Friday, March 25, 2011

Play in the Dragons lair, you'll get burnt...sometimes














Since the draw for the 2012 European Championships qualification groups saw England and Wales squaring off, only one game has been on the minds of the entire nation of Wales. After a battling defeat in Montenegro was, the John Toshack era was finally put to a halt. For years, Toshack had been building the foundations for a good young team, playing players like Lewin Nyatanga, Chris Gunter and Wayne Hennessey before they'd estabilshed themselves at their respective clubs. However after two apalling qualifying campaigns (Euro 2008 & World Cup 2010), a poor result to start the third campaign was the final straw for everyone involved.

After Toshack's departure, Brian Flynn took temprary charge for the following qualifiers, which resulted in a 4-1 demoliton in Switzerland and a 1-0 humbling defeat against a weakened Bulgaria, in the first competetive international played outside the Millenium stadium in over a decade. The fall from grace Welsh football had undergone since the "Mark Hughes era" (when sellouts of 75,000 were commonplace, even against Azerbaijan). From being within one game of Euro 2004, Wales now find themselves outside the worlds top 100.

On Saturday though, form, reputation undoubtedly all go out the window when the Welsh dragon entertains the "Three Lions" in a clash of "home nations". With me supporting Wales internationally (although unlike most Wales fans, don't have the intense hatred of England, due to half my famiily being English), the week in the build-up to the game has been fuelled by KG type trash-talk and false optmism on both sides.

However, waking up yesterday, signing into facebook and seeing that my friend Jamie had posted a link on my wall which was titled "Bale out injured for the England game". The news, met with a patented facepalm, and the optmism being sucked away, flooding out early like a Wigan Warriors rugby league (only stadium with an "early exit door"). Wales beating England without Bale, isn't dissimilar to England beating Germany without Rooney (and given that they got mauled 4-1 with him), it's not surprising you can get 6/1 on a Wales win in some bookmakers.

With the Millenium finally encountering a sellout, for the first since, i think, the last England game in 2005, where a very fortunate deflection helped Joe Cole's effort find the net in a 1-0 win for the English. Since then however, undoubtedly the England team has regressed, a failure to qualify for Euro 2008 was met with Steve McLaren's sacking. Fabio Capello, or "Postman Pat" as my buddy Lewis calls him, flew in fromItaly to take the job, looking like an accomplished mafia boss, with an aura of confidence and expectation, all that went the same way as my optmism and Wigan's fans when we all realised , he couldn't speak English.

Although not a problem in qualifying knocking off Kazakhatan, Croatia amongst others, when the England players were together for an extended period, to say it was a nightmare doesn't do it justice. It made Elm Street look like a regular suburban street. The squad claimed they were bored for long periods, and lethargic performances, calamitous goalkeeping and a foul-mouthed Wayne Rooney tirade all added up to a 2nd round humiliation from the old enemy. The memorable momens of this game to me, are when Tomas Mueller made it 4-1, about 20% of the pub dispersed, then when Heskey was introduced to the game, where the team was chasing goals, anoth 30% left. Leaving a once electric pub looking like the scene from "Scrubs" after Laverne dies.

To the present day however, with the main threat of Bale gone, the midfied pairing of Joe Ledley and the new captain Aaron Ramsey will need to be main source of creativity and will need to match Scott Parker and Jack Wilshere step-for-step. Scoring goals has been Wales achilles heel for a few years now, since John Hartson left the international scene, but now, with stalwart Craig Bellamy and Millwall's rising star Steve Morison, Wales may have their best strike force since 2004.

New Wales gaffer, Gary Speed, knows that this will be the best way to announce his return to the Welsh set-up, Speed, who was capped over 80 times for Wales, took the job, leaving his post at Sheffield United. Speed, if he didn;t know already, saw the mammoth size of the task aahead when Wales were thrashed 3-0 by the Republic Of Ireland in the first game of the Carling Four nations tournament (football's wrong answer to rugby's six nations).

For Wales, a recreation of the Italy game from 2002 (yes, we are going back that far) will be needed to pull off this herculean task. When Wales beat Italy 2-1 (best Wales game i've ever been to) with a selection of Premier League players and Championship players met Champions League and Uefa Cup.

For Wales, they will always be the underdog when the "big brother comes to town", but Eli has won as many rings as Peyton, Phil has outplayed Gary (whose finally retired) since Phil moved to Everton.

The little brother has his moment... and the dragon has new fire.


Saturday, March 19, 2011

Are sportsmen stupid, or just ignorant?

Gary Neville, Robbie Savage and Sol Campbell. Three players who among the widespread football community, suffer from a complete lack of popularity. Whether it be due to their style of play (Neville), the way they embrace the role of the villain, and act like the"wind-up merchant"(Savage). Or Campbell, whose acrimonious departue from Tottenham to North London neighbours Arsenal, or that leaving Arsenal to play "abroad" ended up with him playing in Portsmouth. Suing Portsmouth when they had no money to pay him his "image rights". Campbell has displayed a petulant, irresponsible attitude on several occasions in his career, the Portsmotuh fiasco, like kicking a dog when it's on down, was a real middle finger to a club that had supported him.

With good reason, these three men are unpopular, and in the eyes of the general public, these athletes are villified more than their colleagues Steven Gerrard, and Lee Hughes, to use as examples. Gerrard, whose nightclub assault on a DJ who didn;t succumb to his request to have control on the music played was well documented. With the CCTV of the incident that was distributed and the pictures of the victm did show the severity of this mans injury. After pleading not guilty, claiming self-defence (whereas the 2 other charged pleaded guilty) the case was dropped and no charges were made. Not a story you want an MBE to be apart of. In my mind, not enough was made of the arrogance of Gerrard to react in themanner he did at being told "no", it showed the pedestal elite sportsman are placed, a bulletproof pedestal, where they cannot be touched.

Hughes, now playing for Notts County in League 1, was involved in a car accident during the 2003-04 season. Hughes, accused of "callous disregard" for other people, and allegedly fleeing the scene, which killed the driver of the other vehicle was rumoured to have been under the influence at the time of the crash. Hughes was sentenced to 6 years imprisonment, which he served less than 3 years of before release. Hughes, when leaving prison, joined Oldham Athletic and resumed a once promising football career. As a supporter of everyone earning a second chance, I don't feel that this should be totally forgotten, as it seems like it has. I fail to see how somebody like this isn't criticised in the media as heavily as somebody like Robbie Savage, whose off-field record in pristine.

In Britian,  "professional footballer" is the occupation most often charged with driving offences. Not a stat ti make pleasant reading for these so called role models.

It's not just here where DUI's are an issue with athletes. Across the pond, our transatlantic cousins have their share of incidents. The main culprit of this has been Detroit Tigers slugger Miguel Cabrera, who the night before the Tigers one game play-off in Minnesota, was charged with a DUI, and allegedly striking his wife. With baseball mourning the passing of young Anaheim Angels pitcher Nick Adenhart just a few months earlier, who was the victm of a drunk driver. Cabrera issued his apology and after an off-season of getting "clean" he bounced back to have a "career year" this past season.

With that in mind, and Cabrera's past misdemeanours apart of the past, the news that he was stopped in Florida with an astronomical blood alcohol level sent shockwaves rippling through the U.S media. However after a few days of intense reporting, a new story emerged: Charlie Sheen.

Sheen, the latest Hollywood star to suffer, what now must be considered, the sociological cliche of the "mental breakdown". Everyones favourite "warlock" went on a critical rampage of all "them" that were against him, and expressed his anger through his UStream show "Sheen's Korner". Sheen's attitude and fall from grace was met judgemental dissections of his character and mental fragility.

The Cabrera story was then met with apathy, despite the fact that getting into a car drunk endangers all people on the roads near him, and civillians, Cabrera wasn't nearly as villified as Sheen, whose strange ranting, peculiar metaphors and recreational drug use were seen as more newsworthy. The fact that the only person Sheen is a threat to is Sheen himself shou;d've been confirmed when videos like this were made. (Let it be known, that i think Sheen is a cultural icon, and although most breakdowns are dull, this is the best since Britney)

Having Tiger Blood is now worse than having a high Blood Alcohol.

Althought DUI's are a high issue and the most serious in the contemporary sporting world, there's been someone else whose irked me, but this time with ignorant comments. Adrian Peterson.

"Does he look like a slave to you?"
Now, anyone with a working knowlede of the NFL knows of the ongoing lockout. As of now, the season isn't scheduled to start, so the players won't be getting their obscene salries whilst the lockout is in effect. Peterson, with that in mind, described being an NFL player as "modern day slavery", because a salary a clip under $11 million, before bonuses, endorsements and sponsorship deals. Not to mention the free college education when being awarded his scholarhsip. Slavery is playing the game you've loved and played since you were a young boy. 

Without turning this into a race issue, given that Peterson, an African American would make such outlandish comments considering the days of slavery, and apartheid. If he ever read about slavery, if he ever listened to Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, etc he would know what slavery was. My job, I work in a basement with dim lights, heating only comes on 2 hours into my shift and it's early starts (6am), and I find myself quite lucky to be in employment (given that by 2013 5 million Britons won't be). To put it into, perspective, it would take me about 9 years to earn what Peterson earns in a week.

Peterson said "without us (the players)- there's no football". Maybe the owners could trade some common sense and morlaity to him in exchange for Football, because it seems he;s lacking it. Given that Japan has just an earthquake that nearly hit 9 on the richter scale. That in America people still live in poverty, and have to work 2 or 3 jobs just to make ends meet and put food on the table. Peterson should look in the mirror, see how blessed he is to be in his position and apologise for how ridiculous his comments were, if not for Jedward speaking on ITV2 last night, it would be the most ridiculous thing i'd heard in weeks.

If there's no football, his some off-season training for Peterson: Watch Roots. Then tell Yahoo if what you do is slavery.




Tuesday, March 15, 2011

The 5 highlights of my sporting calendar.






With "March Madness", baseball season just around the corner, the football season winding down and the NBA and NHL playoffs lurking, March, April and May may well be the 3 best months of sporton the calendar. With that in mind, I set my mind to listing my 5 favourite events on the sporting calendar.

5) At the foot of my list, I was debating whether the NBA playoffs or NHL were more etched in my mind. After much deliberation, the NBA Playoffs are certainly more often at the forefront of my mind come late June/July. With football season over, Baseball season still waking up, the Celtics have annually kept me tuned into basketball deep into the postseason, with fascinating 7 game series. Although their are more upsets, 7 game series and drama in the NHL playoffs, the Bruins are on the receiving end of it more than dishing it out.

"Come on Tim"
4) For 2 weeks in the summer, the sun is shining, birds are chirping and for a fortnight, Britons give Tennis more than a passing interest. That's right at four, it's Wimbledon.  The summer of my childhood consisted of staying out alot later, because it was lighter, Big Brother was on the T.V (guilty pleasure, don't judge me) and for 2 weeks, i rabidly cheered for Tim Henman to win Wimbledon. Every year we were disappointed, but every year, whether playing well, or struggling Henman without fail managed to make it into the second week, and without fail managed to inexplicably fail just when the country is in Tennis euphoria. Henman made a habit of always being the bridesmaid, never the bride, but for how he captivated the British public for a small period of time every summer, he should be held in higher esteem than he is.

3) For 3 weeks every year, the NCAA Tournament takes centre stage. The unique set-up of the tournamnet (a 68 team knock-out) is gripping and creates tension, suspense and drama all in one. With games thick and fast and cinderella stories, big teams losing to the underdog and 3 weeks of Dick Vitale on commentary. It's sporting bliss. No doubt over the next 3 weeks, we will see buzzer-beaters, tears of joy/despair. The drama, upsets and crowd make the Tournament a daily F.A Cup. However, the best part of the whole of "March Madness" is predicting and following your bracket (you'll see my dismal attempt in the near future), with prizes, money etc to be won, over a million people will submit brackets on ESPN alone over the next 3 days.
"The Vince Lombardi Trophy"

2) The greatest event on the North American sporting calendar, the Superbowl. The Superbowl as an event is usually the most wached sporting event of the year (flip-flopping with the Champions League final the last few years). The difference between the Superbowl and the World Series to me, is that since 2007, I have watched 2 World Series ('07 &10), as I had minimal interest in watching the Phillies, and even less interest in the Yankees. The two of them are like the two bullies at school fighting each other, you want both of them to get beaten up and lose, but can't resign yourself to the fact that one will win and their ego (in this case, fans ego's) skrocket to biblical heights.


Every year, the superbowl is on in my house, and every year there's an increasing number of people i know who watch and enjoy the "greatest show on earth" . Despite my 49ers being nowhere near the superbowl, every year, it seems to be 2 different teams, a different winner. The NFL's parity and salary cap make it the most balanced and arguably most entertaining league in any sport.

1) The perfect sporting event requires a monumental helping of tension, pressure and a reward at the end worth winning. The perfect sporting event needs to have you feeling like you're in the middle of two people having a huge row in a public place, where you fell all the tension in the room, where you are glued to the situation, and can't turn away. The perfect sporting event, is the Football League/Conference Playoffs. The drama of the two-legged semi finals is unrivalled in sport, the rewards so high, losing meaning the end of the season. Whether observing as a neutral or if your team is a part of it, the playoffs are something to be  apart of every year. 4 years ago i witnessed my team, Oxford United lose to Exeter City on penalties after a two-legged semi-final. A feeling of bitterness to the opponent, anger towards...well everything, and a feeling of emptiness.

After that description, whats to love. Well last summer, I was on the other side of the playoff coin, witnessing Oxford defeat Rushden 2-0 after a 1-1 draw in the first leg, to secure a trip to the (new) home of English football, Wembley. At Wembley, nerves unrivalled, unmatched and unbeleivable, I saw my team beat York City and return to the Football League. A feeling every football fan should feel is the pain of relegation, the despair of missing out on promotion, but every fan like me, Blackpool, Millwall and Dagenham fans all did last year.

That's why for me, the playoffs are the greatest moment on the sporting calendar, every year.