ENGLAND OVERCOME WALLABIES AT TWICKERS !

As we build up towards the Rugby Union World Cup in 2015, the progress of Stuart Lancaster's developing England team is becoming more significant. After the last 6-Nations' tournament, when they were roundly slaughtered by Wales, England suddenly realised that they were not, perhaps, developing as quickly as they'd believed; a summer tour of Argentina restored some belief but the real measure had to be the autumn series.

 

Yesterday, that autumn series got under way with the Australians visiting Twickenham. After a stuttering first half in which Owen Farrell managed to miss 3 penalty kicks and England failed to make any real impression on the visitors, the half-time score of 6-13 looked pretty gloomy. However, the second half produced a much more coherent performance from the home side with 2 converted tries and eventual victory by 20-13.

 

Although this was a decent result and, in the end, a strong performance at least from the forwards, no one should be carried away. Australia have not been a great power this year; although they haven't exactly played badly, their results have been disappointing, so an English victory cannot be seen as a pointer to World Cup success - yet. Next week, they take on Argentina and the week after that it's the real test, against New Zealand. The 'All Blacks' are undoubtedly the best team around at the moment and how well we do against them will tell us much more than did yesterday's match. Let's hope we at least give them a run for their money.

 

 

VETTEL & RED BULL UNBEATABLE AGAIN.

There can be no doubt that Sebastian Vettel is a very good driver but just how good is difficult to determine.

 

Vettel's fourth Formula One world championship, won in India on Sunday, puts him into an elite group; only Juan Fangio, Alain Prost and Michael Schumacher have previously won 4 titles and none of them was anywhere as young as Vettel who is still only 26. However, while Fangio drove in a bygone era of derring-do and Prost was active well before the modern 'safety first' era, Vettel has the benefit of all manner of computer generated design and analysis which even Schumacher only partly experienced, and it can be very difficult to determine where the real excellence lies - in the car, the driver or a bit of both.

 

Vettel's 'Red Bull' car is the best of its day and Vettel is easily the better of the 2 drivers in the team. His team mate, Mark Webber, with the same car and support, simply hasn't been able to keep up with his younger partner so it's clear that Vettel is better than him, but is he really better than the other top drivers such as Alonso, Raikonnen and Hamilton ? Unfortunately, we're not likely to find out any time soon, as Vettel's team mate for 2014 will be the relatively unknown Daniel Ricciardo rather than one of the big names.

 

However, putting all of this aside, Sebastian Vettel is undoubtedly the World Champion driver and 'Red Bull' have won the 'Constructor's' championship again as well; both driver and car have left their competition far behind. Well done to both.

SPURS CRASH TO WEST HAM AND GO BACK TO NORMAL.

Today's result from White Hart Lane surely bursts the Spurs' bubble.

 

After spending huge amounts of money in the summer and bringing in numerous supposedly very good players, today they lost 3-0 at home to lowly West Ham. Last year, Spurs had 2 problems; firstly they leaked goals whenever the opposition got around their rather static defence, and secondly, they had trouble finding the net themselves. This term, they appeared to have resolved the leaky defence issue but still find it almost impossible to score goals against any but the poorest opposition; today's result shows that the defence is every bit as dodgy as before.

 

Oh Dear, Oh Dear, Oh Dear :-(  The premature talk of a top 4 finish and Champions' League spot now seems very, very fanciful indeed; the madness of them being title challengers can be forgotten for at least another year. They may have several better players but they still lack the penetration necessary to score more than the occasional goal against top sides. Come the January transfer window expect some more frantic activity as they search desperately for someone who can create those missing goal scoring opportunities on a regular basis. Oh, and a decent left full back, cover for Walker and a winger or 2 might be useful as well.

MURRAY BROUGHT CRASHING DOWN !

Following his heroics of the last 12 months, with wins at the Olympics, US Open and Wimbledon, Andy Murray's world collapsed around him yesterday as the Swiss number 2, Stanislas Wawrinka, simply destroyed him.

 

Murray has played Wawrinka before and usually had the better of him but yesterday was different. The Scot had no answers to the powerful play of his opponent and was blown away in straight sets; perhaps it was an overdue reaction to the events of the last year. Whatever the reasons, Murray was never settled in the match and seemed horribly ill at ease with himself; his post-match interview was a twitchy affair as he moved constantly in his seat while fielding questions. All-in-all, the impression given was that he was close to breaking point.

 

As for Stan Wawrinka, the perennial Swiss number 2 behind Roger Federer may be on the point of overtaking his compatriot in the rankings. As Federer's star appears to be waning rapidly, Stan's chance may have come; one or two more good performances could see him outshining the Great Man. How ready he is to assume such a mantle may be revealed by his next match, against the world number 1, Novak Djokovic, in tomorrow's semi-final.

BALE TRANSFER SHOWS FOOTBALL HAS GONE MAD.

The conclusion of months of gossip about the possible move of Gareth Bale from Tottenham Hotspur to Real Madrid must come as a huge relief to many people. It's been clear for several weeks that Bale was on his way out of White Hart Lane, with Tottenham anticipating the sale by spending enormous amounts in the transfer market; now that Bale's gone, this outlay has been recouped and their accountants must be happy once more.

 

The real question is whether anyone who kicks a football around can be worth paying £85.3m for, and whether they can be worth paying £15.6m per year in wages. In my view, the answer is an emphatic "NO".

 

We hear and read much about greedy bankers and other business leaders who receive large salaries and bonuses, though few of these came close to the numbers now routinely bandied about in the world of football. Those who run major multinational corporations are often responsible for many thousands of employees and company budgets of many billions of pounds; whole economies may depend on their success or failure, as we discovered when banks began to fail 5 or 6 years ago. The people who have ultimate responsibility within such vast entities need to be the best and that means highly paid, but even they are not paid the staggering sums received by some sports 'stars'.

 

When it comes to sport, matters should be rather different. Those who choose to follow this largely selfish and egotistical path do very little to manage anything, create employment or enhance the world in any other tangible way; in fact, it seems that their primary purpose is to fleece the poor supporter out of as much money as possible while becoming enormously rich for doing what they themselves most enjoy, be it playing football, tennis, golf, basketball or a myriad of other essentially pointless games. They are the true parasites, not the bankers.

 

Gareth Bale is a great footballer but is he worth paying £85.3m for ? Certainly not. Is he worth paying £300,000 per week as has been reported ? Of course not, it's a ludicrous amount of money to pay someone for playing a game, no matter how good they are.

 

The world has gone mad.

RIP CRICKET - WE NEED A NEW SET OF ASHES.

Watching the final moments of the fifth Ashes test match, one has to bemoan the death of cricket.

 

When I was a lad, it was perfectly normal for 100 and more overs to be bowled in a 6 hour day; today, this rarely, if ever, happens. In test matches, the rule is that there have to be 90 overs in a day that now extends to a maximum of 6½ hours, but there appears to be no penalty for missing this target and no way of making up the deficit unless it was caused by bad weather or bad light. Even then, umpires seem to be beset by a plethora of rules and regulations that require them to react in particular ways, usually without the slightest consideration of the paying public. The public are expected to accept a confection that crawls along at a snail's pace and is stopped at a moment's notice for the most bureaucratic of reasons.

 

The premature end to the final test, albeit at 7:40 pm, was stupid and certainly did not please the paying public; how was it that David Hughes once won a Gillette Cup match at something around 9:00 pm and no one complained about the light ?

 

Today's cricket is a pale shadow of the wonderful game played by the likes of Grace, Hobbs, Hammond, Bradman, Headley, Compton, Hutton, Gregory and MacDonald, Lindwall and Miller, Trueman and Statham, Hall and Griffiths and the like. Today they play on manicured pitches with so much in the way of helmets and padding, not to mention worries about a few drops of rain or a bit of dodgy light, that it's a wonder that the game has survived at all. How any of today's players can be compared with the greats of the past is a mystery - one or two perhaps but generally speaking any comparison is laughable.

 

England retained the Ashes by beating one of the worst Australian teams ever to tour this country. They may well repeat this feat by winning again in Australia in the coming winter, but it will be a hollow victory. Cricket, as anyone over the age of 45 ever knew it, is dead; the money men have finally got their claws into it and the future is the crash-bang-wallop rubbish of 20-20, with its accompanying paraphernalia of noise and hype. One of the major consequences of this is the death of real cricket; county, state and test matches that last for more than a day.

 

Cricket is no longer a game played to entertain the paying public, it's simply a money machine; as such, it has an enormous bureaucracy that determines how it works and that develops rules and regulations for every possible eventuality. As such, it does nothing but serve itself and drive real supporters away while constantly congratulating itself on how well it's doing.

 

Let's not be fooled. Real cricket is dead but not quite buried yet; I hope to see a bit of the real game in the coming week though I wonder for how many more years it will continue. With luck, it will last longer than I, though I have my doubts.

MO FARAH, SUPERSTAR !

Every now and then a special performer appears and, right now, it's Mo Farah.

 

A few minutes ago, Farah put himself into genuine superstardom with a stunning performance in the World Championship 5,000 metre final. Following his win in the 10,000 meters last weekend, he bided his time and only seemed to take the race seriously in the last 2 or 3 laps. With less than 800 meters left, he finally moved to the front and, despite the best efforts of his opponents, he refused to be passed, eventually storming to victory and even going away from the others over the last 50 metres.

 

Farah has now become holder of both the Olympic and World 5,000 and 10,000 metre titles at the same time, something only previously achieved by the great Ethiopian, Kenenisa Bekele. Of course, others may have achieved the same had the opportunity arisen, but the World Championships have only been held since 1983 so many great athletes never had the chance; whether or not Paavo Nurmi, Emil Zatopek or Lasse Viren could have achieved the same will never be known but even to mention Farah's name in the same breath as these athletic greats tells how exceptional is his performance.

 

Farah's achievement must rank with the very greatest in athletics history and must certainly make him the greatest distance runner ever to represent the UK.

 

Well done, Mo, and more power to your elbow !