great driving saw him past Vettel and fending off the fast-starting Hamilton. Delivering the fast laps demanded of him by team boss Ross Brawn (exactly as Schumacher used to do when he and Brawn ruled Ferrari), Button ensured that the Toyota challenge would remain thus: a challenge.
Although there were several other drivers leading the race at various stages because of fuel stops, Button was the clear winner from early on. The only issue was whether the car would hold together. In practice and qualifying, Brawn GP had been concerned about their cars’ ability to operate well at the high temperatures encountered in Bahrain.
Unfounded worries. Jense came home a worthy winner, Barrichello notching up good points in fifth ensuring that the team move on to Barcelona with a more than healthy lead in the championship tables – both drivers’ and constructors’.
You can’t help wondering what Honda are feeling now having pulled the plug on the team just a couple of months ago. And doubly bad given Motegi – read on my friends.
It was another great day for Red Bull and Adrian Newey’s 2009 championship contender. It seems that comparative newbie Sebastian Vettel (he’s only in his second full year of F1) has the measure of many more experienced drivers. After a superb win in wet Shanghai, he drove faultlessly to second in Bahrain.
Red Bull are ready to stand toe-to-toe with Brawn GP this season.
Back east, in Japan, the racing had already been done but I didn’t see it until after.
What a race! If F1 has rediscovered its mojo this year, then MotoGP has done that and more.
The new tyre restrictions – one supplier, only two choices (much as F1 has done, I have to say) have helped to chuck a spanner in the works of some teams. It’s strangely equivalent in these two sports at the moment. We have the rule changes, we have a “phoenix” team in that Kawasaki pulled out at the last moment only to re-emerge with a black paint-job and the name Hayate and we’ve had rain (of biblical proportions) affecting the racing.
So Saturday qually was a complete and utter wash-out. There were rivers running across the track in at least three corners. The safety car could barely make it round. Spectators were pictured forlornly huddled under their sponsor branded umbrellas but there could be no action. A grid was set from the one brief Friday practice and the god who is Valentino Rossi was on pole.
Sunday’s race got underway in sunshine – thank the weather. The 125cc lot and indeed the 250cc brigade had to race on a nastily damp track. Rossi did nothing wrong – clean start and led by over a second for several laps. Problems with the front end allowed team mate Gorgeous Jorge Lorenzo through and boy, did Jorge make the most of that.
While Rossi scrapped with Dani Pedrosa, Jorge scampered away and by the time Dani was well and truly put in his place, Rossi didn’t have the laps or the tyres to chase for the win.
Pragmatic as ever, and thinking about the big picture, Valle settled for a comfortable second as Jorge took the glory and his second GP win.
Dani showed rare signs of emotion coming in third. He’s not exactly a PR dream – usually appearing as surly and sullen – but his post-race interview was really rather sweet. He’s been through the mill in the off season with surgery to his knee and he is rather bashed up and bruised, but he smiled a lot at getting on the podium and I reckon he’s won new fans this race.
Rossi was thrilled, as he always is when he’s fought hard for a podium – and the trademark knee-out was there a lot this race. There is no doubt at all that he is fighting to keep his crown.
Gorgeous George is as delightful and arrogant as always. We love him for his insouciance and he’s only the second person ever, after Telly Savales, to make sucking a lollipop cool – I can’t believe he doesn’t have Chuppa Chups sponsorship!
Stoner finished fourth – wrestling the Ducati all the way. His team-mate, former World Champion Nicky Hayden didn’t finish (not his fault, but he should have qualified better) so the next best Ducati was Finn Mika Kallio who is definitely defying the rules about Finnish drivers – they need four wheels – not!. A superb ride from the back of the grid to eighth means he is a man to watch.
So there we go – both disciplines are heading back to Europe. F1 to Barcelona – where Brawn GP performed superbly in testing and are looking to further humiliate a rather shambolic Ferrari.
MotoGP comes back to Jerez and who knows what will happen there? Honda scraped a podium at their home track and must be expected to fight back.
And believe you me, every single person involved in Honda Racing will be feeling huge pain tonight. To be beaten by Yamaha, a one-two, at their home track of Motegi, my oh my those Honda boys and girls are going to be searching for a way to win at Jerez.
Button sits comfortably atop the F1 Drivers’ table, Rossi is second to team-mate Jorge – with Jorge coming in to a home race.
All is to play for and the only bitter pill is what will happen for McLaren in Paris next week. Hamilton did a sterling job driving to fourth in Bahrain. It would be sad to see his results and an historically important and brilliant team done down in a court of law.
Fans of every team want to see results on the track. One of the reasons why MotoGP is becoming the motorsport of choice ahead of F1 is these silly politics.
Let the boys race – that’s my call, and thus far (aside from silliness), that’s what we’re getting.
All things being equal, this should have been a weekend with weather taking a back seat. Fears about a fierce sandstorm that had kept Baghdad airport closed for two days were proven unfounded for the four-wheelers in Bahrain. Practices and qualifying played out under perfect (though extremely hot) conditions while in Japan, guess what? There was, as the commentators would say, rain of biblical proportions! Saturday qualifying was quite literally washed-out for all three classes and grids were set from Friday’s practice times.
Sunday morning dawned – here in Scotland it was misty and a bit dreich. In Bahrain it was outstandingly hot and in Japan – well, there was a bit of morning rain, but nothing to worry about.
What I had to worry about was how I could watch all the racing and get to my work without missing anything. In theory I could have got up at 6am for the bikes and watched live, but – it may surprise my readers to know this, I have a social life. Not getting to bed til when gone midnight on Saturday meant that the bikes had to be taped.
Rising late on Sunday morning, my mission was to avoid any sports news results. This was achieved and I settled down for the first part of the F1 race – knowing that I would miss the end as I had to go to work at 2pm. That first hour was truly exciting. Overtaking off the line, and all through the first lap reminded me of how racing used to be.
Toyota had bagged the front row but they had done it by running very light on fuel in the final session of qualifying. Behind them were cars, notably Sebastian Vettel’s Red Bull and Jenson Button’s Brawn that were due to run much deeper into the race before pitting for tyres and fuel.
Button simply stormed the start. Some great driving saw him past Vettel and fending off the fast-starting Hamilton. Delivering the fast laps demanded of him by team boss Ross Brawn (exactly as Schumacher used to do when he and Brawn ruled Ferrari), Button ensured that the Toyota challenge would remain thus: a challenge.
Although there were several other drivers leading the race at various stages because of fuel stops, Button was the clear winner from early on. The only issue was whether the car would hold together. In practice and qualifying, Brawn GP had been concerned about their cars’ ability to operate well at the high temperatures encountered in Bahrain.
Unfounded worries. Jense came home a worthy winner, Barrichello notching up good points in fifth ensuring that the team move on to Barcelona with a more than healthy lead in the championship tables – both drivers’ and constructors’.
You can’t help wondering what Honda are feeling now having pulled the plug on the team just a couple of months ago. And doubly bad given Motegi – read on my friends.
It was another great day for Red Bull and Adrian Newey’s 2009 championship contender. It seems that comparative newbie Sebastian Vettel (he’s only in his second full year of F1) has the measure of many more experienced drivers. After a superb win in wet Shanghai, he drove faultlessly to second in Bahrain.
Red Bull are ready to stand toe-to-toe with Brawn GP this season.
Back east, in Japan, the racing had already been done but I didn’t see it until after.
What a race! If F1 has rediscovered its mojo this year, then MotoGP has done that and more.
The new tyre restrictions – one supplier, only two choices (much as F1 has done, I have to say) have helped to chuck a spanner in the works of some teams. It’s strangely equivalent in these two sports at the moment. We have the rule changes, we have a “phoenix” team in that Kawasaki pulled out at the last moment only to re-emerge with a black paint-job and the name Hayate and we’ve had rain (of biblical proportions) affecting the racing.
So Saturday qually was a complete and utter wash-out. There were rivers running across the track in at least three corners. The safety car could barely make it round. Spectators were pictured forlornly huddled under their sponsor branded umbrellas but there could be no action. A grid was set from the one brief Friday practice and the god who is Valentino Rossi was on pole.
Sunday’s race got underway in sunshine – thank the weather. The 125cc lot and indeed the 250cc brigade had to race on a nastily damp track. Rossi did nothing wrong – clean start and led by over a second for several laps. Problems with the front end allowed team mate Gorgeous Jorge Lorenzo through and boy, did Jorge make the most of that.
While Rossi scrapped with Dani Pedrosa, Jorge scampered away and by the time Dani was well and truly put in his place, Rossi didn’t have the laps or the tyres to chase for the win.
Pragmatic as ever, and thinking about the big picture, Valle settled for a comfortable second as Jorge took the glory and his second GP win.
Dani showed rare signs of emotion coming in third. He’s not exactly a PR dream – usually appearing as surly and sullen – but his post-race interview was really rather sweet. He’s been through the mill in the off season with surgery to his knee and he is rather bashed up and bruised, but he smiled a lot at getting on the podium and I reckon he’s won new fans this race.
Rossi was thrilled, as he always is when he’s fought hard for a podium – and the trademark knee-out was there a lot this race. There is no doubt at all that he is fighting to keep his crown.
Gorgeous George is as delightful and arrogant as always. We love him for his insouciance and he’s only the second person ever, after Telly Savales, to make sucking a lollipop cool – I can’t believe he doesn’t have Chuppa Chups sponsorship!
Stoner finished fourth – wrestling the Ducati all the way. His team-mate, former World Champion Nicky Hayden didn’t finish (not his fault, but he should have qualified better) so the next best Ducati was Finn Mika Kallio who is definitely defying the rules about Finnish drivers – they need four wheels – not!. A superb ride from the back of the grid to eighth means he is a man to watch.
So there we go – both disciplines are heading back to Europe. F1 to Barcelona – where Brawn GP performed superbly in testing and are looking to further humiliate a rather shambolic Ferrari.
MotoGP comes back to Jerez and who knows what will happen there? Honda scraped a podium at their home track and must be expected to fight back.
And believe you me, every single person involved in Honda Racing will be feeling huge pain tonight. To be beaten by Yamaha, a one-two, at their home track of Motegi, my oh my those Honda boys and girls are going to be searching for a way to win at Jerez.
Button sits comfortably atop the F1 Drivers’ table, Rossi is second to team-mate Jorge – with Jorge coming in to a home race.
All is to play for and the only bitter pill is what will happen for McLaren in Paris next week. Hamilton did a sterling job driving to fourth in Bahrain. It would be sad to see his results and an historically important and brilliant team done down in a court of law.
Fans of every team want to see results on the track. One of the reasons why MotoGP is becoming the motorsport of choice ahead of F1 is these silly politics.
Let the boys race – that’s my call, and thus far (aside from silliness), that’s what we’re getting.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Hockley's Sporting Second Chance - Wooley
I can honestly say that no piece of sporting news has given me more pleasure during the long, cricket-free winter months than the return of James Hockley to Kent colours.
It all dates back to 2000, the worst season I had ever endured as a Kent supporter, as an injury ravaged squad sneaked away from deserved relegation only in the last game, and Mr Hockley singularly failed to nail down a first team spot. Luckily in what had become a play-off to avoid the drop on the last day of the season, Kent beat Worcestershire, who even with Glenn McGrath in their side - at that point comfortably the best seam bowler in the world - were sent down instead.
This match was no classic. In fact, I suspect that there is only one member of either side who can remember anything more about it than that it happened. At one point, the interchangeable Sky commentator (Bob Willis? Paul Allott? Graham ‘Foxy’ Fowler? Who can tell?) did indeed say, “he’ll remember that all his life”, the Sky-box never a place in which to fear the cliché. But they had an excuse, you see, as Hockley, 21 at the time, had just lent into a pitched up delivery from McGrath and sent it comfortably past cover point for four vital runs.
Australian journalist Gideon Haigh once observed that he took more pleasure from a well timed cover drive than Mark Waugh, noting that the languid Australian number five expected to score runs, while for him there was a pleasing element of surprise. I suspect that the same applied with James Hockley’s cover drive. Not even a first team regular and facing the most skilful fast bowler of them all? He can’t have expected to do well. But that cover drive was the only evidence of cricketing genius in the entire match. Of course he remembers it.
Alas, this single shot is the only memory I have of his entire county career. He managed just one decent first-class score in Kent colours (although he did manage a century in a one day game), and when Kent chose not to renew his contract at the end of the 2002 season, he retired with an average below twenty.
Cricket in England is often ridiculed for the ease with which players with a palpable lack of the necessary talent wangle temporary passes on the professional circuit; we never have quite shaken off the crazed notion of the noble amateur. “On coming down from Oxford, (he looked) for some walk in life that would ensure the three squares a day and give him time to play a bit of county cricket”, was how PG Wodehouse put it. County members have endured swathes of these players, sons of high profile committee members, perhaps, or old boys from Eton, and most of us have visibly aged as a result.
But, the reason I’m glad to see James Hockley back is that he was different. He actually had the required talent, as he showed when asked to face down Australia’s leading strike bowler.
It’s just that when asked to use it, he failed, and he was dropped, and then (having biffed some poor second team attack for another frightening hundred) he came back to the first team, and failed again, and was dropped again. After his retirement, Hockley drifted into Kent League cricket and frightened plenty of attacks there too. He was good. But he wasn’t quite good enough.
It’s a fact many sportsmen eventually have to accept. You play for the school team, and are the best. Then the county juniors, and are the best. Then the county seconds, and you’re still the best. Then the first team selects you, and you’re the worst. Maybe you’re unlucky, maybe you lack talent. But, one meeting with the chairman of selectors later, and you’re signing up for a PGCE and training to be a PE teacher.
Failure in sport, for anyone who seeks to play at the highest level they can, is so obviously the norm that I sometimes wonder why anyone bothers. Hockley must look back at his single half centuries and think, “if only I’d not wafted at a wide one, I’d have made a hundred”.
But crisis for Kent, who actually did get relegated for the first time in 2008, changed that. No money and no players, these were the crucial variables. The credit crunch became the banking crisis, and this became a recession, and the building firm due to develop the ground went bust. Kent’s rising star Neil Dexter walked out, leaving Kent in a state of mild panic - they had no spare batsmen at all. Someone spoke to someone else, address books were skimmed, memories consulted. And James Hockley had given up teaching and was an ‘ex-player’ no more.
This really isn’t supposed to happen. Sport is supposed to be ruthless - just look at Arsene Wenger, who won’t even let his players flavour their food. In such an environment, second chances, we’re told, never come.
So, this romantic return is a victory for every fan who’s ever hoped that someone would pop down from the dressing room and say, ‘awfully sorry, old chap, I know its your day off work, but we’re a man down today, would you mind putting some whites on and batting at seven?’
No doubt in his first stab at professional sport he was ambitious and determined. But, now, having tasted real life, Hockley can surely not believe his luck. Now aged 30, he’s getting another stab at living true his childhood dream. If he does score that elusive first-class hundred, I shall rejoice.
It all dates back to 2000, the worst season I had ever endured as a Kent supporter, as an injury ravaged squad sneaked away from deserved relegation only in the last game, and Mr Hockley singularly failed to nail down a first team spot. Luckily in what had become a play-off to avoid the drop on the last day of the season, Kent beat Worcestershire, who even with Glenn McGrath in their side - at that point comfortably the best seam bowler in the world - were sent down instead.
This match was no classic. In fact, I suspect that there is only one member of either side who can remember anything more about it than that it happened. At one point, the interchangeable Sky commentator (Bob Willis? Paul Allott? Graham ‘Foxy’ Fowler? Who can tell?) did indeed say, “he’ll remember that all his life”, the Sky-box never a place in which to fear the cliché. But they had an excuse, you see, as Hockley, 21 at the time, had just lent into a pitched up delivery from McGrath and sent it comfortably past cover point for four vital runs.
Australian journalist Gideon Haigh once observed that he took more pleasure from a well timed cover drive than Mark Waugh, noting that the languid Australian number five expected to score runs, while for him there was a pleasing element of surprise. I suspect that the same applied with James Hockley’s cover drive. Not even a first team regular and facing the most skilful fast bowler of them all? He can’t have expected to do well. But that cover drive was the only evidence of cricketing genius in the entire match. Of course he remembers it.
Alas, this single shot is the only memory I have of his entire county career. He managed just one decent first-class score in Kent colours (although he did manage a century in a one day game), and when Kent chose not to renew his contract at the end of the 2002 season, he retired with an average below twenty.
Cricket in England is often ridiculed for the ease with which players with a palpable lack of the necessary talent wangle temporary passes on the professional circuit; we never have quite shaken off the crazed notion of the noble amateur. “On coming down from Oxford, (he looked) for some walk in life that would ensure the three squares a day and give him time to play a bit of county cricket”, was how PG Wodehouse put it. County members have endured swathes of these players, sons of high profile committee members, perhaps, or old boys from Eton, and most of us have visibly aged as a result.
But, the reason I’m glad to see James Hockley back is that he was different. He actually had the required talent, as he showed when asked to face down Australia’s leading strike bowler.
It’s just that when asked to use it, he failed, and he was dropped, and then (having biffed some poor second team attack for another frightening hundred) he came back to the first team, and failed again, and was dropped again. After his retirement, Hockley drifted into Kent League cricket and frightened plenty of attacks there too. He was good. But he wasn’t quite good enough.
It’s a fact many sportsmen eventually have to accept. You play for the school team, and are the best. Then the county juniors, and are the best. Then the county seconds, and you’re still the best. Then the first team selects you, and you’re the worst. Maybe you’re unlucky, maybe you lack talent. But, one meeting with the chairman of selectors later, and you’re signing up for a PGCE and training to be a PE teacher.
Failure in sport, for anyone who seeks to play at the highest level they can, is so obviously the norm that I sometimes wonder why anyone bothers. Hockley must look back at his single half centuries and think, “if only I’d not wafted at a wide one, I’d have made a hundred”.
But crisis for Kent, who actually did get relegated for the first time in 2008, changed that. No money and no players, these were the crucial variables. The credit crunch became the banking crisis, and this became a recession, and the building firm due to develop the ground went bust. Kent’s rising star Neil Dexter walked out, leaving Kent in a state of mild panic - they had no spare batsmen at all. Someone spoke to someone else, address books were skimmed, memories consulted. And James Hockley had given up teaching and was an ‘ex-player’ no more.
This really isn’t supposed to happen. Sport is supposed to be ruthless - just look at Arsene Wenger, who won’t even let his players flavour their food. In such an environment, second chances, we’re told, never come.
So, this romantic return is a victory for every fan who’s ever hoped that someone would pop down from the dressing room and say, ‘awfully sorry, old chap, I know its your day off work, but we’re a man down today, would you mind putting some whites on and batting at seven?’
No doubt in his first stab at professional sport he was ambitious and determined. But, now, having tasted real life, Hockley can surely not believe his luck. Now aged 30, he’s getting another stab at living true his childhood dream. If he does score that elusive first-class hundred, I shall rejoice.
Monday, April 20, 2009
A new season of Motorsport - mimitig
Formula One got underway in Australia last month with an exciting race in Melbourne. A raft of new regulations designed to spice up the racing on the track – technical changes made in an attempt to make it easier to overtake by reducing downforce and the reliance of aerodynamics had been introduced over the winter.
From pre-season testing in Barcelona it looked as though the new rules were going to work. First practices and qualifying in Melbourne carried through those hopes and the race was great. Far more overtaking, a shake-up of the old order (Ferrari and McLaren no longer topping all the time-sheets) and a fairy-tale finish for brand new team - phoenix from the Honda ashes – Brawn, taking first and second places. Button and Barrichello – referred to in some parts of the press as the over-hyped washed up driver and the on-the-edge of retirement has-been respectively. [Humble-pie being eaten now at certain newspapers? I do hope so!]
However, as has happened so often in the history of F1, the sport began its traditional pastime of shooting itself in the foot. Protests were lodged by teams who didn’t get points about the way Brawn GP, Williams and Toyota had interpreted the regulations. As the circus moved on to Malaysia, fans could not be sure whether the result of the previous week would stand.
And it got worse. As they had crossed the finish line in Melbourne, Toyota’s Jarno Trulli had been in third place. By the time the highlights came on, Lewis Hamilton had been awarded third place and Trulli given a 25 second penalty. This was subsequently overruled when McLaren – in the person of Team Director Dave Ryan – was proved to have been economical with the truth to the race stewards. Full story here:
Unfortunately these shenanigans ensured that as the cars hit the track in Sepang, talk was more of McLaren-gate and the upcoming case in Paris when the FIA would rule definitively about those pesky diffusers on the Brawn GP, Williams and Toyotas which were causing the other teams so much heartache than of the racing itself.
Nonetheless we had a race – another exciting one, albeit one truncated by rain described, rather unimaginatively by the commentators, as “of biblical proportions”. Won by Brawn GP for the second time out in the person of Jenson Button.
Hamilton and McLaren had endured a torrid weekend – acting quickly and suspending, later sacking, Dave Ryan had not got the press pack off their back, but Lewis put in a strong drive and took seventh place putting his team back on the leader board after they had been stripped of points earned in Melbourne.
With a two week gap before battle was re-engaged in China, the FIA Court of Appeal in Paris heard evidence on the diffuser conflict and made their ruling – binding for the 2009 season.
Fortunately for the credibility of the sport they, for once, paid heed to commonsense and ruled that Brawn, Williams and Toyota had done nothing wrong. All points thus far won would stand and the race in China would go ahead with no technical shadows hanging over it.
Here’s the take on it from the viewpoint of ex-Toyota and Force India technical guru, Mike Gascoyne:
While all this was going on MotoGP got underway with none of the hype and palaver that surrounds F1. Starting later in the year than usual, their opening race was a second year’s running of a night race in Qatar, at the Doha circuit deep in the desert. How unlucky then to have the race called off at the very last minute, with all the bikes on the grid, when the heavens opened?
As the commentators would say: it was rain of biblical proportions.
However, with comparatively little fuss, they re-organised themselves, went off for a kip and came back last Monday night to run the race.
To be honest it was not a great race. Casey Stoner on his Ducati Desmocedici was in a class of his own. The god on earth who is Valentino Rossi gave good chase on the Yamaha but, as you would expect from a multiple world champion, gave up to settle for a bag-load of points in second rather than risking a high-side chasing nothing.
Gorgeous George (Jorge Lorenzo) took a fine third and Colin Edwards fourth – putting to bed the idea that having had his race engineer “poached” by team mate James Toseland would hamper his form. Sadly for British fans, it was Toseland who was hampered – not least by heavy crashes in practice and qualifying – and finished in 16th and out of the points.
Although this race was no indicator of how the season will play out, it is clear that Rossi is up for it again, and Stoner is mentally far stronger than he was last year. Everyone else is pretty much in the balance. It’s really not possible to judge their form.
With no bikes this weekend, the focus was back on F1 – how would all the off-track issues affect the race in China? And what would the weather do? Climate change has certainly had an impact of three of the first four premier level motor races this year.
Brawn GP rocked up in Shanghai full of confidence – they won their case in Paris and Ross Brawn (team principal and part-owner) was obviously relishing that victory. As one of the key architects behind the revival of Ferrari helping them to shedloads of races and world titles, he was obviously finding it hard to not snigger about the accusations of “arrogance” thrown at him by Ferrari’s lawyer. In an interview with the BBC on Saturday, he could hardly keep the smile off his face when asked to comment on the FIA result. He knew he’d won, he said, when the Ferrari lawyer began by making a personal attack.
Time-sheets told the story – Brawn GP still impressively fast, and McLaren putting their woes (and former boss Ron Dennis who retired from all F1 involvement) behind them were much improved.
One other team caught the eye – Red Bull, formerly Jaguar, formerly Stewart Grand Prix – were constantly hitting the spot.
This was interesting. They do not have the contentious diffuser, but what they do have is Adrian Newey. Adrian has been designing title-winning cars since time immemorial – or so it seems. He is an engineering guru in the mould of the great British engineers like Thomas Telford and Isambard Kingdom Brunel.
He has that gift of having a different way of thinking and working – if he didn’t design cars and had been born two hundred years ago, we might have the Newey Suspension Bridge in Bristol, or the Newey Caledonian Canal.
Today his genius was there for the world to see. In a rain-affected but not shortened Shanghai GP, his cars came in first and second. Great drives from baby-faced Sebastian Vettel and old Aussie peddler Mark Webber achieved a result that team boss Christian Horner could only have dreamed of.
With “our Jense” taking the bottom step of the podium (and thereby still leading the championship), this was a wonderful celebration of British achievement and excellence.
The legacy of those goliaths of eighteenth and nineteenth engineering should rest happy knowing that their vision goes on – not now building canals, bridges and tunnels – but designing state-of-the-art racing cars.
I hope that young people can be inspired by the success of engineers like Ross Brawn and Adrian Newey, as they were by the likes of IK and Telford, and be the next generation of winners.
Role on the rest of the season and let’s hope everything will be decided on the track, and that weather will only intervene to spice it all up and not dominate.
From pre-season testing in Barcelona it looked as though the new rules were going to work. First practices and qualifying in Melbourne carried through those hopes and the race was great. Far more overtaking, a shake-up of the old order (Ferrari and McLaren no longer topping all the time-sheets) and a fairy-tale finish for brand new team - phoenix from the Honda ashes – Brawn, taking first and second places. Button and Barrichello – referred to in some parts of the press as the over-hyped washed up driver and the on-the-edge of retirement has-been respectively. [Humble-pie being eaten now at certain newspapers? I do hope so!]
However, as has happened so often in the history of F1, the sport began its traditional pastime of shooting itself in the foot. Protests were lodged by teams who didn’t get points about the way Brawn GP, Williams and Toyota had interpreted the regulations. As the circus moved on to Malaysia, fans could not be sure whether the result of the previous week would stand.
And it got worse. As they had crossed the finish line in Melbourne, Toyota’s Jarno Trulli had been in third place. By the time the highlights came on, Lewis Hamilton had been awarded third place and Trulli given a 25 second penalty. This was subsequently overruled when McLaren – in the person of Team Director Dave Ryan – was proved to have been economical with the truth to the race stewards. Full story here:
Unfortunately these shenanigans ensured that as the cars hit the track in Sepang, talk was more of McLaren-gate and the upcoming case in Paris when the FIA would rule definitively about those pesky diffusers on the Brawn GP, Williams and Toyotas which were causing the other teams so much heartache than of the racing itself.
Nonetheless we had a race – another exciting one, albeit one truncated by rain described, rather unimaginatively by the commentators, as “of biblical proportions”. Won by Brawn GP for the second time out in the person of Jenson Button.
Hamilton and McLaren had endured a torrid weekend – acting quickly and suspending, later sacking, Dave Ryan had not got the press pack off their back, but Lewis put in a strong drive and took seventh place putting his team back on the leader board after they had been stripped of points earned in Melbourne.
With a two week gap before battle was re-engaged in China, the FIA Court of Appeal in Paris heard evidence on the diffuser conflict and made their ruling – binding for the 2009 season.
Fortunately for the credibility of the sport they, for once, paid heed to commonsense and ruled that Brawn, Williams and Toyota had done nothing wrong. All points thus far won would stand and the race in China would go ahead with no technical shadows hanging over it.
Here’s the take on it from the viewpoint of ex-Toyota and Force India technical guru, Mike Gascoyne:
While all this was going on MotoGP got underway with none of the hype and palaver that surrounds F1. Starting later in the year than usual, their opening race was a second year’s running of a night race in Qatar, at the Doha circuit deep in the desert. How unlucky then to have the race called off at the very last minute, with all the bikes on the grid, when the heavens opened?
As the commentators would say: it was rain of biblical proportions.
However, with comparatively little fuss, they re-organised themselves, went off for a kip and came back last Monday night to run the race.
To be honest it was not a great race. Casey Stoner on his Ducati Desmocedici was in a class of his own. The god on earth who is Valentino Rossi gave good chase on the Yamaha but, as you would expect from a multiple world champion, gave up to settle for a bag-load of points in second rather than risking a high-side chasing nothing.
Gorgeous George (Jorge Lorenzo) took a fine third and Colin Edwards fourth – putting to bed the idea that having had his race engineer “poached” by team mate James Toseland would hamper his form. Sadly for British fans, it was Toseland who was hampered – not least by heavy crashes in practice and qualifying – and finished in 16th and out of the points.
Although this race was no indicator of how the season will play out, it is clear that Rossi is up for it again, and Stoner is mentally far stronger than he was last year. Everyone else is pretty much in the balance. It’s really not possible to judge their form.
With no bikes this weekend, the focus was back on F1 – how would all the off-track issues affect the race in China? And what would the weather do? Climate change has certainly had an impact of three of the first four premier level motor races this year.
Brawn GP rocked up in Shanghai full of confidence – they won their case in Paris and Ross Brawn (team principal and part-owner) was obviously relishing that victory. As one of the key architects behind the revival of Ferrari helping them to shedloads of races and world titles, he was obviously finding it hard to not snigger about the accusations of “arrogance” thrown at him by Ferrari’s lawyer. In an interview with the BBC on Saturday, he could hardly keep the smile off his face when asked to comment on the FIA result. He knew he’d won, he said, when the Ferrari lawyer began by making a personal attack.
Time-sheets told the story – Brawn GP still impressively fast, and McLaren putting their woes (and former boss Ron Dennis who retired from all F1 involvement) behind them were much improved.
One other team caught the eye – Red Bull, formerly Jaguar, formerly Stewart Grand Prix – were constantly hitting the spot.
This was interesting. They do not have the contentious diffuser, but what they do have is Adrian Newey. Adrian has been designing title-winning cars since time immemorial – or so it seems. He is an engineering guru in the mould of the great British engineers like Thomas Telford and Isambard Kingdom Brunel.
He has that gift of having a different way of thinking and working – if he didn’t design cars and had been born two hundred years ago, we might have the Newey Suspension Bridge in Bristol, or the Newey Caledonian Canal.
Today his genius was there for the world to see. In a rain-affected but not shortened Shanghai GP, his cars came in first and second. Great drives from baby-faced Sebastian Vettel and old Aussie peddler Mark Webber achieved a result that team boss Christian Horner could only have dreamed of.
With “our Jense” taking the bottom step of the podium (and thereby still leading the championship), this was a wonderful celebration of British achievement and excellence.
The legacy of those goliaths of eighteenth and nineteenth engineering should rest happy knowing that their vision goes on – not now building canals, bridges and tunnels – but designing state-of-the-art racing cars.
I hope that young people can be inspired by the success of engineers like Ross Brawn and Adrian Newey, as they were by the likes of IK and Telford, and be the next generation of winners.
Role on the rest of the season and let’s hope everything will be decided on the track, and that weather will only intervene to spice it all up and not dominate.
Monday, April 13, 2009
An earlier Hillsborough disaster - Margin
Every few years in April a new headline anniversary reminds us of one of the greatest disasters of English football. This year it is 20 years since The Hillsborough tragedy in which Liverpool fans were crushed to death watching their team play an FA Cup semi-final.
English football still feels bitter about the sorrow of that day. And we all know why that is. The police screwed up; and with the help of the newspapers they blamed us. We football fans were accused of unspeakable horrors that I simply refuse to repeat. And plenty of normal human beings in this country believed it. Then when the truth became apparent the police who screwed up got off scot free for their criminal incompetence, largely thanks to the argument that it was an unprecedented situation.
But that argument was another lie.
I know it was a lie. I know far too many Spurs fans to think otherwise. It was a lie because in 1981 Spurs played Wolves in an FA Cup Semi Final at Hillsborough, and Spurs fans, like Liverpool fans eight years later, were allocated the now notorious Leppings Lane end.
Spurs fans, like Liverpool fans that went after them, felt that the ends were badly allocated. Leppings Lane was perceived to be the smaller end and should thus have been given to the team with the smaller travelling support. But this was probably just perception, and switching ends would sadly just have switched the suffering from one bunch of fans to another.
Spurs fans were sent through the concourses that led to the various pens behind the goal. And those directly behind the goal were the most popular. So just as pens 3 and 4 filled to dangerous levels in 1989, the same part of the ground filled dangerously quickly in 1981.
People were crushed not because of surging support or bad behaviour, but simply because the spaces between the large metal fences were too small. Indeed there was a feeling even before then, without benefit of hindsight, that the supposed capacity of Leppings Lane was overstated and unsafe.
Panic ensued and Spurs fans faced the prospect of a pain that Liverpool fans eventually had to suffer. Those at the front were bruised and battered well before kick-off and realised quickly they simply could not escape as things got worse. Some still speak of the crowd being packed so tight that their feet were off the ground as they moved.
But in 2011 there will be no Match of the Day special, and no retrospective interviews to mark thirty years since that semi-final. There will no documentaries made or reefs laid on Bill Nicholson Way at the gates to White Hart Lane.
And the reason for that is simple.
Unlike their counterparts in 1989 the police commanders in charge in 1981 were not in charge of their first match, were not ignorant and incompetent, and were seemingly not predisposed to assume all problems were the result of violent scum on the terraces who deserved everything they got.
Instead those in charge acted sensibly on the feedback of officers on the frontline. As a result they ordered the closure of the gates leading to the most crowded pens, and then directed incoming fans to safer areas. They acted somewhat late, but they did act. And many fans were helped out of the crowded spaces by fellow fans and police alike. They then sat along the edge of the pitch to watch the game unfold.
As a result of sensible policing more and more unaware fans could no longer pour into pens where they would innocently crush to death those at the front. My fellow Yids thus gradually adjusted to their tight space, regained composure, and despite a fair few injuries stayed alive to see Ossie and Ricky win at Wembley a month later.
The experience led fans to do something that few ever did back before the days when the internet made complaining so easy. They wrote letters to the authorities to express their severe concerns and to seek answers. And while they never heard back, the FA did take action.
It would of course be understandable that those in charge of football thought very little had happened that day. In fact very little did happen thanks to good policing that negated a need for countless funerals. But even so, Hillsborough was barred as a venue for major neutral matches and only allowed to do so again in 1987 after modifications were made to the pens. Those modifications were designed to make policing easier.
Which leads back to that bitterness.
For Spurs fans the defence of the commanders after 1989 that it was an unprecedented situation they couldn’t possible have seen coming was simply a lie. Fans had been through the precedent. They had been saved from the exact same tragedy by good policing. And the FA ordered the ground changed to make good policing easier in future. So to hear bad police pretend that good police would have done no better was sickening.
Of course very little of what I’ve just written will surprise Liverpool fans. And what really spurred me to write this was not really that people out there won’t know about a semi-final in 1981 that matters little in the grand scheme of football history. What bothers me is that it has just occurred after all this time that I have no idea whether this was a similarly isolated case.
I realise now, and am suddenly frightened by this. I have no idea how exceptional or commonplace the events of both days were. Were we all regularly just a bad police chief away from death for all those years? Or were Spurs fans incredibly lucky that of the two times it really mattered our coin toss landed heads, while Liverpool’s sadly fell to tails?
English football still feels bitter about the sorrow of that day. And we all know why that is. The police screwed up; and with the help of the newspapers they blamed us. We football fans were accused of unspeakable horrors that I simply refuse to repeat. And plenty of normal human beings in this country believed it. Then when the truth became apparent the police who screwed up got off scot free for their criminal incompetence, largely thanks to the argument that it was an unprecedented situation.
But that argument was another lie.
I know it was a lie. I know far too many Spurs fans to think otherwise. It was a lie because in 1981 Spurs played Wolves in an FA Cup Semi Final at Hillsborough, and Spurs fans, like Liverpool fans eight years later, were allocated the now notorious Leppings Lane end.
Spurs fans, like Liverpool fans that went after them, felt that the ends were badly allocated. Leppings Lane was perceived to be the smaller end and should thus have been given to the team with the smaller travelling support. But this was probably just perception, and switching ends would sadly just have switched the suffering from one bunch of fans to another.
Spurs fans were sent through the concourses that led to the various pens behind the goal. And those directly behind the goal were the most popular. So just as pens 3 and 4 filled to dangerous levels in 1989, the same part of the ground filled dangerously quickly in 1981.
People were crushed not because of surging support or bad behaviour, but simply because the spaces between the large metal fences were too small. Indeed there was a feeling even before then, without benefit of hindsight, that the supposed capacity of Leppings Lane was overstated and unsafe.
Panic ensued and Spurs fans faced the prospect of a pain that Liverpool fans eventually had to suffer. Those at the front were bruised and battered well before kick-off and realised quickly they simply could not escape as things got worse. Some still speak of the crowd being packed so tight that their feet were off the ground as they moved.
But in 2011 there will be no Match of the Day special, and no retrospective interviews to mark thirty years since that semi-final. There will no documentaries made or reefs laid on Bill Nicholson Way at the gates to White Hart Lane.
And the reason for that is simple.
Unlike their counterparts in 1989 the police commanders in charge in 1981 were not in charge of their first match, were not ignorant and incompetent, and were seemingly not predisposed to assume all problems were the result of violent scum on the terraces who deserved everything they got.
Instead those in charge acted sensibly on the feedback of officers on the frontline. As a result they ordered the closure of the gates leading to the most crowded pens, and then directed incoming fans to safer areas. They acted somewhat late, but they did act. And many fans were helped out of the crowded spaces by fellow fans and police alike. They then sat along the edge of the pitch to watch the game unfold.
As a result of sensible policing more and more unaware fans could no longer pour into pens where they would innocently crush to death those at the front. My fellow Yids thus gradually adjusted to their tight space, regained composure, and despite a fair few injuries stayed alive to see Ossie and Ricky win at Wembley a month later.
The experience led fans to do something that few ever did back before the days when the internet made complaining so easy. They wrote letters to the authorities to express their severe concerns and to seek answers. And while they never heard back, the FA did take action.
It would of course be understandable that those in charge of football thought very little had happened that day. In fact very little did happen thanks to good policing that negated a need for countless funerals. But even so, Hillsborough was barred as a venue for major neutral matches and only allowed to do so again in 1987 after modifications were made to the pens. Those modifications were designed to make policing easier.
Which leads back to that bitterness.
For Spurs fans the defence of the commanders after 1989 that it was an unprecedented situation they couldn’t possible have seen coming was simply a lie. Fans had been through the precedent. They had been saved from the exact same tragedy by good policing. And the FA ordered the ground changed to make good policing easier in future. So to hear bad police pretend that good police would have done no better was sickening.
Of course very little of what I’ve just written will surprise Liverpool fans. And what really spurred me to write this was not really that people out there won’t know about a semi-final in 1981 that matters little in the grand scheme of football history. What bothers me is that it has just occurred after all this time that I have no idea whether this was a similarly isolated case.
I realise now, and am suddenly frightened by this. I have no idea how exceptional or commonplace the events of both days were. Were we all regularly just a bad police chief away from death for all those years? Or were Spurs fans incredibly lucky that of the two times it really mattered our coin toss landed heads, while Liverpool’s sadly fell to tails?
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Damned United II: The Sequel - Mountainstriker
Tom Hooper’s ‘The Damned United’ staring Michael Sheen as Brian Clough is currently playing to favourable reviews across the nation. Based on David Peace’s 2006 book of the same name, the film recounts ‘ol Big ‘ead’s turbulent 44 days at the helm of Leeds United in 1974. Most of the stories are common currency amongst football folk – how Clough deserted his long-time ally Peter Taylor to take the job, how he despised Leeds’ physical style and what he saw as gamesmanship, his address to the squad in which he told them to throw their medals in the bin as ‘’…you got them all by cheating’, the inevitable player revolt, poor results and dismissal - only for Clough to re-emerge triumphantly at Nottingham Forest with Taylor by his side.
The subtext to both the film and book is the inevitability of a clash between a squad of successful players and a manager who had raised Derby County not only to be their arch-rivals but the antithesis of their playing style and beliefs. It’s possible that this difference was exaggerated at the time and that this film will serve only to magnify it. Though few would dispute that Leeds could look after themselves (one has only to think of Jack Charlton’s little book of those marked for future retribution) they were also a supremely skilful side that accommodated the wiles of Johnny Giles, Peter Lorimer and Eddie Gray as well as bruisers like Charlton and Norman Hunter. Even the arch enforcer himself, Billy Bremner, could play a bit. This after all, was a side that reached European finals in 1973 and 1975.
Shortly before his death in 2004, Clough gave an extended interview to the BBC. Yellow faced and bloated from a recent liver transplant, he was asked whether any of the current managerial crop caught his eye. His response,
‘I like the look of Mourinho, there's a bit of the young Clough about him. For a start, he's good-looking and, like me, he doesn't believe in the star system. He's consumed with team spirit and discipline,’
has been regarded ever since to be the anointing of his successor.
Certainly there are parallels – like Clough, Mourinho took a provincial side to European victory, defeating the likes of Manchester United en route. He also won the English championship in his first season and has always been good for a controversial (and often funny) quote.
But there are significant differences. Clough’s teams, particularly his First Division and European Cup Forest winning sides of 1978-80, were notable for their willingness to pass to feet and hit on the break – an approach exemplified by his principal forwards at that time - Woodcock, Birtles, Francis and Robertson. Though Clough could also accommodate the more rudimentary attributes of Peter Withe, he would have scorned Mourinho’s reliance on long balls to Didier Drogba and his current taste for Zlatan Imbrahimovic. He would also have been disappointed by Mourninho’s failure to play to the strengths of Andriy Shevchenko and his decision to sell ball-carrying wingers like Damien Duff and Arjen Robben. In retrospect, it’s not inconceivable that, had he lived to see them, Clough would have regarded Mourinho’s later Chesea teams similarly to the Leeds side of the early 70s.
So I find it surprising that Mourniho is often touted to succeed Alex Ferguson at Manchester United. If any manager could be said to have carried Clough’s legacy over the last 20 years then surely it’s Ferguson and not the Special One. Their teams have had far more than Roy Keane in common. Defensive parsimony built on buying the best keeper available (Shilton/Schmeichal/Van Der Saar) and a no-nonsense centre half (Lloyd/Burns/Stam/Vidic); midfielders who can pass (McGovern/O’Neill/Scholes/Carrick); tricky and pacy wingers (Robertson/Giggs/Kancheskis/Ronaldo) and mobile forwards with both skill and an eye for goal Woodcock/Francis/Clough/Yorke/Sheringham/Rooney). United at their best pass, move at pace and counter attack in the best traditions of Clough’s Forest. Hell, they even have the same red nose.
Sit down Mourinho
Mourinho’s arrival at Old Trafford would mean a wholesale demolition of Ferguson’s legacy.
Though I’m sure he wouldn’t proffer a bucket for Ronaldo’s medals, I doubt that he would oppose his move to Real Madrid as stubbornly. Man U fans know this, instinctively sensing that Mourinho is not one of them. Anyone who stood behind Mourinho while Inter succumbed to United last month can’t have failed to notice that Old Trafford paid scant attention to the game, preferring to indulge in 70,000 strong choruses of ‘Sit down Mourinho’, ‘Bye Bye Mourinho’ and hilariously ‘You’re not Special anymore’ throughout. Just as Elland Road never accepted Clough, Mourinho would always be ‘the other’. How long would it be before the rumours of player revolt stated? Paul Scholes or Ryan Giggs as Johnny Giles anyone? My money’s on Gary Neville.
The subtext to both the film and book is the inevitability of a clash between a squad of successful players and a manager who had raised Derby County not only to be their arch-rivals but the antithesis of their playing style and beliefs. It’s possible that this difference was exaggerated at the time and that this film will serve only to magnify it. Though few would dispute that Leeds could look after themselves (one has only to think of Jack Charlton’s little book of those marked for future retribution) they were also a supremely skilful side that accommodated the wiles of Johnny Giles, Peter Lorimer and Eddie Gray as well as bruisers like Charlton and Norman Hunter. Even the arch enforcer himself, Billy Bremner, could play a bit. This after all, was a side that reached European finals in 1973 and 1975.
Shortly before his death in 2004, Clough gave an extended interview to the BBC. Yellow faced and bloated from a recent liver transplant, he was asked whether any of the current managerial crop caught his eye. His response,
‘I like the look of Mourinho, there's a bit of the young Clough about him. For a start, he's good-looking and, like me, he doesn't believe in the star system. He's consumed with team spirit and discipline,’
has been regarded ever since to be the anointing of his successor.
Certainly there are parallels – like Clough, Mourinho took a provincial side to European victory, defeating the likes of Manchester United en route. He also won the English championship in his first season and has always been good for a controversial (and often funny) quote.
But there are significant differences. Clough’s teams, particularly his First Division and European Cup Forest winning sides of 1978-80, were notable for their willingness to pass to feet and hit on the break – an approach exemplified by his principal forwards at that time - Woodcock, Birtles, Francis and Robertson. Though Clough could also accommodate the more rudimentary attributes of Peter Withe, he would have scorned Mourinho’s reliance on long balls to Didier Drogba and his current taste for Zlatan Imbrahimovic. He would also have been disappointed by Mourninho’s failure to play to the strengths of Andriy Shevchenko and his decision to sell ball-carrying wingers like Damien Duff and Arjen Robben. In retrospect, it’s not inconceivable that, had he lived to see them, Clough would have regarded Mourinho’s later Chesea teams similarly to the Leeds side of the early 70s.
So I find it surprising that Mourniho is often touted to succeed Alex Ferguson at Manchester United. If any manager could be said to have carried Clough’s legacy over the last 20 years then surely it’s Ferguson and not the Special One. Their teams have had far more than Roy Keane in common. Defensive parsimony built on buying the best keeper available (Shilton/Schmeichal/Van Der Saar) and a no-nonsense centre half (Lloyd/Burns/Stam/Vidic); midfielders who can pass (McGovern/O’Neill/Scholes/Carrick); tricky and pacy wingers (Robertson/Giggs/Kancheskis/Ronaldo) and mobile forwards with both skill and an eye for goal Woodcock/Francis/Clough/Yorke/Sheringham/Rooney). United at their best pass, move at pace and counter attack in the best traditions of Clough’s Forest. Hell, they even have the same red nose.
Sit down Mourinho
Mourinho’s arrival at Old Trafford would mean a wholesale demolition of Ferguson’s legacy.
Though I’m sure he wouldn’t proffer a bucket for Ronaldo’s medals, I doubt that he would oppose his move to Real Madrid as stubbornly. Man U fans know this, instinctively sensing that Mourinho is not one of them. Anyone who stood behind Mourinho while Inter succumbed to United last month can’t have failed to notice that Old Trafford paid scant attention to the game, preferring to indulge in 70,000 strong choruses of ‘Sit down Mourinho’, ‘Bye Bye Mourinho’ and hilariously ‘You’re not Special anymore’ throughout. Just as Elland Road never accepted Clough, Mourinho would always be ‘the other’. How long would it be before the rumours of player revolt stated? Paul Scholes or Ryan Giggs as Johnny Giles anyone? My money’s on Gary Neville.
Sporting changes - Mac Millings
As fans of sport, we are becoming increasingly disillusioned by the growing gap between how our favourite sports are played now, and how we think they should be played. The following simple rule changes are guaranteed to redress the balance.
Tennis:
To avoid increasingly boring domination by a select few players of all surfaces, replace grass, hard and clay courts with 3 of the following: ice; forest; prison yard; babies; lava; bed of nails, trampoline.
Athletics:
As part of a bid for greater transparency in sport, Javelin, Shot Put and Hammer events to be renamed, ‘Throwing A Big Sharp Stick’, ‘Throwing A Heavy Ball On The End Of A Chain’ and ‘Fat People Throwing A Metal Ball From Under Their Chin’.
Boxing:
Scrap the 17 weight-based divisions, replacing them with 17 sobriety-based ones, distinguished by the number of pints imbibed prior to the bout, from 1 to 17. Also known as the ‘Ricky Hatton Rule’.
Cycling:
Mandatory drug testing, to ensure a level playing field. Any cyclist discovered to be clean should be forced to take performance-enhancing substances.
Darts:
Not a rule change, but Darts has been awarded Olympic Status for London 2012, along with fellow pub-based sports, Drunken Pontificating, “Do You Want To Take This Outside?”, and Throwing Up On That Really Cute Girl You Only Just Met.
Squash:
In order to make the sport more appealing to young people, Squash to be renamed “Energy Drink!”
Cricket:
The game is crying out for new technology that can tell us with certainty whether that sharp nip-backer did, indeed, clank the batsman in the balls, rather than merely on the abdomen or inner thigh. Said technology to be named Soft Spot. Or CockEye. Or Testicometer.
Tennis:
To avoid increasingly boring domination by a select few players of all surfaces, replace grass, hard and clay courts with 3 of the following: ice; forest; prison yard; babies; lava; bed of nails, trampoline.
Athletics:
As part of a bid for greater transparency in sport, Javelin, Shot Put and Hammer events to be renamed, ‘Throwing A Big Sharp Stick’, ‘Throwing A Heavy Ball On The End Of A Chain’ and ‘Fat People Throwing A Metal Ball From Under Their Chin’.
Boxing:
Scrap the 17 weight-based divisions, replacing them with 17 sobriety-based ones, distinguished by the number of pints imbibed prior to the bout, from 1 to 17. Also known as the ‘Ricky Hatton Rule’.
Cycling:
Mandatory drug testing, to ensure a level playing field. Any cyclist discovered to be clean should be forced to take performance-enhancing substances.
Darts:
Not a rule change, but Darts has been awarded Olympic Status for London 2012, along with fellow pub-based sports, Drunken Pontificating, “Do You Want To Take This Outside?”, and Throwing Up On That Really Cute Girl You Only Just Met.
Squash:
In order to make the sport more appealing to young people, Squash to be renamed “Energy Drink!”
Cricket:
The game is crying out for new technology that can tell us with certainty whether that sharp nip-backer did, indeed, clank the batsman in the balls, rather than merely on the abdomen or inner thigh. Said technology to be named Soft Spot. Or CockEye. Or Testicometer.
Monday, March 23, 2009
SuperCav wins ... Classic for the first time! – mimitig
In August 2008 headlines in the mainstream sports media switched from endless stories about the dirty world of druggie Pro-cycling to glorious tributes to Dave Brailsford’s Team GB Cyclists. Mostly the Track boys and girls, but a nod here and there to the wonderful Welshwoman Nicole Cook. By September cycling was almost forgotten bar a tiny tiny wee mention for Nicole who did the never-before done double of winning Olympic Gold and The World Championship.
In January 2009 the worst kept secret in sport was out in the public arena. Yes, Lance Armstrong was back and had the rules changed so that he could compete in season-opener, The Tour Downunder.
Now far be it from me to carp about cycling getting headlines for good reasons, but when I saw the one this weekend at:
http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/cycling/news/story?id=4003350
it made my blood boil.
“Lance finishes well back of Cavendish”
Outrageous. What it should have read was:
“Cycling Superstar The Manx Express Cavendish breaks 45 year British duck to win Classic”
Armstrong is a has-been [and yes, I will publicly eat my words if he wins anything this year] whose reasons for returning to the sport are far from clear and who has a questionable reputation. Not for winning all his Tours fired up with dubious substances – I think that has been long laid to rest for lack of evidence – but for the way he went about his racing. He never aspired to do anything else except win Le Tour and made sure that when he raced, his team was made up of the best super-domestiques money could buy to ensure that they could burn off the opposition. Now there is nothing inherently wrong in winning that way, but no-one could convincingly argue that it was in the spirit of the sport, or that it actually did the sport any good.
What happened in San Remo on Saturday 21 March was the breath of fresh air that cycling needs so desperately and the coverage of SuperCav’s win has been pretty underwhelming.
There are pieces in the mainstream media. The Guardian has this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/mar/22/mark-cavendish-milan-san-remo-win
The Times has this:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/more_sport/cycling/article5956522.ece
Reading either of these pieces might presuppose a casual reader to the idea that the sporting press gives a shit about cycling. They don’t and nowhere, except here or in the specialist media has anyone had much to say about the phenomenon that is Mark Cavendish.
Mark Cavendish is one of the brightest stars shining on the cycling, indeed sporting, stage and as if winning four stages of Le Tour last year wasn’t enough, he’s just gone and done the business and won one of the most famous one-day Classics on the cycling calendar. And he wasn’t even in it to win it. Before the season started Mark said of this race that he’d never done it before and although “2009 is going to be massive” he [didn’t] “expect the victories to come reeling off like they did in 2008 [he took 17 wins last year]. It just won’t happen.”
Understand that Mark is not the shy and retiring type. He has a level of confidence that is oft perceived as arrogance and he is no stranger to comments that border on the offensive – his views on Belgian Golden (Cocaine) Boy Tom Boonen are well-publicised.
So for his season to have started as it has: the first outing resulted in two stage wins in the Tour of Qatar in the first week of February. A week later our man trolled over to the States to take part in the Tour of California – rapidly gaining kudos and importance in the view of cycling enthusiasts, and guess what – he took Stages Four and Five.
Then he consolidated his form, picking up the final stage win of the Tirreno-Adriatico giving him five stage wins in the opening races of the season and on a par with Mattia Gavazzi (not in his class, a winner in Langkawi for goodness sake!), and ahead of Italian superstar Daniele Bennati.
Winning Milan-San Remo, and in the style that he did – by a tyre’s breath (or even breadth) from Germany’s Heinrich Haussler (second to Contador in Paris-Nice earlier in March) confirms the utter class of this British cyclist. Boonen needled Mark constantly before the race suggesting that any fast fool can win sprints in a stage race but only a great rider wins a Classic.
Mark’s response – blow Boonen away over the climbs and win one of the best Classics on the calendar. At his first attempt. At only 23.
It is clear to me that Mark is well on the way to being one of the very best in the world, worthy to take over the mantle of that prince of sprinters and all-round good guy: Robbie McEwen
Robbie finished 67th in San Remo last weekend. He’s closing on 37 years of age, truly old for a pro-cyclist but I have no doubt at all that he would rather see his crown pass to SuperCav than CocoBoon.
However before Mark gets out on the road again in April for Paris-Roubaix (“I am going to the Hell of the North come what may” – he said in January), cycling fans should get the chance to see him back on the track this week.
After Beijing, when Mark was the only British cyclist to return home having not “medalled”, he said that was over for him and the track. To everyone’s amazement he has been included in the squad that take on the world in Poland:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/cycling/7945829.stm
While I can understand he has a point to prove, personally I wish he’d focus on the road and making damn sure that when the mainstream press does bother itself with cycling we get less of:
“Poor Lancie breaks collarbone” and more of
“SuperCav wins again”.
In January 2009 the worst kept secret in sport was out in the public arena. Yes, Lance Armstrong was back and had the rules changed so that he could compete in season-opener, The Tour Downunder.
Now far be it from me to carp about cycling getting headlines for good reasons, but when I saw the one this weekend at:
http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/cycling/news/story?id=4003350
it made my blood boil.
“Lance finishes well back of Cavendish”
Outrageous. What it should have read was:
“Cycling Superstar The Manx Express Cavendish breaks 45 year British duck to win Classic”
Armstrong is a has-been [and yes, I will publicly eat my words if he wins anything this year] whose reasons for returning to the sport are far from clear and who has a questionable reputation. Not for winning all his Tours fired up with dubious substances – I think that has been long laid to rest for lack of evidence – but for the way he went about his racing. He never aspired to do anything else except win Le Tour and made sure that when he raced, his team was made up of the best super-domestiques money could buy to ensure that they could burn off the opposition. Now there is nothing inherently wrong in winning that way, but no-one could convincingly argue that it was in the spirit of the sport, or that it actually did the sport any good.
What happened in San Remo on Saturday 21 March was the breath of fresh air that cycling needs so desperately and the coverage of SuperCav’s win has been pretty underwhelming.
There are pieces in the mainstream media. The Guardian has this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/mar/22/mark-cavendish-milan-san-remo-win
The Times has this:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/more_sport/cycling/article5956522.ece
Reading either of these pieces might presuppose a casual reader to the idea that the sporting press gives a shit about cycling. They don’t and nowhere, except here or in the specialist media has anyone had much to say about the phenomenon that is Mark Cavendish.
Mark Cavendish is one of the brightest stars shining on the cycling, indeed sporting, stage and as if winning four stages of Le Tour last year wasn’t enough, he’s just gone and done the business and won one of the most famous one-day Classics on the cycling calendar. And he wasn’t even in it to win it. Before the season started Mark said of this race that he’d never done it before and although “2009 is going to be massive” he [didn’t] “expect the victories to come reeling off like they did in 2008 [he took 17 wins last year]. It just won’t happen.”
Understand that Mark is not the shy and retiring type. He has a level of confidence that is oft perceived as arrogance and he is no stranger to comments that border on the offensive – his views on Belgian Golden (Cocaine) Boy Tom Boonen are well-publicised.
So for his season to have started as it has: the first outing resulted in two stage wins in the Tour of Qatar in the first week of February. A week later our man trolled over to the States to take part in the Tour of California – rapidly gaining kudos and importance in the view of cycling enthusiasts, and guess what – he took Stages Four and Five.
Then he consolidated his form, picking up the final stage win of the Tirreno-Adriatico giving him five stage wins in the opening races of the season and on a par with Mattia Gavazzi (not in his class, a winner in Langkawi for goodness sake!), and ahead of Italian superstar Daniele Bennati.
Winning Milan-San Remo, and in the style that he did – by a tyre’s breath (or even breadth) from Germany’s Heinrich Haussler (second to Contador in Paris-Nice earlier in March) confirms the utter class of this British cyclist. Boonen needled Mark constantly before the race suggesting that any fast fool can win sprints in a stage race but only a great rider wins a Classic.
Mark’s response – blow Boonen away over the climbs and win one of the best Classics on the calendar. At his first attempt. At only 23.
It is clear to me that Mark is well on the way to being one of the very best in the world, worthy to take over the mantle of that prince of sprinters and all-round good guy: Robbie McEwen
Robbie finished 67th in San Remo last weekend. He’s closing on 37 years of age, truly old for a pro-cyclist but I have no doubt at all that he would rather see his crown pass to SuperCav than CocoBoon.
However before Mark gets out on the road again in April for Paris-Roubaix (“I am going to the Hell of the North come what may” – he said in January), cycling fans should get the chance to see him back on the track this week.
After Beijing, when Mark was the only British cyclist to return home having not “medalled”, he said that was over for him and the track. To everyone’s amazement he has been included in the squad that take on the world in Poland:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/cycling/7945829.stm
While I can understand he has a point to prove, personally I wish he’d focus on the road and making damn sure that when the mainstream press does bother itself with cycling we get less of:
“Poor Lancie breaks collarbone” and more of
“SuperCav wins again”.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Testing times and unfriendly friendlies - Ringo37
It’s the standard-issue answer from your standard-issue sports professional as (with his standard-issue fat tie-knot and hairfudge-moulded mullet) he fronts up to the standard-issue post-match inquisition: “The result,” he’ll say, “is the main thing.”
Well, what if it wasn’t? What if the result wasn’t the main thing? What if the result wasn’t anything?
Modern football – hell, maybe football full-stop – is devout in its devotion to the result. “Ask any supporter,” we’re often told, “and they’ll take three points over a good performance any day of the week”. Your greatest sporting memory? “Reading in the paper that we’d stuffed the Mackems (or, as it might be, the Bluenoses, or the Skates, or whoever) 2-1.”
Perhaps this is because football is our most rabidly partisan sport. Results matter because Our Team matters. The team takes precedence over the sport. Which, in a sense, is fair enough. But, if this is the case, why not just replace the current four-division league system with a 28-week serial coin-toss? You get winners, losers, bragging rights, reasons to smash up train carriages etc, and for a fraction of the cost (2p, unless you wanted to insist on playing important games simultaneously in order to prevent one set of tossers – pardon me – having an unfair advantage).
I’m not trying to deride football; it just worries me that this result-obsessed culture can only have a bad influence on all our sports.
I’ve just switched off the radio after the close of play in Trinidad: the Windies scraped a draw in the final Test, and bagged the series 1-0. What a finish. I mean – what a finish.
But what I didn’t like about this series was the use of the umpiring referral system. Its failings have been pretty thoroughly picked over in the press over the last few days, but the specifics of the system don’t much interest me. What I’m interested in is the principle.
Borderline decisions – borderline wickets, borderline survivals – should be seen to be of borderline value. No bowler is going to recline in the clubhouse in the twilight of his career, thoughtfully swill his cognac in its balloon and murmur: “Remember that time Perkins was questionably given out to my speculative armball back in ’72?”. Results matter, and teams matter, but the game – the great achievements and great moments of the game – should surely be paramount. Cricket isn’t usually bad at this sort of thing. Record run-hauls on shirtfronts are given short shrift by the cognoscenti; eight-fers on sticky dogs likewise. Results are just another kind of statistic, and the statistic is brother to the damned lie.
The clincher is this: cricket, like rugby, has Tests – football has Meaningless Friendlies. Why are the Ashes so important? Because the Aussies are so damned good. Why, in contrast, is the Football World Cup important? Because we all want a big tin pot. If you win an important game in football you win a cup. Hooray. In cricket – give or take the odd token urn or sceptre – what you win, if you win, is a win; it’s about who you beat, and how you beat them, not about the bauble foisted on you by a blazered dignitary.
It used to be like that in football – think England-Scotland in ‘67, or England-Hungary in ‘53. Not any more.
This isn’t an aesthete’s call for football to be prettified, Wengerised, and turned into an easy-on-the-eye circus. Teams should play to win – I don’t mind if they have to be dour and defensive at times to do so. But players and managers should remember that football is more than just a way of deciding who ends up with the cup at the end of the season. Football as football, and not as an over-elaborate results generator, really matters.
So no more bloody football friendlies, I say. Let’s call them Tests. That’s what they ought to be, after all. Let’s remind the players that they’re professional sportsmen even when it isn’t a World Cup year. Let’s remind them that every minute of every game is a test of their skill, their strength, their bottle and – if I might offer a speculative explanation of the origin of the word ‘Test’ – their balls.
Well, what if it wasn’t? What if the result wasn’t the main thing? What if the result wasn’t anything?
Modern football – hell, maybe football full-stop – is devout in its devotion to the result. “Ask any supporter,” we’re often told, “and they’ll take three points over a good performance any day of the week”. Your greatest sporting memory? “Reading in the paper that we’d stuffed the Mackems (or, as it might be, the Bluenoses, or the Skates, or whoever) 2-1.”
Perhaps this is because football is our most rabidly partisan sport. Results matter because Our Team matters. The team takes precedence over the sport. Which, in a sense, is fair enough. But, if this is the case, why not just replace the current four-division league system with a 28-week serial coin-toss? You get winners, losers, bragging rights, reasons to smash up train carriages etc, and for a fraction of the cost (2p, unless you wanted to insist on playing important games simultaneously in order to prevent one set of tossers – pardon me – having an unfair advantage).
I’m not trying to deride football; it just worries me that this result-obsessed culture can only have a bad influence on all our sports.
I’ve just switched off the radio after the close of play in Trinidad: the Windies scraped a draw in the final Test, and bagged the series 1-0. What a finish. I mean – what a finish.
But what I didn’t like about this series was the use of the umpiring referral system. Its failings have been pretty thoroughly picked over in the press over the last few days, but the specifics of the system don’t much interest me. What I’m interested in is the principle.
Borderline decisions – borderline wickets, borderline survivals – should be seen to be of borderline value. No bowler is going to recline in the clubhouse in the twilight of his career, thoughtfully swill his cognac in its balloon and murmur: “Remember that time Perkins was questionably given out to my speculative armball back in ’72?”. Results matter, and teams matter, but the game – the great achievements and great moments of the game – should surely be paramount. Cricket isn’t usually bad at this sort of thing. Record run-hauls on shirtfronts are given short shrift by the cognoscenti; eight-fers on sticky dogs likewise. Results are just another kind of statistic, and the statistic is brother to the damned lie.
The clincher is this: cricket, like rugby, has Tests – football has Meaningless Friendlies. Why are the Ashes so important? Because the Aussies are so damned good. Why, in contrast, is the Football World Cup important? Because we all want a big tin pot. If you win an important game in football you win a cup. Hooray. In cricket – give or take the odd token urn or sceptre – what you win, if you win, is a win; it’s about who you beat, and how you beat them, not about the bauble foisted on you by a blazered dignitary.
It used to be like that in football – think England-Scotland in ‘67, or England-Hungary in ‘53. Not any more.
This isn’t an aesthete’s call for football to be prettified, Wengerised, and turned into an easy-on-the-eye circus. Teams should play to win – I don’t mind if they have to be dour and defensive at times to do so. But players and managers should remember that football is more than just a way of deciding who ends up with the cup at the end of the season. Football as football, and not as an over-elaborate results generator, really matters.
So no more bloody football friendlies, I say. Let’s call them Tests. That’s what they ought to be, after all. Let’s remind the players that they’re professional sportsmen even when it isn’t a World Cup year. Let’s remind them that every minute of every game is a test of their skill, their strength, their bottle and – if I might offer a speculative explanation of the origin of the word ‘Test’ – their balls.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Let’s Hear It For The - Who? -- Zephirine
The England Cricket XI is ranked no 1 in the world.
The England Cricket XI includes the top-ranked batsman in the world.
The England Cricket XI includes the top-ranked bowler in the world.
The England Cricket XI has just retained the Ashes.
Last year the England Cricket XI beat the West Indies, South Africa and India.
Currently the England Cricket XI is playing in the World Cup in Australia, and has a good chance of winning.
All of the above are true.
Yep, it’s the Women’s XI.
Unlike their male counterparts, who are well-paid, well-publicised, expensively sponsored, and over the last few years have alternated being maddeningly inconsistent with being downright useless, the women are semi-professional or amateur, don’t get much sponsorship or media coverage, and over the last 18 months have become world-beaters.
You’re used to seeing the England men in adverts for Boss or expensive watches... here’s the top-ranked bowler in the world (female), Isa Guha, at her part-time job as a lab technician:
(picture by Christopher Lee from Cricinfo)
Now, all right, women’s cricket isn’t quite like men’s, they don’t play many Test matches for a start, they don’t bowl as fast or hit as hard. But the same is true in most sports. Women’s tennis gets plenty of press coverage. Perhaps the cricketers should play in short dresses and frilly knickers...
During the Olympics, we all got to know our Victoria Pendleton from our Rebecca Adlington. But apart from a very brief phase when the England captain Charlotte Edwards (ICC Women’s Player of the Year 2008) was in contention for BBC Sports Personality of the Year, we don’t hear much about the cricket players. Sports editors don’t bother to cover the competitions, even when England are winning.
But how many sports can you name in which the England team is the best in the world? Exactly.
So, UK Pseuds, keep an eye on the papers for those small paragraphs, and if – when – the girls win the World Cup Final on March 22nd, raise a cheer and maybe drink their health. Because they’re worth it.
Women’s World Cup fixture list: http://content.cricinfo.com/wwc2009/content/series/351827.html?template=schedule
The England Cricket XI includes the top-ranked batsman in the world.
The England Cricket XI includes the top-ranked bowler in the world.
The England Cricket XI has just retained the Ashes.
Last year the England Cricket XI beat the West Indies, South Africa and India.
Currently the England Cricket XI is playing in the World Cup in Australia, and has a good chance of winning.
All of the above are true.
Yep, it’s the Women’s XI.
Unlike their male counterparts, who are well-paid, well-publicised, expensively sponsored, and over the last few years have alternated being maddeningly inconsistent with being downright useless, the women are semi-professional or amateur, don’t get much sponsorship or media coverage, and over the last 18 months have become world-beaters.
You’re used to seeing the England men in adverts for Boss or expensive watches... here’s the top-ranked bowler in the world (female), Isa Guha, at her part-time job as a lab technician:
(picture by Christopher Lee from Cricinfo)Now, all right, women’s cricket isn’t quite like men’s, they don’t play many Test matches for a start, they don’t bowl as fast or hit as hard. But the same is true in most sports. Women’s tennis gets plenty of press coverage. Perhaps the cricketers should play in short dresses and frilly knickers...
During the Olympics, we all got to know our Victoria Pendleton from our Rebecca Adlington. But apart from a very brief phase when the England captain Charlotte Edwards (ICC Women’s Player of the Year 2008) was in contention for BBC Sports Personality of the Year, we don’t hear much about the cricket players. Sports editors don’t bother to cover the competitions, even when England are winning.But how many sports can you name in which the England team is the best in the world? Exactly.
So, UK Pseuds, keep an eye on the papers for those small paragraphs, and if – when – the girls win the World Cup Final on March 22nd, raise a cheer and maybe drink their health. Because they’re worth it.
Women’s World Cup fixture list: http://content.cricinfo.com/wwc2009/content/series/351827.html?template=schedule
Saturday, March 7, 2009
What's England's problem - Ebren
It's a week off in the Six Nations championship, and time to reflect.
While there's plenty to write about Wales, Ireland, France Scotland and Italy, that's not what I'm going to do - instead I'm going to ask a question that's been on my mind for years now: "What's England's problem?"
Why am I asking this now? Well, put simply it's because all of a sudden the question has become a lot harder to answer.
As the wonderful 2003 team/machine broke apart, England were always going to struggle. We had this lunatic notion at the time that so blessed were the Red Roses the England 'B' team could take on and win against any side in Europe and give a good showing against the Tri-Nation powerhouses. We were wrong, very, very wrong.
But that lack of players no longer applies.
Not since the days of Bracken and Dawson have we had two scrum halves of international quality fighting for a starting shirt - gone are the has beens and almost men that have tried to link play between forwards and backs. Ellis and Care are actually good - I was as surprised as anyone.
Cueto, Sackey and Armitage are players of genuine pace and quality - with classical outside breaks in their locker to make the purist's heart sing. Tindal my be a brute, but he has more international pedigree than his girlfriend's mount (if a little less pace and good looks). Flutey offers trickery and experience - and a player of such rare ability as Tait is left on the bench.
Fly Half is a problem, Flood and Goode are adequate, but neither really convinces me as an international player. The feeling persists that a fit Wilkinson (or even Hodgeson) would walk into the role, but the stronger feeling is that Cipriani is missing out. He might be raw, but he will stay that way unless given game time. Playing a defensive fly half - no matter how much he looks like Phillip Glennister and how happy that makes me - at home against Italy is criminal.
The back row may lack a Williams or a Harinordoquy, but it's the strongest we've had since the Back-Dallaglio-Hill triumvirate. Easter, Haskell and Worsley offer muscle, energy and really effective defence - which is their job.
The second rows lack genuine world class, but is good enough, Vickery and Sheridan at 3 and 1 are impressive and Mears the equal of many of the men who pulled on the No 2 shirt in the 'glory days'.
So - what we have is a good team, stacked with ability and with flashes of brilliance. But it's not good enough.
An unconvincing win against Italy, losses - no matter how close - to Wales and Ireland, and the worrying prospect of games against France and even Scotland to come.
Which brings me back to my original question: what's the problem?
Discipline is what the team is getting hammered for, but that's a red herring. Players do stupid things, they always have and always will, but they do them a lot more often when they're under pressure.
It's really rather hard to concede a penalty or be sin-binned when in possession of the ball and moving forward and penalties generally reflect the balance of play (defending teams just give more of them away - a point I made repeatedly when everyone was criticising England for winning courtesy of Jonny's left boot).
Our defence has been sound, Ireland and Wales are exciting, attacking teams - we smothered them, actually outscoring Wales two tries to one and restricting Ireland to a close-range smash.
So what are we lacking, what's the difference between a good team going close and a great one winning all the time?
Well, part of the difference is habit. The Wales or Ireland of a few seasons ago might not have had the savvy to close out those games. The England of a few seasons ago would have known how to win them. This is not a comment on players, more on the team mentality. But you don't change that mentality without winning a few games.
Part of what's missing is a kicker - we missed enough penalties to beat both Ireland and Wales - Woodward always maintained you should not set foot on an international pitch without a world-class kicker - but we can't conjure one our of thin air, so we will have to ignore that while hoping Johnson is making his available options practice a lot (Armitage for the long-term anyone?).
But I think it comes down to inspiration - that moment when you break a line, knock an opposing player off their feet, drop a goal.
Martin Johnson was strong, hard, unrelenting. He inspired by refusing to quit, ignoring risk of injury and pain, and driving forward. He never inspired with skill or controlled with intelligence. Wilkinson, Greenwood, Robinson - heck, even Austin Healy - were the ones that made things happen.
We need that vision back - in short we need Tait and Cipriani in the team. It might weaken the defence. Scratch that, it would weaken the defence. But as good as this defence is, without inspiration going forward or a kicker to convert possession and manage territory; defence is not going to win games. So we need players that put points on the board, not players that restrict our losses.
What's England's problem then? Simples - as Alexander the Meerkat might put it - we are trying not to lose rather than win.
While there's plenty to write about Wales, Ireland, France Scotland and Italy, that's not what I'm going to do - instead I'm going to ask a question that's been on my mind for years now: "What's England's problem?"
Why am I asking this now? Well, put simply it's because all of a sudden the question has become a lot harder to answer.
As the wonderful 2003 team/machine broke apart, England were always going to struggle. We had this lunatic notion at the time that so blessed were the Red Roses the England 'B' team could take on and win against any side in Europe and give a good showing against the Tri-Nation powerhouses. We were wrong, very, very wrong.
But that lack of players no longer applies.
Not since the days of Bracken and Dawson have we had two scrum halves of international quality fighting for a starting shirt - gone are the has beens and almost men that have tried to link play between forwards and backs. Ellis and Care are actually good - I was as surprised as anyone.
Cueto, Sackey and Armitage are players of genuine pace and quality - with classical outside breaks in their locker to make the purist's heart sing. Tindal my be a brute, but he has more international pedigree than his girlfriend's mount (if a little less pace and good looks). Flutey offers trickery and experience - and a player of such rare ability as Tait is left on the bench.
Fly Half is a problem, Flood and Goode are adequate, but neither really convinces me as an international player. The feeling persists that a fit Wilkinson (or even Hodgeson) would walk into the role, but the stronger feeling is that Cipriani is missing out. He might be raw, but he will stay that way unless given game time. Playing a defensive fly half - no matter how much he looks like Phillip Glennister and how happy that makes me - at home against Italy is criminal.
The back row may lack a Williams or a Harinordoquy, but it's the strongest we've had since the Back-Dallaglio-Hill triumvirate. Easter, Haskell and Worsley offer muscle, energy and really effective defence - which is their job.
The second rows lack genuine world class, but is good enough, Vickery and Sheridan at 3 and 1 are impressive and Mears the equal of many of the men who pulled on the No 2 shirt in the 'glory days'.
So - what we have is a good team, stacked with ability and with flashes of brilliance. But it's not good enough.
An unconvincing win against Italy, losses - no matter how close - to Wales and Ireland, and the worrying prospect of games against France and even Scotland to come.
Which brings me back to my original question: what's the problem?
Discipline is what the team is getting hammered for, but that's a red herring. Players do stupid things, they always have and always will, but they do them a lot more often when they're under pressure.
It's really rather hard to concede a penalty or be sin-binned when in possession of the ball and moving forward and penalties generally reflect the balance of play (defending teams just give more of them away - a point I made repeatedly when everyone was criticising England for winning courtesy of Jonny's left boot).
Our defence has been sound, Ireland and Wales are exciting, attacking teams - we smothered them, actually outscoring Wales two tries to one and restricting Ireland to a close-range smash.
So what are we lacking, what's the difference between a good team going close and a great one winning all the time?
Well, part of the difference is habit. The Wales or Ireland of a few seasons ago might not have had the savvy to close out those games. The England of a few seasons ago would have known how to win them. This is not a comment on players, more on the team mentality. But you don't change that mentality without winning a few games.
Part of what's missing is a kicker - we missed enough penalties to beat both Ireland and Wales - Woodward always maintained you should not set foot on an international pitch without a world-class kicker - but we can't conjure one our of thin air, so we will have to ignore that while hoping Johnson is making his available options practice a lot (Armitage for the long-term anyone?).
But I think it comes down to inspiration - that moment when you break a line, knock an opposing player off their feet, drop a goal.
Martin Johnson was strong, hard, unrelenting. He inspired by refusing to quit, ignoring risk of injury and pain, and driving forward. He never inspired with skill or controlled with intelligence. Wilkinson, Greenwood, Robinson - heck, even Austin Healy - were the ones that made things happen.
We need that vision back - in short we need Tait and Cipriani in the team. It might weaken the defence. Scratch that, it would weaken the defence. But as good as this defence is, without inspiration going forward or a kicker to convert possession and manage territory; defence is not going to win games. So we need players that put points on the board, not players that restrict our losses.
What's England's problem then? Simples - as Alexander the Meerkat might put it - we are trying not to lose rather than win.
Friday, March 6, 2009
Atrocity in Lahore - Mimitig
Geographically Lahore is many miles from these shores but the events of Tuesday 3 March have brought terrorism painfully close to home. The ex-Patriot Pakistani community in the UK and those born here of Pakistani origins are perhaps the most affected as they have immediate family to be concerned about – not that in most of the reporting I’ve heard and read over the last few days has any mention of them been made – but the sporting world and the cricket world in particular has been shaken to its roots. And will never be the same.
Sport in general has felt itself immune from attack. The belief that sport exists to bring people together and celebrate life is inherent in fans. We may indulge in “hating” the opposition, but very seldom does that mean actually wishing harm or bad fortune on any team.
Cricket especially so. Support for one’s own side is of course paramount, but fans are unanimous in appreciating the skills of opponents. A batsman making 50 or a century is applauded by all, as is a bowler getting a five-fer. When one’s side is beaten, the phrase universally used is “the best side won on the day”. Very rarely are excuses made for the losing side, and blaming the umpires for defeat is just not done.
This may be why an attack on cricket has become such a news monster. Former England captain, Michael Atherton writes in the Times and mentions how cricketers have accidentally been caught up in events of global terrorism, but on those occasions, no headlines involved the sportsmen.
Bronwen Maddox, also in the Times, notes the five most recent terror attacks in Pakistan, none of which, although more people died, attracted as many column inches and headlines as the latest attack.
So here is the horrible question that faces sport now: is it now a viable and worthwhile target for terrorism?
If what the terrorists want is publicity and a change in behaviour of the targets, then those behind the attack in Lahore must be feeling pretty smug already. The world has focussed on their activities and the international cricket community has said, fairly definitively, that they will no longer play in Pakistan.
The fact that the head of the Pakistan Cricket Board feels able to go on air and criticise comments made by match referee Chris Broad shows how defensive the authorities in Pakistan are, and also how much in denial. Sadly his remarks – that Broad is inaccurate in his reporting of events – also show that the authorities are concentrating less on where they have failed and more on what overseas media are reporting.
There is a serious suggestion, Giles Clarke head of the ECB, is said to be considering it, that Pakistan will come to England to play their international cricket. Peter Young of Cricket Australia has added his voice:
While many on these shores would welcome the addition of more international cricket being played in the UK – and the thought of Australia v Pakistan here is indeed exciting (and not just for fans, I wouldn’t mind betting that the ECB are rubbing their financial hands with glee at the thought of selling out Old Trafford and Headingley amongst other grounds) - one wonders what the price in security would be.
If sport is no longer immune from terrorist attacks, will it matter whether games are played on the Sub-Continent, in neutral territory such as Dubai or England – where we have already seen hideous and successful terrorism in London in 2005 (when the cricketers of Australia and England were playing a Test Match in Leeds).
A can of worms has been opened, an evil genie let out of the bottle.
Sport can never be the same again, not for those playing the games, those running the games and not for fans.
An age of innocence that we have basked in since Munich 1972 is over, my friends.
It’s gone.
Sport in general has felt itself immune from attack. The belief that sport exists to bring people together and celebrate life is inherent in fans. We may indulge in “hating” the opposition, but very seldom does that mean actually wishing harm or bad fortune on any team.
Cricket especially so. Support for one’s own side is of course paramount, but fans are unanimous in appreciating the skills of opponents. A batsman making 50 or a century is applauded by all, as is a bowler getting a five-fer. When one’s side is beaten, the phrase universally used is “the best side won on the day”. Very rarely are excuses made for the losing side, and blaming the umpires for defeat is just not done.
This may be why an attack on cricket has become such a news monster. Former England captain, Michael Atherton writes in the Times and mentions how cricketers have accidentally been caught up in events of global terrorism, but on those occasions, no headlines involved the sportsmen.
Bronwen Maddox, also in the Times, notes the five most recent terror attacks in Pakistan, none of which, although more people died, attracted as many column inches and headlines as the latest attack.
So here is the horrible question that faces sport now: is it now a viable and worthwhile target for terrorism?
If what the terrorists want is publicity and a change in behaviour of the targets, then those behind the attack in Lahore must be feeling pretty smug already. The world has focussed on their activities and the international cricket community has said, fairly definitively, that they will no longer play in Pakistan.
The fact that the head of the Pakistan Cricket Board feels able to go on air and criticise comments made by match referee Chris Broad shows how defensive the authorities in Pakistan are, and also how much in denial. Sadly his remarks – that Broad is inaccurate in his reporting of events – also show that the authorities are concentrating less on where they have failed and more on what overseas media are reporting.
There is a serious suggestion, Giles Clarke head of the ECB, is said to be considering it, that Pakistan will come to England to play their international cricket. Peter Young of Cricket Australia has added his voice:
While many on these shores would welcome the addition of more international cricket being played in the UK – and the thought of Australia v Pakistan here is indeed exciting (and not just for fans, I wouldn’t mind betting that the ECB are rubbing their financial hands with glee at the thought of selling out Old Trafford and Headingley amongst other grounds) - one wonders what the price in security would be.
If sport is no longer immune from terrorist attacks, will it matter whether games are played on the Sub-Continent, in neutral territory such as Dubai or England – where we have already seen hideous and successful terrorism in London in 2005 (when the cricketers of Australia and England were playing a Test Match in Leeds).
A can of worms has been opened, an evil genie let out of the bottle.
Sport can never be the same again, not for those playing the games, those running the games and not for fans.
An age of innocence that we have basked in since Munich 1972 is over, my friends.
It’s gone.
Monday, February 23, 2009
The Fattest Footballer In The World: Can The Ogre Save River Plate? - Clack
30 minutes remaining, River Plate 1-0 down at Rosario Central on the 2nd weekend of the Argentine championship, and the signal is given to the man known as the Ogre to remove his large posterior from the bench, and commence warming up, or wobbling up rather. Cue loud cheers and collective donning of shrek masks from the 5000 traveling fans. The 24 year old with a figure more akin to a middle-aged ex pro turning out for a charity match is about to make his league debut for River.
“I’m a few kilos over the ideal”, he said before signing the week before, a slight under-statement, as demonstrated when he stripped off for his live medical; a torso that would make Neil Ruddock look like Stan Laurel if he stood beside him. Christian Fabbiani has always lacked shape, even when he was in-shape, but 6 months of inactivity due to a dispute over pay with former club Newell's Old Boys has converted muscle into yet more flab to the point where the Ogre must surely now be the fattest professional footballer in the world?
His on-off transfer from Newells to River Plate was the summer soap opera of Argentine soccer. Refusing to take part in pre-season training, the striker posed, Paul Ince-like, in the white and red shirt of River while still a Newells player. He explained that he had stood as a 10-year-old on he terraces of the club he wished to join, and how, in June 2008, while still a player at Cluj (with whom he won the Romanian league title), had been amongst the hundreds of River fans celebrating their 'closing' championship victory on the pitch. Instant kudos from the supporters; not only did their prospective new signing speak like one of their bare-topped 'barras' who fill one end of the Monumental stadium every home game, but he looked like one aswell, complete with beer belly...
There was just one snag for Fabbiani though. Debt-ridden River Plate couldn't afford to buy him. The economic recession has dictated the end of the usual sale of young players, or percentage stakes in young players, to European clubs, and therefore, no funds for new signings, no matter how badly they want to join.
Two weeks ago, on the eve of this year's 'closing' Championship, disillusion hung over the Monumental. The team had finished a humiliating bottom of the 'opening'* Championship that ran from last August to December, and just to rub salt in the wounds, everything was going smoothly at big city rivals, Boca Juniors, where legendary manager Carlos Bianchi was returning as technical director of the 'opening' champions to oversee a squad, containing the likes of Argentine internationals Riquelme, Palacios, Palermo and Battalliga, exactly the kind of characters and fan favourites, River lacked.
In two pre-season friendlies with Boca (the word friendly being used in the loosest possible sense here, as they were sell-out showpiece matches held in Mar Del Plata and Mendoza. part of a summer mini-tournament, screened live across the country), River's faceless players not only lost, but were comprehensively outplayed on both occasions.
Something had to be done to breathe new life into the stagnant River, and right on transfer deadline day, a delighted Fabbiani received the call he had been wishing for all summer, just as he was about to undergo, literally, a medical for Velez Sarsfield. The Ogre apologised to the Velez doctors and staff and asked to leave the clinic. "Well, if his heart wasn't in it,then it's better that he told us now than after 15 games", said a very understaning Velez manager and everything was arranged with River the same day..
Shrek fever began on the very day of his signing; children and adults turning up to Fabbiani's official presentation with their faces painted ogre green. One ex-River player, sitting in the canteen, remarked how it had taken him ten years to become a crowd favourite, but the new lad was already an idol without even playing a a game.
Again, Fabbiani said all the right things. "They won't kick Falcao anymore, now I'm alongside him", a reference to some tasty treatment the River Plate player had received from San Lorenzo players in the pre-season mini-tournament, part of a long running feud, although it is probably little Buononotte, 'the dwarf', who will probably benefit the most from having Fabbiani's physical presence. What more balanced attacking partnership could you ask for? The fattest player in the world alongside the shortest player in the world! However, the truth is that there is actually a lot more to Fabbiani's game than just putting his weight about. He has a lot of skill and an excellent finish.
Then, in one of those moments when football does imitate hollywood scripts, the shrek saga part 1 had a perfect happy ending. Just a few minutes after Fabbiani came on in the match at Rosario last sunday, River equalised through Martin Galmarini, nipping in with a header from a free kick while the defenders were all watching Fabbiani. Ten minutes later, the Ogre himself, 30 metres out and with no run up, lashed the ball into the back of the net to score the winning goal. Out came the shrek masks again, the commentators and fans went into a frenzy, and Fabbiani collapsed flat on his back, Charlie George style.
Fabbiani's goal here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpyWNfHTJBQ
Fatso' and 'Monster', were the headlines the next day (the latter a play on words, eg. Gardel is a 'monster' of the Tango.) Comparisons with Ference Puskas and the Brazilian Ronaldo were naturally drawn, one newspaper putting together a list of the fattest players of all-time, placing Fabbiani at the top, and a psychologist wrote about how Fabbiani gave hope to all weight-challenged kids.
"A lot of kilos and a lot heart", said Clarin, and just to round off a perfect weekend for River fans, rivals Boca lost 2-0 at home to Newells. Contrary to what Tina Turner sang at her concert in the club's Monumental stadium, River Plate do need another hero. The Ogre could be just the job.
------------------------------------------
*Since 1992, the Argentina Primera league (1st Division) has been divided into two championships: The apertura (opening) which runs from August to December, and Clausura (closing) which runs from February to June, with seperate winners for each tournament. The 20 teams play one another once in each tournament. A return to a one-season championship has been recently suggested by AFA president Julio Grondona, but the majority of the 1st Division clubs are unlikely to vote for a change as the current format gives more clubs a chance of winning, or at least challenging for the Championship. Relegation is decided by a complicated system of point averages over the previous three seasons.
“I’m a few kilos over the ideal”, he said before signing the week before, a slight under-statement, as demonstrated when he stripped off for his live medical; a torso that would make Neil Ruddock look like Stan Laurel if he stood beside him. Christian Fabbiani has always lacked shape, even when he was in-shape, but 6 months of inactivity due to a dispute over pay with former club Newell's Old Boys has converted muscle into yet more flab to the point where the Ogre must surely now be the fattest professional footballer in the world?
His on-off transfer from Newells to River Plate was the summer soap opera of Argentine soccer. Refusing to take part in pre-season training, the striker posed, Paul Ince-like, in the white and red shirt of River while still a Newells player. He explained that he had stood as a 10-year-old on he terraces of the club he wished to join, and how, in June 2008, while still a player at Cluj (with whom he won the Romanian league title), had been amongst the hundreds of River fans celebrating their 'closing' championship victory on the pitch. Instant kudos from the supporters; not only did their prospective new signing speak like one of their bare-topped 'barras' who fill one end of the Monumental stadium every home game, but he looked like one aswell, complete with beer belly...
There was just one snag for Fabbiani though. Debt-ridden River Plate couldn't afford to buy him. The economic recession has dictated the end of the usual sale of young players, or percentage stakes in young players, to European clubs, and therefore, no funds for new signings, no matter how badly they want to join.
Two weeks ago, on the eve of this year's 'closing' Championship, disillusion hung over the Monumental. The team had finished a humiliating bottom of the 'opening'* Championship that ran from last August to December, and just to rub salt in the wounds, everything was going smoothly at big city rivals, Boca Juniors, where legendary manager Carlos Bianchi was returning as technical director of the 'opening' champions to oversee a squad, containing the likes of Argentine internationals Riquelme, Palacios, Palermo and Battalliga, exactly the kind of characters and fan favourites, River lacked.
In two pre-season friendlies with Boca (the word friendly being used in the loosest possible sense here, as they were sell-out showpiece matches held in Mar Del Plata and Mendoza. part of a summer mini-tournament, screened live across the country), River's faceless players not only lost, but were comprehensively outplayed on both occasions.
Something had to be done to breathe new life into the stagnant River, and right on transfer deadline day, a delighted Fabbiani received the call he had been wishing for all summer, just as he was about to undergo, literally, a medical for Velez Sarsfield. The Ogre apologised to the Velez doctors and staff and asked to leave the clinic. "Well, if his heart wasn't in it,then it's better that he told us now than after 15 games", said a very understaning Velez manager and everything was arranged with River the same day..
Shrek fever began on the very day of his signing; children and adults turning up to Fabbiani's official presentation with their faces painted ogre green. One ex-River player, sitting in the canteen, remarked how it had taken him ten years to become a crowd favourite, but the new lad was already an idol without even playing a a game.
Again, Fabbiani said all the right things. "They won't kick Falcao anymore, now I'm alongside him", a reference to some tasty treatment the River Plate player had received from San Lorenzo players in the pre-season mini-tournament, part of a long running feud, although it is probably little Buononotte, 'the dwarf', who will probably benefit the most from having Fabbiani's physical presence. What more balanced attacking partnership could you ask for? The fattest player in the world alongside the shortest player in the world! However, the truth is that there is actually a lot more to Fabbiani's game than just putting his weight about. He has a lot of skill and an excellent finish.
Then, in one of those moments when football does imitate hollywood scripts, the shrek saga part 1 had a perfect happy ending. Just a few minutes after Fabbiani came on in the match at Rosario last sunday, River equalised through Martin Galmarini, nipping in with a header from a free kick while the defenders were all watching Fabbiani. Ten minutes later, the Ogre himself, 30 metres out and with no run up, lashed the ball into the back of the net to score the winning goal. Out came the shrek masks again, the commentators and fans went into a frenzy, and Fabbiani collapsed flat on his back, Charlie George style.
Fabbiani's goal here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpyWNfHTJBQ
Fatso' and 'Monster', were the headlines the next day (the latter a play on words, eg. Gardel is a 'monster' of the Tango.) Comparisons with Ference Puskas and the Brazilian Ronaldo were naturally drawn, one newspaper putting together a list of the fattest players of all-time, placing Fabbiani at the top, and a psychologist wrote about how Fabbiani gave hope to all weight-challenged kids.
"A lot of kilos and a lot heart", said Clarin, and just to round off a perfect weekend for River fans, rivals Boca lost 2-0 at home to Newells. Contrary to what Tina Turner sang at her concert in the club's Monumental stadium, River Plate do need another hero. The Ogre could be just the job.
------------------------------------------
*Since 1992, the Argentina Primera league (1st Division) has been divided into two championships: The apertura (opening) which runs from August to December, and Clausura (closing) which runs from February to June, with seperate winners for each tournament. The 20 teams play one another once in each tournament. A return to a one-season championship has been recently suggested by AFA president Julio Grondona, but the majority of the 1st Division clubs are unlikely to vote for a change as the current format gives more clubs a chance of winning, or at least challenging for the Championship. Relegation is decided by a complicated system of point averages over the previous three seasons.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Two down Three to go – Mimitig
I’m not known in these parts for writing about Rugby, but it’s that time of year.
It’s Six Nations time, and for the first time in my grown-up years Wales are not only the defending champions, but favourites to retain the crown.
This means that the Welsh blood in my veins stirs, and makes me do things like search out this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBY4PMk39QM&feature=related
And so we are singing Hymns and Arias … as the English came to Cardiff to do what Edward Hammer of the Scots and Bloody Bastard Castle Builder of Wales did to us. They wore their red rose with pride and they put Mike Tindall into the side. To do what the Royals have done to the Welsh for eight centuries.
So what a joy when the Royal connection was sin-binned! As if all the ancient reasons for hating the English were laid out on a lovely green Millenium Stadium tranche of grass. In that moment I knew we would win. Of course it wasn’t that simple, it never is.
Wales make their supporters suffer. At half time, we had a scant one point lead after Goode had dropped a goal for England. And Sackey had gone over the line.
England seemed to have learned the lessons from a poor victory over Italy last week. They had studied the tapes and they knew which Welshman to smother. They made sure Andy Powell had no space to work in. But Stephen Jones had regained his touch and kicked far better than he had at Murrayfield. He did the business and Wales started to draw clear.
Then England lost Goode to typical indiscipline – sin-binned and the Welsh pair of Byrne and Halfpenny showed just what free-flowing Welsh rugby is all about. England proved tough and made us feel sick for about ten minutes, thinking maybe we hadn’t done enough. But the crowd sang again:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3pf1HORL_c&feature=related
There is nothing, nothing like the stadium filled with Welsh voices singing. When the team are winning, we are untouchable. We are the conquerors of the world and so happy. I think that we are happier when we win than any England fan can dream of. We expect to lose. Our songs are all about being vanquished, and we expect that.
So our glory in victory is very humble. We didn’t expect it, we don’t expect to win next time, but we are Champions and we play very very good rugby.
I am so proud to be Welsh. I am always Welsh, obviously, but at Six Nations time, one declares nationality in a unique way – it’s different from football because we have no Home Nations, so this is the sport that declares your interest.
I don’t know if we’ll manage to defend the title – France and Ireland are looking very strong, but we’ve won the big grudge match, again and England leave Cardiff, licking their wounds.
I was going to end with a clip of the Welsh nation singing their hearts out, but this is far more appropriate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzjyO7DJ1n0&feature=related
It’s Six Nations time, and for the first time in my grown-up years Wales are not only the defending champions, but favourites to retain the crown.
This means that the Welsh blood in my veins stirs, and makes me do things like search out this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBY4PMk39QM&feature=related
And so we are singing Hymns and Arias … as the English came to Cardiff to do what Edward Hammer of the Scots and Bloody Bastard Castle Builder of Wales did to us. They wore their red rose with pride and they put Mike Tindall into the side. To do what the Royals have done to the Welsh for eight centuries.
So what a joy when the Royal connection was sin-binned! As if all the ancient reasons for hating the English were laid out on a lovely green Millenium Stadium tranche of grass. In that moment I knew we would win. Of course it wasn’t that simple, it never is.
Wales make their supporters suffer. At half time, we had a scant one point lead after Goode had dropped a goal for England. And Sackey had gone over the line.
England seemed to have learned the lessons from a poor victory over Italy last week. They had studied the tapes and they knew which Welshman to smother. They made sure Andy Powell had no space to work in. But Stephen Jones had regained his touch and kicked far better than he had at Murrayfield. He did the business and Wales started to draw clear.
Then England lost Goode to typical indiscipline – sin-binned and the Welsh pair of Byrne and Halfpenny showed just what free-flowing Welsh rugby is all about. England proved tough and made us feel sick for about ten minutes, thinking maybe we hadn’t done enough. But the crowd sang again:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3pf1HORL_c&feature=related
There is nothing, nothing like the stadium filled with Welsh voices singing. When the team are winning, we are untouchable. We are the conquerors of the world and so happy. I think that we are happier when we win than any England fan can dream of. We expect to lose. Our songs are all about being vanquished, and we expect that.
So our glory in victory is very humble. We didn’t expect it, we don’t expect to win next time, but we are Champions and we play very very good rugby.
I am so proud to be Welsh. I am always Welsh, obviously, but at Six Nations time, one declares nationality in a unique way – it’s different from football because we have no Home Nations, so this is the sport that declares your interest.
I don’t know if we’ll manage to defend the title – France and Ireland are looking very strong, but we’ve won the big grudge match, again and England leave Cardiff, licking their wounds.
I was going to end with a clip of the Welsh nation singing their hearts out, but this is far more appropriate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzjyO7DJ1n0&feature=related
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