Sport – Football -The Losers

Commiserations for those teams (and their fans) who are relegated !

Wigan

Reading

QPR

Peterborough

Wolves

Bristol

Barnet

Aldershot

Stockport

Barrow

Ebbsfleet

Corby

Droylsden

Hinkley Utd

Hornchurch

Billericay

TruroCity

Arsenal and Tottenham set for day of reckoning

Roberto Mancini sacked by Manchester City as Pellegrini waits in wings

• Italian manager leaves after weeks of speculation
• Manuel Pellegrini, the Málaga coach, set to take over

• Jamie Jackson
• The Guardian, Monday 13 May 2013 22.34 BST

 

  

Speculation had heightened over Roberto Mancini's future at Manchester City even before the FA Cup final defeat.

  

Photograph: Richard Sellers/Sportsphoto/Allstar

Roberto Mancini was finally sacked on Monday night as Manchester City manager, a year to the day after he led

the club to a first championship in 44 years. The owners said the Italian's failure to meet any of his targets this

season, with the exception of qualifying for the Champions League, had led to his dismissal.

The dramatic Sergio Agüero strike that won the title last May secured Mancini a lucrative five-year contract worth

around £35m and a mandate to build City into an ongoing force. But 12 months on Mancini is unemployed, with

the Abu Dhabi-led executive's decision to remove him coming after they allowed him to limp on when news broke

on the eve of Saturday's FA Cup final with Wigan Athletic that they were in advanced discussions with Málaga's  

Manuel Pellegrini, who is almost certain to replace him.

Although on Monday morning Pellegrini denied he had reached an agreement with City, discussions between the

club and his agent, Jesús Martínez, regarding financial terms and contractual clauses are at the stage where a deal

is ready to be signed. This should now be a formality.

The Chilean is likely to start his new role at the turn of the month after City said the assistant manager Brian Kidd

will "take interim responsibility for the remaining two games of the season and the post-season tour to the United States".

Until the announcement confirming Mancini's removal, posted on the club website at 10.22pm, City had not issued

any public comment since indications began that the manager's job was in doubt. This had cast the Italian as an

increasingly isolated figure, with it becoming a matter of when not if he would lose his job.

The statement said: "It is with regret that Manchester City football club announces that Roberto Mancini has been

relieved of his duties as Manchester City manager. This has been a difficult decision for the owner, chairman and

board to make and it is the outcome of a planned end-of-season review process that has been brought forward in

light of recent speculation and out of respect for Roberto and his extensive contributions to the football club.

"Despite everyone's best efforts, the club has failed to achieve any of its stated targets this year, with the

exception of qualification for next season's Uefa Champions League. This, combined with an identified need to

develop a holistic approach to all aspects of football at the club, has meant that the decision has been taken to find

a new manager for the 2013-14 season and beyond."

The reference to a "holistic approach" suggests a sea change in philosophy from top to bottom of the club, driven

by the chief executive, Ferran Soriano, and Txiki Begiristain, the director of football. This may include playing 4-3-3

throughout the academy and in the first team. Following the removal of Mancini, who could be a divisive figure,

there may also be a hope that the club will be more cohesive.

Khaldoon al-Mubarak, the chairman, said: "Roberto's record speaks for itself and he has the respect and gratitude

of Sheikh Mansour [the owner], myself and the board for all of his hard work and commitment over the last three

and a half years. He has clearly also secured the love and respect of our fans. He has done as he promised and

delivered silverware and success, breaking the club's 35-year trophy drought [winning the 2011 Cup] and

securing the title in 2012. I would like to personally and publicly thank him for his dedication to the progress that

he has overseen and for his support and continued friendship."

Before the club's pursuit of Pellegrini emerged, the plan was for Mancini to end the season and have a review in

the emirate. This would have been led by Mubarak and included Soriano and Begiristain.

Mubarak and his team were adamant that if it were decided to let Mancini go, there should be a candidate in place

who had agreed terms and would be ready to take over. This was the strategy under which Pellegrini was approached.

With regard to Mancini's position being all but untenable before he was removed, City were in precisely the same

position when he became manager in 2009. Then, it was common knowledge that he would supersede the

incumbent, Mark Hughes as the Welshman took charge of the club's match with Sunderland on 19 December.  

Following a 4-3 win, Hughes was sacked.

City intend to make cuts lower down the club, too, with an extensive sacking programme. Soriano and Begiristain

have decided the faults in the existing coaching staff go all the way to youth level and will make their point

ruthlessly

Roberto Martinez could stay, says Dave Whelan

FA Cup final preview: Roberto Martinez believes Cup win would be forever

Sir Alex Ferguson Retires:

Is This The End Of The Manchester United Referee Conspiracy?

by Nadim Bedran

8 May 2013

Fans of Manchester City, Liverpool, Arsenal, Leeds, Spurs, Chelsea, Everton, West Ham, Newcastle - you name

the club and they've all suffered at the hands of the Manchester United Referee Conspiracy. This season Man U

were the only team not to have a player sent off or a penalty given against them.

That's just this season - there's plenty more proof out there...

Fans of Manchester City, Liverpool, Arsenal, Leeds, Spurs, Chelsea, Everton, West Ham, Newcastle – you name

the club and they’ve all suffered at the hands of the Manchester United Referee Conspiracy.

This season Man U were the only team not to have a player sent off or a penalt given against them. That’s just

this season –  there’s plenty more proof out there…

After I wrote my last piece, on Manchester United’s relationship with the FA, I was taken aback by the response I

had. I suggest to people who haven’t read it to jump to that post now as it gives a lot of background on what we

will look at in this article.

As stated in my previous post, the fortunes of the  institutions surrounding football in the UK will be negatively

hit should any proof of corruption come out. It is naturally in their interest not to investigate the matter. In fact,

the managers that have come out and questioned the refereeing selection process (Rafa Benitez, Andre Villas

Boas) have been turned into laughing stocks by the English press corps.

So, investigate some more I did. And some of the stuff I found out surprised even me.

During United’s title winning 2010/11 season, they only lost 4 league games. I looked at who refereed those

games and how long they then spent without being assigned Manchester United games as well their

subsequent trend of behavior towards United.

Michael Oliver took charge of their first defeat, the February 2011 2-1 loss at Wolves. He was not given another

Manchester United game to referee until December 2011. Since then, Oliver has had 2 United games.

United have won both, with Oliver refusing to give a clear Fulham penalty in the 1-0 United win late last season at

Old Trafford; a game came right at the end of the title race. A few weeks ago, Oliver gave United a penalty for a

shocking dive by Danny Welbeck in the home win against Wigan.

The second game United lost was away to Chelsea. Martin Atkinson was the referee then and some of his

decisions incurred the wrath of Alex Ferguson. Atkinson was not given another United game to referee for an

ENTIRE YEAR.

Atkinson was further punished with his decisions that went against United that day. He was not given a single  

Premier League game to referee for a full month. Even worse, he was subsequently given 3 lower league games

to referee that season- when he’d previously not officiated a single one that campaign.

It seems that Atkinson was given a clear message that day.

The 3^rd United loss came at Anfield, where a Dirk Kuyt hat trick secured a 3-1 home win. The referee that day was

Phil Dowd. He was criticized by Ferguson for not sending Jamie Carragher off. In the very next United game

Dowd refereed, he gave them a penalty which secured a 1-1 draw at Blackburn and their 19^th league title.

Giving United penalties in the very next game you referee for them after having been criticized is a trend we’ll

soon notice.

The final United loss of the 2010/11 season came at the Emirates, where Chris Foy refereed a 1-0 Arsenal win. It

will come to no surprise to people to know that Foy was subsequently not assigned a United league game for,

again, AN ENTIRE YEAR.

He did however referee 2 United games in the cups during that time. The first was in the Carling Cup against

CrystalPalace. He awarded United a penalty. The second was at Manchester City in the FA Cup. United got a

penalty and Vincent Kompany was sent off early in the game.

To resume, we’ve just analyzed what happened to the 4 referees that officiated United’s 4 league losses in the

2010/11 season. 2 of them were not given any more United league games for a full year (Atkinson and Foy), a

third for 9 months (Oliver). 2 of those referees gave United penalties in the very next game (Foy and Dowd) they

took charge of and one refused to give a blatant one to the opponents (Oliver). Martin Atkinson, was not given

Premier League games to officiate for an entire month and assigned to 3 lower league games.

I also looked at Mike Jones after prompting from the comments board. Jones refereed the 1-1 home draw with

Newcastle last season and falsely awarded Demba Ba a penalty.

Subsequently, Jones was not given a single football game, at ANY level, to referee for an entire month. The next

United game he was handed came a few months later, the 2-0 home win against Stoke which saw… You

guessed it: 2 penalties awarded to Manchester United which, according to reports, were “very soft”. 

How about Mark Halsey? Well, when he gave WBA a debatable penalty in the 1-1 draw at Old Trafford in May 2005 it was his 5^th United game that season. He then also went an ENTIRE YEAR without being given any United

games to referee. From 5 games in a season to none for a year. His record since then? He’s refereed 11 Man Utd

games which have seen 11 United wins: the latest coming at Anfield, where 3 controversial decisions went the

away team’s way.

In terms of trends, considering what we discovered about Alan Wiley and Mark Clattenburg (whose record with

no United games to referee now stands at 36 league games since he took charge of the 6-1 home loss to

Manchester City), there’s enough to make you wonder what exactly is going on in the referee selection process.

It also ties in perfectly with ex referee Jeff Winter’s comments about The FA being reticent to assign United

games to referees Ferguson has criticized in the past.

The whole world revolves around incentives and punishment. From a young age, kids are brought up that way.

Positive and negative reinforcement are at the very core of child psychology. You can’t blame people who are

well aware of the punishment awaiting them (through the form of demotionsand suspension from future United

games) if they’d rather go for the safe option of keeping Ferguson happy.

I don’t blame the referees.

The people I blame are the ones that are letting this happen. The media who have not uttered a peep or written a

single article about this for 2 decades. The FA who run the game in this country and have allowed this situation

to fester. The clubs who see no issue with having David Gill, United’s CEO, on the board of the FA. And of

course, the PGMOB:  the people who regulate officiating in England

The person at the head of the PGMOB and who is in charge of selecting which referee gets handed which game

is Mike Riley, an ex professional referee who is most famous for giving a penalty for a clear dive by Wayne

Rooney in the 2004 Man United 2-0 win against Arsenal which ended the Gunners 49 game unbeaten streak.

Riley was accused of pro United favoritism throughout his career. For younger readers, he’s my generation’s

Howard Webb.

According to the Guardian’s research, which goes to back to the beginning of the 1997-98 season until 2004,

“Riley refereed 23 United games in all competitions and gave 12 penalties for United in that time, but only three

against them. And he has sent off five of United’s opponents.

At Old Trafford, Riley’s record is weighted even more heavily in favor of United: He gave 10 penalties in the 14

games he officiated to the home side, Manchester United.”

Riley’s bias was so suspected than when was awarded the Everton vs Man Utd FA Cup semi final to officiate in

2009, David Moyes actually called for an investigation on whether Riley was a United supporter.

This is the man who now decides which premier league games to assign to referees.

Add that to everything we’ve found out: the year long waits for referees who take charge of United losses to be

given another United game to officiate, the penalties that are given to United in said referees next United games,

the punishment for making mistakes that cost United points (Atkinson’s month long suspension from premier

league games, Jones’ 1 month suspension from ALL PROFESSIONAL games), the comments from ex referee

Jeff Winter (see my previous post), the fact that 18% of Howard Webb’s career penalties have gone to

Manchester United,the retirement of Alain Wiley after being called unfit by Alex Ferguson and, of course, the

presence of David Gill inside the FA and surely there’s enough there for some investigative journalist in the UK

to actually look more into this.

If only to put the millions of football fans’ across the world’s minds at ease.

Because we could all be wrong and all of this may just be a set of freakish coincidences. Maybe English football

is squeaky clean like they make us believe and the referee selection process is completely unbiased.

Maybe we’re just paranoid…

Or maybe not… Chris Foy failed to give Manchester United a penalty in their 3-2 loss to Spurs last month. The

PGMOB did not handed Foy a Premier League game to referee the next weekend: instead, officiated in League 2

for the first time in more than 4 years.

Mike Jones meanwhile, who missed a blatant penalty on Luis Suarez at Norwich the same weekend, took charge

of West Brom vs QPR in the Premier League. Finally, Howard Webb (who sent off Jordi Gomez on Saturday; a

red card today rescinded by the FA) took charge of Newcastle’s home game against Manchester United.

Why did Foy’s errors on last month lead to his demotion to the lowest professional league in England while

Webb’s and Jones’ mistakes didn’t cost them?

I guess we all know the answer to that question…

1 April 2012 Last updated at 00:03

By Ruth Alexander BBC News

A familiar sight at Old Trafford - penalty dispatched

Famous football teams benefit from favourable refereeing decisions when playing at home, it has been claimed

this week. Is that true?

That was the complaint after Fulham were denied a penalty against Manchester United in a Premier League 1-0

defeat at Old Trafford, Manchester, last Monday.

The Fulham manager Martin Jol said afterwards that referees needed to be "brave" to give a visiting team a

penalty at Old Trafford.

And two days later, Manchester City executive Patrick Vieira gave voice to a widely held belief when he said:

"When United play at home, they may get some advantage that some other teams do not get."

The assumption among some fans has long been that big refereeing decisions tend to favour the big clubs

when they play in front of their large and fervent home crowd.

"If you go to Spain it's the same, if you go to Italy, it's the same," said Vieira, who played for Arsenal for many

years.

Emphasising that he hadn't seen the incident in the Fulham game and wasn't criticising Manchester Utd, he

added: "It's something the teams who are used to winning get all the time, so we need to win games so we may

have this kind of advantage in the future."

So is there any evidence that referees are more likely to make penalty decisions that favour big teams playing at home?

This is more than Fulham, who have conceded roughly one penalty every 14 games at home.

So it is actually more common for a visiting team to get a penalty at Old Trafford than Craven Cottage.

Fulham are in fact among seven current Premier League clubs who have since 2006 conceded fewer penalties at

home than Man Utd.

It's true that the team in the Premier League that has conceded the most penalties on average (one penalty every

six matches) is one of the smaller clubs, Blackburn Rovers.

And also the team that has conceded the fewest (one penalty only every 18 games) is Chelsea, one of the top

dogs.

They have also won a penalty on average once every five games.

But there could be a far simpler explanation than referee bias, says a sports correspondent with a keen eye on

the statistics, Bill Edgar of the Times newspaper.

"Given that Chelsea have been among the most successful clubs over that period, you would have expected

them to have given away the fewest penalties simply because the opposition are generally weaker and therefore

will spend less time in Chelsea's penalty area, so there will be less opportunity for them to win penalties," he

says.

If the big clubs aren't necessarily conceding fewer penalties because of the referee, do they maybe have

penalties awarded in their favour?

Manchester United have been awarded a penalty every 4.4 games, on average. This makes them the second-

placed team in terms of the number of penalties won.

The first? Patrick Vieira's Manchester City. They were awarded a penalty every 3.93 games they played on average.

The two Manchester teams are the top two this season, battling it out for the Premier League trophy.

The team that ranks lowest in terms of the number of penalties won is Wolverhampton Wanderers who were

awarded a penalty only every 13 matches on average.

What does Sir Alex say?

 

 

• Sir Alex Ferguson conceded his Man Utd team were a little fortunate in the incident against Fulham
• But he denies his Man Utd team benefit from an advantage
• Penalty decisions even themselves out over the season, he says
• And he has pointed to instances when he says his team were denied clear penalties themselves

 

But Vieira also complains that refs are biased towards the big clubs in Spain and Italy. And Real Madrid's

manager Jose Mourinho is frequently up in arms over what he sees as bias in favour of Barcelona.

For the BBC, the sports statisticians at Opta have looked at every La Liga match involving Barcelona and Real

Madrid since 2006.

The stats show that Real Madrid conceded one penalty roughly every 11 games in front of their home crowd,

while Barcelona conceded one penalty in every 10 games.

So it's Jose Mourinho's own team, Real Madrid, who have a better penalty average.

And Real Madrid didn't just concede fewer penalties at home - they won more too - roughly one every four home

games, compared with Barcelona's one in five.

But statistics alone do not tell us the truth about whether big teams really are favoured in the penalty area, says

Edgar, who has an interesting solution.

"Then collect a panel of football experts and let them watch them. You would have the players' identities

removed and the teams' identities removed and compare [the panel's] consensus with the decision the referees

made.

"And if there was a considerable difference, then that would point to a bias among referees."

This kind of anonymised approach is possible in some fields. Orchestras famously introduced blind auditions

where musicians played behind screens.

When they did, the number of women hired rose sharply.

But it would be somewhat trickier to conduct blind experiments involving referees.

Mind you, some football fans will tell you the ref's blind anyway.

Fresh scandal hits horseracing:

Newmarket's Gerard Butler faces anabolic steroid probe

What the impact of Godolphin doping furore means to horse racing

Bookmakers do not have to refund bets on Mahmood al-Zarooni-trained horses

which will not be able to take up engagements

• 
• Greg Wood
• The Guardian, Tuesday 23 April 2013 21.33 BST

Trainer Mahmood al-Zarooni has admitted using steroids on some of his horses in the powerful Godolphin stable.

  

Photograph: Michael Mayhew/Sportsphoto/Allstar

Q Will ante-post bets on banned horses be refunded?

A No bookmaker is under any obligation to refund bets on horses trained by Mahmood al-Zarooni which will not be able to take up planned engagements in races such as the 1,000 Guineas. Ante-post bets are traditionally placed on an "all-in, run or not" basis and it is accepted by punters that the price they receive reflects the possibility that, for whatever reason, their horse will not line up. Nonetheless, most major firms have refunded ante-post bets on Certify, who had been a 6-1 chance for the 1,000 Guineas and was the only horse among those to test positive to have attracted significant support. Bets on the Betfair betting exchange, however, are losers.

Q What are the best ways to improve a horse by doping?

A One of the first drugs to be used to boost racing performance was cocaine, which was used by doping gangs in Britain towards the end of the19th century. However, its effects were so powerful that it was not easy to hide. More recently "milkshaking" – the administration of a powerful alkaline solution via a tube to the horse's stomach – has been used to boost performance, particularly in America where horses are trained on the track and the "shake" can be given shortly before a race. Steroids have more long-term effects, however, and muscle bulk built up while a horse is on steroids will be retained once the substance has left its system.

Q How common is 'testing in training'?

A About 7,500 horses are sampled for testing immediately after a race in Britain each year, roughly 8% of the total annual starters. The British Horseracing Authority (BHA) does not release details of the number of horses tested in their stables but Zarooni would have been warned in 2012, after two of his horses tested positive for a painkiller, that he could expect a visit from the security department's testing team at some point over the next12 months.

Q Do steroids have welfare implications for racehorses?

A Certainly. Accelerating the process of building up muscle increases the pressure applied through the narrow column of a horse's leg, while steroids are, by definition, powerful hormones and the effects of even a slight change in hormonal balance will be felt throughout a horse's system. Given the stresses that are placed on their bodies during racing, the use of steroids can increase the risk of injuries to horses and, as a result, to their riders.

Q For how long can Zarooni expect to be banned?

A The "entry point" penalty for a positive sample after "testing in training" is a six-month ban but Zarooni has some "previous" in this particular area as he was fined when those two horses tested positive for a painkiller last year. What is more, this case is so extensive, and serious, that the maximum penalty of a 10-year ban is more likely to be closer to the mark. It is also possible that Zarooni will be charged with a "catch-all" offence, similar to a "disrepute" charge in football, which could well carry an additional ban.

Q Who will take over at Moulton Paddocks?

A Unfortunately 150 horses will not sort out their own exercise regimes or make their own entries. Someone will need to be in charge of such a significant string but it is unlikely that there will be a promotion from within, at least until Godolphin has established exactly what – if anything – everyone knew and when they knew it. Zarooni was hired in 2010 because Saeed bin Suroor, who looks after the other half of the Godolphin string in the middle of Newmarket, could not possibly cope with 300 or more thoroughbreds. However, he may be able to keep an eye on them all in the short term at least. As for a long-term replacement for Zarooni, following the excruciating embarrassment of the last two days, Sheikh Mohammed will probably want to take his time overthat decision.

Q How was Zarooni caught by the racing authorities?

A It should have come as no great surprise to Zarooni to find a testing team turn up on his doorstep, given that he had been warned to expect one. But it seems that he was either complacent or overconfident that his use of steroids would not be uncovered.

Q How long has it been going on for at Moulton Paddocks?

A This is a question that the BHA will certainly be desperate to answer. It is difficult to believe that these 11 horses from a sample of 45 were the only ones to have received what seems to have been an almost routine treatment atthe stable. Greg Wood

The Commercialisation of the London Marathon

How Political this race has become  ?

Refused Entry to the London Marathon-Not a “Virgin Money” Supporter 

Not having Virgin plastered all over me

I do have  Non Named Running Shoes and believe in The Loneliness of the Long Distant Runner ?

But I would not run, or even be allowed to run, as I would object to having Virgin or Virgin Money

plastered over my shirt and everywhere else.

Not everyone wants to be associated with Virgin logo or Virgin boss Richard Branson.

The Lords have politiced the London Marathon by claiming Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson is too “political”.

Peers try to block 'political' Paralympian Tanni Grey-Thompson Gold medalist's welfare policy criticism blamed for

delay in Sport England appointment

Alan Hubbard , Brian Brady Sunday 21 April 2013

Tory peers are trying to block one of Britain's most decorated Paralympians, Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson,

from becoming chair of Sport England because they fear she would be "too political".

Prime Minister David Cameron must decide this weekend whether to bow to pressure from peers who believe she

would be unsuitable to run the country's grassroots sports body. It was expected that her appointment would be

rubber-stamped following her recommendation by the interviewing panel.

Several unnamed members of the House of Lords, however, have made representations in private to Downing

Street.

The cross-bench baroness is an acknowledged Labour supporter and a senior Whitehall source says her fierce

criticism of the Government's disability benefit reforms has caused several peers to feel she might be "too

political" for the job.

There is also thought to be concern in Whitehall that despite the recommendation of the panel, whose report was

presented by former London 2012 vice-chairman Sir Keith Mills, Lady Grey-Thompson does not have sufficient

experience of leading a major sports organisation or administering a budget the size of the Government quango's

£300m.

But Baroness Billingham, a shadow spokeswoman on culture, media and sport, said of Lady Grey-Thompson:

"The only reason that she has been critical is that the Government have been hopeless.... I am sure the Tories

would like someone who is more compliant and is not so critical of their policies."

Mr Cameron himself is believed to be open-minded, and is worried that vetoing her appointment would be

perceived as a political stitch-up. Those opposing Lady Grey-Thompson do not include Lord Coe or his

predecessor as British Olympic Association chairman, Lord Moynihan, who are both supportive. Lord Coe was

one of her referees and he spent some time with Mr Cameron on Friday afternoon pressing her claim. He said:

"She would make an ideal chairman." The sports minister Hugh Robertson is also understood to support her for

the job.

Former sports minister Gerry Sutcliffe said he believed Lady Grey-Thompson was "the best person for the job".

The Labour MP, who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on disability sports, said: "She is a strong presence

in the world of sport, not just on the track but also as a leader for athletes and administrators.... No one should be

penalised for disagreeing with the Government." Her chief rival is long-serving board member and sports lawyer

Nick Bitel, chief executive of the London Marathon. However, it is possible Mr Cameron may ask for the application

process to be re-visited to draw out fresh candidates.

Lady Grey-Thompson, 43, who won 11 Paralympic gold medals as a wheelchair athlete, and has a degree in

politics, was seen as favourite to take over from Baroness Sue Campbell at UK Sport, after she made it known she

was applying for the vacant part-time roles both there and at Sport England. "I'm not sure if it's going to go in my

favour or against me that I couldn't decide which box to tick," she said at the time. She opted for the latter because

of her empathy with sport's grass roots.

The recommendations for both posts were reviewed by Culture Secretary Maria Miller and officials and passed to

10 Downing Street over a week ago. A spokesman at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport said yesterday:

"The process of appointing the Sport England chair is completely fair. It is focussed solely on recruiting the best

person with the right attributes to serve grass-roots sport and deliver a lasting sports legacy from London 2012."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The LondonMarathon Charitable Trust Limited

Patron:
His Royal Highness Prince Henry of Wales

President:
John Disley CBE

Independent Trustees:
Chairman - John Bryant
Joyce Smith MBE
John Spurling OBE
Sir Rodney Walker

Treasurer / Company Secretary:
David Golton LLB FCA

Nominee of President of UK Athletics:
Dame Mary Peters DBE

Chairman Sport England:
Richard Lewis

Representatives of London Councils:
John Austin
Ruth Dombey

Representative of Greater London Authority:
Simon Cooper

Chairman England Athletics:
John Graves

Chairman England Federation of Disability Sport:
Charles Reed

The London Marathon Limited

Directors:
Chairman - John Spurling OBE
John Disley CBE
Iain Hook
Bryan Smith

Nominee of the City of London:
Nick Anstee

Nominee of the City of Westminster:
Daniel Astaire

Nominee of the Greater London Authority:
Simon Cooper

Nominee of London Councils:
Moira Gibb CBE

Nominee of UK Athletics:
Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson DBE

The LondonMarathon Charitable Trust - The London Marathon Ltd.

The London Marathon Ltd is wholly owned by the London Marathon Charitable Trust and is responsible for organising the Virgin London Marathon, adidas Half Marathon, Bupa London 10000 and the Standard Chartered Great City Race. Its income comes from sponsorship, marketing, advertising, entry fees, TV etc. and after costs 100% of its surplus is handed to The London Marathon Charitable Trust which then awards grants to recreational projects mainly in London. The amount of the surplus handed over to the Charitable Trust in 2009/2010 was £4.6m which is more than any other Marathon makes anywhere in the world. We are proud of the fact that 100% of this surplus goes to charity.

In addition runners in the 2011 Marathon raised more than £51.8 million for charities of their own choice and this money went, as always, directly to those charities.

Since the race began £45m has been allocated by the London Marathon Charitable Trust in total to recreational projects and the runners themselves have raised over £557.8m which has gone directly to charities of their choosing

Roberto Martinez v Paolo di Canio and a Wearside Boycott

I have enormous respect for Roberto who is loved by  Wigan FC and sadness for Sunderland supporters who

have been lumbered with this nasty little fascist di Canio.

Di Canio was stopped at the gates of the Russian’s Club and did Martinez a favour.

Wigan took a point away at QPR and the result does not look good for Rednap and puts Sunderland nearer

to the drop zone.

So all in all, it was probably the best decision for Sunderland.

While I don’t wish relegation on any club, it may be the best thing for Sunderland and the only way to get rid of

their manger.

Surely he would not survive the drop ?

However the next Sunderland home game may be the best way for Wearside to make sure and protest.

A Boycott of the game will hit the Directors of that Club where it hurts ,in the pocket.

Wigan should do another Houdini and their supporters will have all their efforts focused on keeping Roberto at

the Latics.

It is well known that I support Martinez replacing Wenger at the Arsenal but that is a story for another day.

The Radical

The media have missed the point of Paolo di Canio saga

The right-wing press are treading a dangerous path in their analysis of Sunderland’s appointment of their new

manager

Friday 05 April 2013

by John Millington 

Football comment: The media storm whipped up over

Paolo di Canio’s appointment as Sunderland manager has been far-reaching.

From David Miliband to mainstream anti-racist activists and militant trade union groups, all have taken steps to

criticise — and in some cases taken symbolic action to show their disdain for — the Wearside club’s decision to

employ someone who has described himself as a fascist.

Even the Daily Star carried a front page questioning the appointment, showcasing di Canio’s nazi salute while

playing in Italy seven years ago.

But instead of universal outrage across the press, which one might expect considering that not so long ago

Britain, along with her allies, fought a world war against fascism in Europe, right-wing commentators have

ended up turning the story into an attack on the “left,” criticising di Canio’s detractors.

LBC’s Iain Dale highlighted the so-called hypocrisy of the “liberal left,” emphasing the fact that no-one cared

about di Canio when he was Swindon manager, while treading a dangerous path of attempting to distinguish

national socialism from fascism.

He concludes by suggesting he would not boycott a team or complain if “a devoutly left-wing socialist” or

“Chinese communist” became a manager of a Premier League club.

Jonathan Liew in the Telegraph suggests our obsession with the di Canio story is particularly British “middle

class” pre-occupation and that reminders of the crimes of fascism in the Guardian were all designed to simply

make us all feel better, serving no wider practical purpose.

All of the above raises the questions: when did it become taboo to not like fascists, to criticise them, or to

remind ourselves of the horrors of the worst economic and political system ever devised?

If people were a bit late coming forward to have a pot shot at di Canio, does that make their condemnation any

less worthwhile?

The fact that there wasn’t much coverage of GMB — Britain’s third largest union — withdrawing their

sponsorship of Swindon when di Canio was manager due to his fascist sympathies — views he has now

retracted — is the fault of major newspapers, not anti-fascist commentators.

Durham Miners Association (DMA) leader Davey Hopper, whose group have asked for their banner at

Sunderland to be returned in protest at di Canio’s appointment, was a deep pit miner for 27 years.

I know Davey and have interviewed him several times over the last four years and he would be insulted to be

labelled “middle-class” or to have his association’s decision questioned on the basis of what it “hopes to

achieve.”

As difficult as it might be for Liew, Dale and others to understand — as I am sure they have never covered a

National Union of Mineworkers AGM before — the decision by the DMA is based on principle, one that dates

back to before Adolf Hitler and his partner in crime, Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini.

Opposing fascism whether by pen or sword is something that goes back to international brigades and the

Spanish civil war when thousands of working-class people volunteered to go over to fight fascist dictator

Franco and defend the Republic.

This was something war veterans who fought in the Second World War for Britain can relate to and why several

have come out vigorously opposed to di Canio’s appointment.

Hopper does fit the description of Dale’s “devout left-wing socialist” and the kind of society Davey wants, one

of peace, equality and workers’ rights, is the antithesis to fascist ideology.

As for the defence that di Canio has “several best friends who are black,” how many times have we heard that

one from somebody after they have made a racist comment?

Racism is political and therefore contradictory.

The BNP and English Defence League all have black members

— does this mean that both organisations are any less racist in their policies?

To use the other argument, that sport and politics should be kept separate, is to ignore the platform that

professional sport gives individuals and their viewpoints.

Similar arguments have been used to allow fascist countries or individuals to benefit from such regimes.

One need only look at the World Cup in Italy in 1934, the nazi Olympics in 1936, the open racism of the

International Olympic Committee towards militant black US sprinters in the ’60s or the breaking of sanctions on

apartheid South Africa by England cricketers, to see how sport and politics are inseparable.

The Premier League could learn a thing or two from the Greek footballing authorities who recently banned one

of their up and coming stars Giorgos Katidis from representing the national team due to his nazi salute at the

end of a league game last month.

The di Canio incident has underlined the need to step up campaigning against fascism, whether in uncovering

extremists in the world of sport or entertainment as well as far-right political movements.

To stand still or to ignore the seeds of fascism it is to fall into the trap of appeasement.

Need we be reminded of the concentration camp survivor Pastor Niemoller’s chilling quote about the perils of

ignoring fascism?

“When they came for the Jews, I remained silent; I wasn’t a Jew.

“Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak for me.”

This article first appeared on the Left Foot Forward blog.

Campaigners refuse to accept Paolo di Canio U-turn

Paolo Di Canio insists he does not support 'the ideology of fascism'

• Di Canio responds to 'vicious and personal accusations'
 

• Sunderland manager: 'I am not racist … I respect everyone'

• Louise Taylor
• The Guardian, Wednesday 3 April 2013 17.29 BST

Paolo Di Canio, pictured during his first Sunderland training session, has denied supporting fascism.

Photograph: Lee Smith/Action Images

After almost three days of controversy and confusion, Paolo Di Canio was finally forced into distancing himself

from fascism on Wednesday. The Sunderland manager's move came after criticism that culminated in the dean

of Durham calling on him to renounce the ideology publicly or risk being associated with "toxic far-right

tendencies".

Di Canio and the club had reacted slowly to the firestorm that has engulfed them since the Italian's appointment

on Sunday night, when David Miliband reacted to the 44-year-old's installation as Martin O'Neill's successor by

resigning as the club's vice-chairman.

In the past Di Canio has said he was "a fascist but not a racist" . He refused to confirm whether he was still a

fascist during an introductory media briefing on Wearside on Tuesday but now Di Canio has sought to clarify

his views.

"I am not political, I do not affiliate myself to any organisation," he said in a statement to Sunderland's website

clearly designed to draw a line under the matter. "I am not a racist and I do not support the ideology of fascism. I

respect everyone.

I am a football man and this and my family are my focus.

Now I will speak only of football.

"I feel that I should not have to continually justify myself to people who do not understand this, however I will

say one thing only – I am not the man that some people like to portray."

Sunderland's American owner, Ellis Short, and Northern Irish chief executive, Margaret Byrne, have evidently

been shocked and stunned by the opposition to their new manager from assorted quarters including the

Church of England, former Durham miners and war veterans.

It certainly did not help the struggling club when, earlier on Wednesday, new photographs emerged of Di Canio

seemingly attending the funeral of a well-known Italian fascist and when the Lazio historian Alfonso Dessi told

ITV News: "He was a true fascist. He declared himself a fascist and never denied his ideas but this matter had no

impact on the … football institutions. He had a huge impact on the so-called hooligans because of his political

ideas but no impact on the media." 

Belatedly Sunderland's previously confusingly opaque manager has answered back in a coherent manner.

"I have clearly stated that I do not wish to speak about matters other than football, however, I have been deeply

hurt by the attacks on the football club," he added. "This is a historic, proud and ethical club and to read and

hear some of the vicious and personal accusations is painful. I am an honest man, my values and principles

come from my family and my upbringing."

His words were posted on the club website shortly after the dean of Durham wrote an open letter to Di Canio.

The Very Reverend Michael Sadgrove, a Sunderland supporter and the son of a Jewish war refugee, said he

was struggling to stay loyal to the club and that he found Di Canio's "self-confessed fascism deeply troubling".

In his letter Sadgrove wrote: "Your appointment raises very difficult questions.

You see, I am the child of a Jewish war refugee who got out of Germany and came to Britain just in time.

Some of her family and friends perished in the Nazi death camps.

So I find your self-confessed fascism deeply troubling.

"Fascism was nearly the undoing of the world.

It cost millions of innocent lives.

Mussolini, who you say has been deeply misunderstood, openly colluded with it. You are said to wear a tattoo

DUX [the Latin equivalent of Duce and a reference to Benito Mussolini's title Il Duce] which speaks for itself. This

all adds up to what I find baffling.

"You say that you are not a racist, but it needs great sophistication to understand how fascism and racism are

ultimately different. I can promise you that this distinction will be lost on the people of the north-east where the

British National Party is finding fertile ground in which to sow the seeds of its pernicious and poisonous

doctrine.

"You did not necessarily know this before you came. But I believe that unless you clearly renounce fascism in all

its manifestations, you will be associated with these toxic far-right tendencies we have seen too much of in this

region."

Di Canio had little choice but to respond.

Now Sunderland can only pray that the only F-word mentioned at the Stadium of Light is football.

Considering the team are without a win in eight games, one point above the relegation zone and due to visit

Chelsea on Sunday and Newcastle United the following week such refocusing seems essential.

"I doubt Paolo's political views are really relevant to keeping Sunderland in the Premier League," said Jeremy

Wray, Di Canio's former chairman at Swindon. "I've known Paolo for two years and I don't think I've heard him

discuss politics once."

Short will doubtless be delighted if the same proves true at Sunderland

Fascists should get the boot

Paolo di Canio belatedly claims he doesn't support fascism

The Aintree Grand National

Saturday 6th April 2013

49 horses are in contention for THE race of the year

The Radical has chosen the following selections and current price offered.

Seabass 9/1

Cappa Bleu 11/1

Colbert Station 11/1

Tea for Three 12/1

Imperial Commander 14/1

Join Together 18/1

Balthazar King 20/1

Treacle 33/1

Across the Bay 33/1

Saint Are 50/1

Ninetieth Minute 66/1

Oscat Time 66/1

Cloudy Lane 100/1

Viking Blond 100/1

These horses have the ability to get round the 4 mile trip

Can run on soft ground and jump fences

Have a jockey on board who has done it all before

Their trainer thinks they have a chance

All that remains is to hear it from the horses mouth

Most Bookies are offering a return on the first 5

Good Luck

Anti-fascist campaigners turn up heat on Paolo di Canio

Discrimination

Thursday, 21 March, 2013 18:37

FootballforAll@TheFA.com

Radical

The BBC's loss is the FA's gain - Greg Dyke is the right man for the job

Simon Kelner

Thursday 21 March 2013

Those who remain unmoved by protestations about the dangers of interference in a free press would do well to

recall the events that led to Dyke's departure

Football Association and the BBC have quite a lot in common: national institutions responsible for delivering a

product about which a vast number of Britons feel passionate, they have also been mired in scandal and

mismanagement in recent history.

So, it is entirely logical that the FA should choose as their next boss the man who led the BBC with great style

and acumen.

In fact, I would argue that the Beeb hasn't been the same since Greg Dyke resigned from the

corporation in 2004 in the wake of the Hutton Inquiry into the death of weapons inspector David Kelly.

Dyke felt he had to resign after Lord Hutton criticised inaccuracies in a BBC report that the government had

"sexed up" a dossier on Iraq's illegal weapons.

It is worth remembering the febrile atmosphere of the time: a government, desperate to convince a reluctant

public that the invasion of Iraq was justifiable, and the BBC, discharging their remit for independent, investigative

journalism, were locked in a desperate battle.

Every day, the government spinmeister, Alastair Campbell, would lob rocks in the BBC's direction.

The corporation's credibility was at stake, and, in the end, Tony Blair's administration won the day. 

Dyke - accompanied by his chairman, Gavyn Davies - walked out.

This, I'd suggest, was a victory for the government which came at a considerable cost.

Martin Bell, the saintly, veteran journalist said of Dyke's tenure at the Beeb that "he revived the confidence of

staff".

The result of his departure was that this self-assurance drained away, and many of the failures of the BBC since -

up to and including the Savile affair - can be traced back to the wounds suffered in this bitter confrontation with

the government, and to the effect it had on the editorial confidence of the corporation.

Those who remain unmoved by the current protestations from newspapers about the dangers of government

interference in a free press would do well to recall this chain of events.

Dyke's departure from the BBC led to protests from journalists, who took the unprecedented step of paying for a

full-page advertisement in the Daily Telegraph to convey their displeasure, and his time there was marked by a

plain-speaking, genial approach that will stand him in good stead in his new post.

The FA is an organisation that, similarly, is steeped in tradition and is steadfast in its way of doing things.

Dyke said, early on in his time at Broadcasting House, that he was determined to "cut the crap", and this may be

refreshing to reprise in a week when the FA put the fine detail of their rules ahead of the spirit of the game and

chose not to punish retrospectively a Wigan player for the sort of tackle that, had it happened on the street, might

have resulted in a GBH charge.

Also, Dyke looked around at the BBC and vowed to change the "hideously white" profile of its staff.

He might feel the same as he surveys the FA boardroom.

Whatever else, football's governing body gets a man at the top who combines commercial nous with an

experience of life, and has an abiding love of the game.

He has only one dirty secret: a fondness for Manchester United.

The list of polical racehorses' names grows

MAN U v REAL MADRID- One Two

"The Best Team Lost"- Mourinho

The Referee is also One Too !

Once again the referee decides the result making the game a charade

Nani sending off – There was no intent other than to control the ball. The Real player ran into him on purpose.

The decision won’t do Turkey’s tourist industry any good either !

Manchester United 4 Norwich 0: Alex Ferguson expecting goals against Real Madrid

Ryan Giggs signs contract extension to keep him playing past his 40th birthday

World Football - Matchpack: England v Brazil

Team news, manager quotes, stats and video preview ahead of England's prestige friendly with Brazil at

Wembley on Wednesday night at 19.45

TEAM NEWS

England are without Liverpool forward Daniel Sturridge (thigh), Tottenham’s Jermain Defoe (ankle) and

Manchester United midfielder Michael Carrick (hip). Wayne Rooney is likely to be joined in attack by Danny

Welbeck, but Theo Walcott could feature in a central role up front at some stage.

Roy Hodgson has confirmed Arsenal left-back Ashley Cole will start the match to earn his 100th cap.

Ronaldinho could start for Brazil after earning a recall for the first time in a year. QPR goalkeeper Julio Cesar is

one of four Premier League players who could all feature for the visitors with David Luiz, Ramires and Oscar also available for selection.

MANAGER QUOTES

Roy Hodgson on why Steven Gerrard will captain the side despite Ashley Cole earning his 100th cap:

"I don't see any reason why the captain should let anyone else lead the team out.

Ashley does his talking and work on the field and I don't think he's ever pushed himself forward during his 100

appearances as a potential captain of the team.

I think he's just very happy to be a key player in the team so I'm pretty certain he won't be trying to rip the

armband off Steven. If he does I might have to step in."

Luiz Felipe Scolari on his decision to reject the England job six years ago: "Of course, it hurts.

It hurts a lot because I would have loved to have been the manager of the England team.

Who wouldn't?

It's a wonderful national team.

When I was invited to be national coach of England, when we sat down I still had a contract with the Portuguese

national team and I was not willing to break that contract.

It was my duty to fulfil it. Imagine what it would have been like when we played each other in 2006 and I had

signed that contract with England.

I wish all the best for the English players and their manager on their path to innovation."

MATCH FACTS

England have won just three of their 23 previous internationals against Brazil, drawing nine and losing 11.

England’s 13% win percentage over Brazil is their worst against any nation they have faced more than twice in international matches.

The Three Lions are without a win in eight against Brazil (D4 L4), with Bobby Robson the last England manager

to oversee a victory against them back in March 1990 (1-0, Gary Lineker with the goal).

This run of eight without a win against Brazil is also England’s longest current run without a victory against any side.

Brazil have only won two of their 10 games against England at Wembley, however, though six of these games

have ended level (two England wins).

England have only lost two of their last 22 internationals in all competitions (W13 D7) and have only been defeated once in 12 under Roy Hodgson (W7 D4, including one defeat after penalties).

England have scored at least one goal in all but one of their 31 internationals at the new Wembley, with Montenegro the only side to prevent them from scoring back in October 2010.

Brazil were the last team to prevent England from scoring in a friendly match, beating them 1-0 in Doha in November 2009.

Danny Welbeck, who finished last year as England’s top scorer, scored with all five of his shots on target for Roy Hodgson’s side in the year 2012.

Brazil have won 15 and lost just two of their last 18 internationals (all friendlies), with both defeats coming in the

space of a week back in June 2012 against Mexico and Argentina.

Neymar has scored eight goals in his last six appearances for Brazil.

MATCH ODDS

England (9/4) Brazil (7/5) Draw (5/2)

"Will the Real Wenger please take the reigns in Spain ?"

Arsenal 2 Liverpool 2:

Theo Walcott and Olivier Giroud score as Gunners come from two goals down to claim draw

Londoners fight back to cancel out goals from Luis Suarez and Jordan Henderson

Wednesday 30 January 2013

by Greg Leedham at Ashburton Grove

Football: A combination of scintillating attacking and woeful defending ensured that journalists fingers were kept

warm in the winter air at Ashburton Grove as Arsenal and Liverpool shared the spoils from a thrilling encounter.

The number of chances in this match would have been enough to fill a small book, let alone a match report. In the

end, it wasn't so much Arsenal's comeback from two goals down that was remarkable, but the fact that the sides

only plundered four goals between them.

Luis Suarez and Jordan Henderson gave the visitors, still smarting from Sunday's surprise FA Cup exit to

Oldham, a two-goal lead, but the second of those goals sparked a fightback from the home side, who hit back

through Olivier Giroud and Theo Walcott.

In the end, it was Arsenal who finished the stronger, with Reds keeper Pepe Reina forced into making a string of

saves late on, though Suarez forced a save from Wojciech Szczesny right at the death after Liverpool had seized

on a stray pass from substitute Andre Santos.

Liverpool will feel particularly disappointed given that victory would have seen them go level with their hosts, as

well as reduce the gap on fourth-placed Tottenham, who were held to a 1-1 draw at Norwich.

Both sides have shown themselves to be vulnerable at the back this season, so the end-to-end slugfest was

hardly a surprise.

Nonetheless it was quite a sight to behold as the two English giants went for each other from start to finish.

Liverpool took the lead on five minutes. Bacary Sagna's slip down the left flank allowed Reds left-back Glen

Johnson to cross for the unmarked Daniel Sturridge.

Szczesny did well to save the Englishman's goal-bound effort, but the ball fell to Suarez.

The Uruguayan did well to get his shot away through a sea of players and the ball flicked off defender Per

Mertesacker, wrong-footing Szczesny, who watched in agony as the ball went into the net.

Arsenal nearly hit back immediately.

Walcott found space down the right side of the Liverpool area and stung the palms of Reina with a rasping drive.

The Gunners were pushing forward with intent, but Liverpool, with Suarez, emboldened by his 22nd goal of the

season, and Sturridge, had pace with which to counter-attack.

The latter went close again with the game just 12 minutes old when he pulled away from Thomas Vermaelen to

latch onto a delightful pass from Suarez. Running at goal from the right-side of the area, the Englishman drilled a

half volley a couple of yards wide.

Arsenal were living dangerously, but continued to push a high line as they went in search of an equaliser.

As would be the case on more than one occasion, they found goalkeeper Reina, back in the team for Brad Jones, in fine form.

After a couple of corners in quick succession, the ball fell to Walcott on the edge of the Liverpool area.

The England international steadied himself before bending an Thierry Henry-esque effort.

Reina dived acrobatically and tipped the ball away.

Liverpool skipper Steven Gerrard was the next to come to his side's rescue, cutting out Lukas Podolski's cross

which, had it reached its intended target of Giroud, would have given the Frenchman a simple finish.

Yet a second goal for Liverpool looked just as likely.

First Podolski cleared off the line from Daniel Agger's downward header.

Seconds later the lively Suarez flashed a low, diagonal drive inches wide of Szczesny's goal.

Worse was to come for Arsenal when Kieran Gibbs pulled up with what looked like a hamstring injury. He was

withdrawn eight minutes before the interval for Santos, who was given a torrid time by Brighton's forwards in Saturday's FA Cup tie.

Arsenal's main striker in Giroud had been quiet, but briefly announced himself when he rose highest to a Walcott

cross and flashed a header into the hands of Reina.

Liverpool should have gone in 2-0 at the break.

Stewart Downing, an improving performer in recent weeks, released Henderson down the left flank.

Most of Arsenal's players were a long way from their own goal, having ventured forward for an attack.

Szczesny rushed out to meet the former Sunderland man, but stopped at the edge of his area.

Henderson went for the lob, but could only plant his effort on the roof the Arsenal net.

It was a missed opportunity.

Neither side were able to shore up their defences after the interval.

Sturridge scuffed an effort just wide, seconds after he had appealed for a penalty for handball against Vermaelen.

Arsenal were screaming for a spot kick themselves within a minute when Podolski ran at Andre Wisdom and

appeared to be clipped by the Liverpool defender.

Referee Kevin Friend never looked interested and, in truth, Podolski did himself no favours with a theatrical tumble.

The chances were coming thick and fast.

Podolski picked out Walcott at the back cross with a delightful cross, but the England man headed over with all

the finesse one would expect from a winger.

The next goal would surely change the game and it came to Liverpool in remarkable fashion.

Sturridge drove into the Arsenal half in typically menacing fashion and found Liverpool's forward-most player Henderson.

The midfielder, who had been industrious to that point, seemed to be going nowhere but managed to wriggle his

way free of three Arsenal defenders, with Santos and Mertesacker particularly befuddled.

The ball rebounded off Santos and Aaron Ramsey, who was rushing back, before finding its way back to

Henderson, who slotted home for a simple finish.

Henderson's persistence was admirable, but the way he bullied his way through almost an entire Arsenal

defence on his own was nothing short of outrageous.

As the Englishman celebrated in front of the visiting support, the home fans hurled programmes and abuse towards the pitch.

Their ire would turn to glee remarkably quickly as Arsenal mustered a quick-fire response.

Giroud rose highest to head home from Wilshere's free-kick to reduce the deficit.

The Frenchman could have driven a bus through the gap left by Reds centre-backs Agger and Jamie Carragher,

and he punched the air in delight as he claimed his claimed his fifth goal in a week.

Three minutes later and Arsenal were level. Santi Cazorla found Giroud in the Liverpool area with a cute pass and

the striker laid the ball off to Walcott who simply rifled the ball through Reina for the equaliser.

Suddenly the home fans were in full voice again, imploring the team to go for the jugular.

They responded in kind, with Walcott nearly giving his side the lead with a left-footed drive from the edge of the area that skimmed inches wide.

Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers responded to the sudden crisis by removing Sturridge for defender-cum-

midfielder Jose Enrique. Walcott and Giroud forced further saves from Reina and Suarez nearly gave Liverpool

all three points deep into injury time after Santos inexplicably gave the ball away on the halfway line.

In the end though, a draw was fair, but leaves neither side really where they want to be in the pursuit of a top-four finish.

England will never win a World Cup unless the influx of foreign players to

the Premier League is brought under control, says FIFA president

• Sepp Blatter claimed England will stay in the shadow of Europe's elite

• He said national team will fail to develop if managers keep looking abroad

• FIFA president believes England significantly behind Spain, Italy, Germany

By Dominic King and Larisa Brown

Daily Mail

| UPDATED: 17:58, 15 January 2013

England will stay in the shadow of Europe's elite unless the influx of foreign players to the Premier League is

brought under control, the FIFA president has said.

Sepp Blatter is adamant the national team will fail to develop if managers keep looking abroad for players.

He believes England are significantly in the shadow of Spain, Italy and Germany - and so will therefore never win a

World Cup unless the buying of players from overseas is limited.

He is however impressed with how the Barclays Premier League has been marketed and sold around the world.

Mr Blatter was speaking during a wide-ranging interview with Special Report on Sky Sports News, in which he

tackled subjects including racism, future World Cups and the possibility of being succeeded by Michel Platini.

He said: ‘I don’t think the Premier League is too global (but) you have too many foreigners and not (enough)

English players, so your national team is not yet at the level of these national teams.

‘If you look to Spain, Italy and Germany, you realise 80 per cent or even more of the players of the national team

play in their own league.’

Mr Blatter, who confirmed that goalline technology will be trialled during this summer’s Confederations Cup, called

for clubs whose fans racially abuse players to be docked points.

‘A more radical solution would be deduction of points,’ said Mr Blatter.
 
 ‘Deduction would have a better impact. To have a match played without spectators is a warning. You can never

solve a problem by running away.'

England's striker Wayne Rooney, England's midfielder Steven Gerrard and England's defender John Terry as they

lost 4-1 against Germany in the 2010 World Cup

England was once one of the most fancied teams when entering into the World cup but betting odds this time

round suggest otherwise.

Betfair odds for England winning the cup in 2014 are 25:1 - relatively poor compared to previous years.

The national team appears to have been on the decline for a while now, with most of the so-called 'Golden

Generation' having retired from international football.

England will take a new generation of players to the Brazil World Cup in 2014 and it is thought the team would do well to reach the Quarter Finals.

In 1990 England did well, making it to the Semi Final but being eliminated on penalties against West Germany.

But in 1994 the team did not even qualify.

In 1998 the team were eliminated on penalties against Argentina in the first Knockout Round.

They did better in 2001, where they made it to the Quarter Final but lost 2-1 again Brazil.

Again in 2006 they made it to the Quarter Final but were eliminated on penalties against Portugal.

2010 saw an embarrassing 4-1 defeat against Germany in the Second Round.

The team have so far had a shaky start in Group H, showing the road to Rio is set to be an uphill struggle.

England drew with the Ukraine in September and drew again with Poland in October.

They still have to play San Marino, Montenegro and Moldova and only group winners progress to the finals.

The eight best runners-up from the nine Europe groups - according to all their matches except for games against

the sixth-placed team in their group - play off for the four remaining spots.

Premier League ‘short-changing’ fans, says FSF chairman

Liverpool’s Referee Mariner –Man of the Match

as Mansfield are Stag-gered

FA Cup - Suarez handball shatters Mansfield as Liverpool survive

FA Cup third round, Field Mill - Mansfield 1 (Green 79) Liverpool 2 (Sturridge 7, Suarez 59)

By Jonathan Symcox - follow on Twitter @Symco_Eurosport | Eurosport – 12 hours ago

Eurosport - Liverpool's Uruguayan forward Luis Suarez (C) appears to handle the ball in the lead up to his goal

during the FA Cup third round football match between Mansfield Town and Liverpool at Field Mill …more  (AFP)  less
A handballed Luis Suarez goal was the difference between Liverpool and Mansfield in the FA Cup third round as

the Reds won 2-1 at Field Mill.

The Uruguayan, seemingly never far from controversy, clearly blocked the ball with his hand after Mansfield

keeper Alan Marriott had saved his close-range shot in the 59th minute.

It rolled into the goal and he acknowledged the incident by pointing to his hand as the home fans bayed for a free-kick.

£12 million signing from Chelsea Sturridge opened the scoring in the seventh minute.

A stirring second-half performance from Mansfield saw them pull one back on 79 minutes through Matt Green but they fell just short.

Liverpool will travel to Oldham in the fourth round in late January.

Brendan Rodgers handed Sturridge his debut as Suarez was left on the bench and Steven Gerrard rested from the squad altogether.

It did not take the England striker long to find the net as Jonjo Shelvey, with whom he linked up repeatedly in the first half, played him through and he finished low past Marriott.

Two minutes later he was in again after a weak backpass on a muddy pitch but could not get enough on the ball to stab past Marriott.

It was beginning to look like the Sturridge show as a quarter of an hour in he again sprung the offside trap from a Shelvey pass. The old adage 'too much time' was appropriate as he dallied and Marriot was able to close him down and save.

A famous FA Cup upset seemed remote with Liverpool seemingly at ease as Mansfield toiled in front of them. The Stags had giant defender Exodus Geohaghon to thank for flying back to put off Shelvey when in behind, with Marriott completing the save.

Green, who may provoke Football League interest with this sharp showing, had space 25 yards out to rifle a shot and force a block out of Brad Jones just after the half-hour mark.

On the counter Sturridge motored down the right and cut inside to the byline, where Geohaghon again made a crucial challenge to prevent a cut-back to Shelvey and certain goal.

Sturridge should have made it two on the stroke of half-time, again from a Shelvey pass, as his low shot was tipped wide of the far post.

Mansfield were galvanised by manager Paul Cox at the break and carved out chance after chance in a frenetic few minutes.

Lindon Meikle found Anthony Howell at the near post and his strike was deflected just wide. Another cross, this time from the left, had Jones unsighted by a defender and the ball jumped out of his grasp before being hacked away.

Soon after Green was denied by a last-ditch block then, as Louis Briscoe pounded down the right, diving Liverpool youngster Jack Robinson cut the ball out with his hand right on the edge of the box. Referee Andre Marriner did not give a free-kick or penalty and Briscoe's shot was tipped wide of the near post by Jones.

The Conference National side can point to many decisions that went against them on the night, including another strong penalty shout from the resulting corner: Geohaghon leapt to head thunderously towards goal, Jones blocked and Green executed a brilliant jumping backheel which Joe Allen blocked on the line with his arm.

Liverpool finally broke out of their half on 54 minutes, with Sturridge wasteful in firing wide of the far post, and he was withdrawn for Suarez immediately afterwards.

It took him five minutes to make his mark - but not in ideal fashion. He should have scored his initial chance, but could do nothing about the ball coming off his hand once Marriott saved.

Mansfield kept running but some of the fight had gone out of them - at least until Green got on the scoresheet with 11 minutes left.

Substitute Colin Daniel crossed to the far side of the box where Beevers tapped it back for the striker to fire home via a deflection.

Late on Green was flagged offside when level - Jones made the save anyway - while a series of Geohaghon long throws caused problems but Liverpool held on.

MAN OF THE MATCH

Daniel Sturridge (Liverpool) - He should have scored more, but gave Liverpool fans a glimpse of what he can do and scored on his debut.

PLAYER RATINGS

Mansfield: Marriott 8, Thompson 6, Geohaghon 7, Dempster 6, Beevers 6, Clements 7, Murray 6, Howell 7, Briscoe 7, Green 8, Meikle 6. Subs: Rhead 6, Daniel 7.

Liverpool: Jones 7, Wisdom 6, Robinson 6, Carragher 6, Coates 6, Lucas 5, Allen 6, Shelvey 7, Suso 6, Downing 6, Sturridge 8. Subs: Suarez 6, Henderson 6, Flanagan 6

England confirm squad for 2013 Women's Cricket World Cup in India

• Charlotte Edwards will captain England in tournament
• England will face India, West Indies and Sri Lanka

• Press Association
• guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 12 December 2012 16.58 GMT

Charlotte Edwards will captain England at the 2013 ICC Women's Cricket World Cup. Photograph: Philip Brown/Reuters

The England squad for the 2013 ICC Women's Cricket World Cup has been announced, with Charlotte Edwards

confirmed as captain of a 15-strong party.

The tournament, being held in India in February, will be a fifth World Cup for Edwards, whose team are reigning

champions following their triumph in Australia in 2009.

Eight members of that victorious squad are included this time, while there are six players experiencing their first

World 50-over competition.

Tammy Beaumont, Heather Knight, Danielle Hazell and Danielle Wyatt, along with the uncapped Amy Jones from

Warwickshire, were all part of the ICC World Twenty20 squad to reach the final in Sri Lanka in October but have

never played in the 50-over Women's World Cup.

Georgia Elwiss will be experiencing the world stage for the first time in her career and is the only addition to the

recent World Twenty20 squad.

Edwards said: "The whole team is really excited about defending our world title in Mumbai in February.

I'm so proud to be captaining such a talented team in what is the pinnacle event in our sport."

Drawn in Group A, England will face India, West Indies and Sri Lanka, with the top three from that stage moving

through to the Super Six round along with the top three teams from Group B (Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan and South Africa).

England squad

Charlotte Edwards (Kent, cap), Tammy Beaumont (Kent), Arran Brindle (Sussex), Katherine Brunt (Yorkshire), Holly Colvin (Sussex), Georgia Elwiss (Sussex), Lydia Greenway (Kent), Jenny Gunn (Nottinghamshire), Danielle Hazell (Yorkshire), Amy Jones (Warwickshire), Heather Knight (Berkshire), Laura Marsh (Kent), Anya Shrubsole (Somerset), Sarah Taylor (Sussex), Danielle Wyatt (Staffordshire)

Arsène Wenger says Sir Alex Ferguson should have been punished by FA

• Wenger says of referee row: 'Should you behave like that? No'

Press Association

• guardian.co.uk, Friday 28 December 2012 13.32 GMT

Arsène Wenger believes Sir Alex Ferguson should not have behaved as he did during the Manchester United match against Newcastle Link to this video

Arsène Wenger has criticised Sir Alex Ferguson for his on-field confrontation with the referee Mike Dean on Boxing Day.

The Arsenal manager, who has had his fair share of run-ins with Ferguson during his 16 years in England, thinks the Manchester United manager behaved improperly and should have been punished.

"Should you behave like that? No," said Wenger, who was sent to the stands by Dean for kicking a water bottle in 2009.

"I did not always behave like I should and you can call that a bad example, yes.

The message it sends out when you look at the pictures is just not to behave like that.

"We go sometimes overboard on the touchline and when we do it we have to be punished, it is as simple as that.

[If] it is me or Ferguson or anybody else in the world, the rules are the rules. It is not rules for one person and the rules for another person, it is the same for everybody."

Speaking ahead of Arsenal's home game with Newcastle United on Saturday, Wenger also appeared to rule out a move for Demba Ba.

The Newcastle manager, Alan Pardew, admitted on Thursday that Ba would be sold if the striker did not remove the £7.5m release clause in his contract.

"I like Demba Ba, yes," Wenger said.

"I don't think [this] is the right place to speak about that, because he plays against us tomorrow. I wouldn't like to put Newcastle or us or him in an uncomfortable position.

If you ask me do we sign Demba Ba, I say no."

Wenger refused to comment on reports he is interested in Barcelona's David Villa, but he was more forthcoming on the possibility of re-signing Thierry Henry for a second loan spell.

"I've not lost interest in him," he said. "He's still coming today to practise with us.

We have a close relationship.

You have to be cautious that it's not one time too many.

I have not completely [ruled out a second loan spell] but I haven't spoken about it with him at all."

Cricket - England need one last push

England's hard work has taken them a long way already in India, but they must raise their game one last time to

make sure they do their country proud here.

- Alastair Cook's England must raise their game one last time against India

Defeat in the final Test in Nagpur, where a draw is highly unlikely on what is sure to be a spinners' pitch, would

be an anti-climax after England's back-to-back victories in Mumbai and Kolkata to take an unassailable 2-1 lead.

A drawn series would, of course, still be a substantial achievement - many experts were predicting a 4-0 defeat

after England lost the first Test by 10 wickets - but not the glorious outcome so many supporters crave for

Alastair Cook's team.

They stand on the verge of modern cricket history as the first from England to win a Test series in India for

almost 28 years - and batting coach Graham Gooch believes it is within their grasp. Endeavour and

determination have combined with world-class skill to silence many of their doubters, and Gooch hopes there is more to come.

"Our guys have a good work ethic," he said. "They've taken on board all the help they've been given about

playing the turning ball and how to shape their technique - how you can score runs in these conditions.

"Credit to them - they've worked hard since the first training camp in Mumbai - so it's not just turning it round

since the first Test. All the work they've put in over a long period of time has now started to show rewards.

"We've got to make sure we carry that on in the next game and perform well there and come away from this

country with our supporters being proud of the England cricket team."

England's batsmen struggled haplessly against Pakistan spin in the Middle East last winter, and appeared no

better when this tour started in Ahmedabad.

"India were the better team in the first Test," said Gooch.

"We made a good showing in the second innings, but once you're bowled out for a low score in a five-day

game, you're up against it.

It was a good fighting performance in the second innings, Alastair leading it with a big hundred, but it was too

little too late."

Since then, it has been a very different story.

Graeme Swann warns England against India fightback

India v England: hosts drop Zaheer Khan, Yuvraj Singh and Harbhajan Singh for fourth Test
India have dropped lynchpin fast bowler Zaheer Khan, batting all-rounder Yuvraj Singh and

Harbhajan Singh for the fourth Test against England in the aftermath of their defeat in

Kolkata.

By Telegraph Sport

11:36AM GMT 09 Dec 2012

India's first Eden Gardens defeat since the last millennium was a second in successive Tests at the hands of

resurgent England, and means the hosts can no longer win the four-match series.

Only victory in the final Test, in fact, will rescue a draw and some pride - and India's selectors wasted no time in addressing the issue.

The three big names will be replaced in Nagpur by pace bowler Parvinder Awana, all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja and leg-spinner Piyush Chawla.

It was no surprise, after England had chased just 40 runs in the second innings this morning to prevail by seven

wickets and take an unassailable 2-1 lead, to hear Mahendra Singh Dhoni call to account by an agitated home press contingent.

While England can quietly add a successful 'reintegration' process in their ranks to their list of positive

developments under Alastair Cook, the Times of India front page this morning proclaimed the "disintegration" of Dhoni's team.

A new captain and six changes were the suggested TOI remedy, in a radical line-up especially notable for the absence of Dhoni himself and veteran master batsman Sachin Tendulkar.

The India selectors unsurprisingly stopped short of that.

Dhoni earlier made it clear he was happy to defer to the wisdom of the Board of Control for Cricket, but that he relishes the opportunity to try to put his team back on track.

"The selectors are here to decide," said the wicketkeeper-batsman.

"It's always fine to lead a side when they're doing really well, and everyone's performing.

"But that's not the time when you need a leader.

"Leading a side is all about (doing it) when the team is not doing well, trying to gel them together, back the youngsters and the senior guys.

"The easiest thing for me to do right now is to give up the captaincy and be part of the side, because that's just running away from the responsibility.

"I have to get the team together, and be prepared for the next Test match."

Dhoni does not believe either that India are at their lowest ebb in his tenure, citing instead whitewash defeats

away to both Australia and England.

"We were not really able to compete (then).

"We know what our faults are here, and I think we should be able to rectify them."

He believes a lack of collective productivity among India's frontline batsmen in back-to-back defeats in Mumbai

and Kolkata is the main problem.

"I think the batting order will have to take the responsibility.

"We need to score more runs, on a very good wicket to bat on like this.

"Of course, the bowlers will bowl a few good deliveries that you need to keep out.

"But in the top seven, most of us need to score at the same time to give the bowlers a par total to defend.

"Otherwise, it's very difficult and you find yourself under pressure."

Former England coach Duncan Fletcher has also had his critics since taking the same position with India, and

has now overseen six Test defeats out of seven home and away against his old team.

Dhoni, however, insists Fletcher is not to blame.

"The coach has excellent technical knowledge about batting, and guides the players in the right direction," he said.

"Ultimately, once you cross that rope, you are on your own.

"That's where we are lacking as of now.

It's wrong to question the coach, because we have won quite a few series.

"We should not look for excuses. It's up to the 11 players on the field."

India squad for fourth Test in Nagpur (v England, Dec 13-17): MS Dhoni (Captain, wkt), G Gambhir, S Tendulkar, V Kohli, C Pujara, R Jadeja, R Ashwin, P Chawla, I Sharma, P Ojha, A Rahane, A Dinda, M Vijay, P Awana.
India squad for two Twenty20 Internationals (v England, December 20 and 22 in Pune and Mumbai): MS Dhoni (Captain, wkt), G Gambhir, A Rahane, V Kohli, R Sharma, S Raina, Y Singh, M Tiwary, R Ashwin, R Jadeja, P Chawla, A Dinda, B Kumar, L Balaji, P Awana

Eden Gardens victory is a fitting reward for tough year,

says captain fantastic Alastair Cook

Saturday November 24 - Day 13 
24 Nov, 12:45 Sunderland v West Bromwich Albion  Stadium of Light, Sunderland
24 Nov, 15:00 Everton v Norwich City  Goodison Park, Liverpool
24 Nov, 15:00 Manchester United v Queens Park Rangers  Old Trafford, Manchester
24 Nov, 15:00 Stoke City v Fulham  Britannia Stadium, Stoke-on-Trent
24 Nov, 15:00 Wigan Athletic v Reading  DW Stadium, Wigan
24 Nov, 17:30 Aston Villa v Arsenal  Villa Park, Birmingham
Sunday November 25 - Day 13 
25 Nov, 13:30 Swansea City v Liverpool  The Liberty Stadium, Swansea
25 Nov, 15:00 Southampton v Newcastle United  St. Mary's Stadium, Southampton
25 Nov, 16:00 Chelsea v Manchester City  Stamford Bridge, London
25 Nov, 16:00 Tottenham Hotspur v West Ham United  White Hart Lane, London

GEOFF BOYCOTT LEFT IN A SPIN
  

 Geoff Boycott  Monty must feel like packing his bags and getting the next flight home Geoff Boycott

18th November 2012

By Gary Fitzgerald

FURIOUS Geoff Boycott hit out at England’s bungling selectors for going in to the first Test with just one spinner.

Ex-Test ace Boycott could not believe the “ridiculous” decision not to team up Monty Panesar with Graeme Swann.

Instead, they chose to rely on “club bowler” Samit Patel as the back-up spinner.

He took just one wicket for 96 runs as England allowed the Indians to take control.

Boycott said: “Monty must feel like packing his bags and getting the next flight home.

“He must feel very dispirited and fed up because if you are a top spinner and cannot get a game in India, there is something wrong.

I don’t see any fun coming to the sub-continent and just practising in the nets and carrying drinks.

“I like Samit Patel because he bowls and bats well.

But he’s more like a club bowler compared to the spinners India have at their disposal.

“You need a spinner who can turn it big time.”

India v England,

second Test: Cheteshwar Pujara puts hosts

into ascendancy after Monty Panesar's exploits

Radical -(Where should all the Flowers have gone ? Long time Passing !)

Second Test, day one (close): India (266-6) v England 

Monty Panesar took two wickets during the first session of the second Test in Mumbai  

By Derek Pringle, Mumbai

5:30PM GMT 23 Nov 2012

England’s bowlers unleashed the full Monty against India on Friday, but it was not enough to still the torrent of runs from Cheteshwar Pujara’s bat.

Alastair Cook’s side may have unearthed a wicket-taker for Indian pitches, after Panesar took four wickets on his return to the side, but India have found a batsman whose appetite for runs surpasses even that of Sachin Tendulkar.

So far, England have met Pujara four times this tour and only once have they dismissed him for less than a hundred, in the warm-up match in Navi Mumbai when he made 87. Since then he yet to be dismissed in this Test series, and has scored 361 runs. Yesterday’s unbeaten 114 was his latest serving of trouble for the visitors.

At 24, Pujara’s timing was impeccable and not just in the way he caressed England’s two main spinners for four through extra cover.

Batting between three and five in Indian domestic cricket these past 15 years has been a pointless occupation with Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman all immoveable objects.

Entire generations of batsmen have come and gone without the slightest chance of breaking into the Test team.

But Pujara has come to prominence at just the right time and played with such élan that Dravid and Laxman have not really been missed following their recent retirements.

Unsurprisingly, there are elements of both those batsmen in him with Dravid’s calm authority making up the lion’s share.

Some of the whipped flicks he played off Stuart Broad yesterday are pure Laxman in their virtuosity, though as a recent piece in one the papers here proclaimed, Pujara is very much his own creation.

In one of his worst days for England, Broad began by trying to bounce him out before moving to a tactic that seemed to revolve round Pujara missing a half-volley. He did not and Broad conceded runs at five an over, a rate his team could ill-afford on what is likely to become a increasingly difficult pitch for batting.

As he did in Ahmedabad, Pujara certainly stood out.

While other more vaunted batsmen lost their minds and their wickets playing across the spin, he worked out his best scoring options early and struck to them.

It helps that he appears to possess the concentration of a chess grandmaster and the speed of a striking cobra when latching onto the short ball, as both were needed to flourish yesterday on a pitch custom made to turn after the first hour.

Indeed, it was one of his whiplash pulls, off James Anderson with the second new ball, that enabled him to bring up his hundred to rapturous applause.

He and Ravichandran Ashwin, with whom he shared a telling partnership for the seventh wicket, were the difference between England assuming control on the opening day and ending it in second place.

Ashwin finished unbeaten on 60 enabling India to reach 266 for six, a score that looked some way off when they were 119 for five on a pitch crumbling by the hour.

After Ahmedabad, M S Dhoni said he wanted the remaining pitches in the series to spin from the outset to minimise the effect of the toss.

Yesterday, he won the toss and got what he wanted if not what he bargained for with the pitch, after seeing his team slump to five down just after lunch with Panesar rampant.

Reading pitches is an inexact science and team director Andy Flower admitted he and England got it wrong after omitting Panesar from the first Test.

There was no such mistake here once the match was to be played on a used pitch and Panesar’s inclusion brought almost instant reward after Anderson had won the early breakthrough by trapping Gautam Gambhir lbw with the second ball of the match.

Panesar replaced Anderson to bowl the seventh over and took his first wicket six overs later, bowling Virender Sehwag off his pads as he tried to play the ball to leg against the spin.

It is Sehwag’s 100th Test and while Panesar’s celebration was jubilant, it was nothing compared to his crazy, careering run across the square when he clean bowled Tendulkar soon after with a ball that will be replayed for decades, such was its perfection of arc, line and turn, as it spun from middle and leg to hit off stump.

Tendulkar made it look dramatic by playing across it and opening up his stumps, but such was its potency that a perfectly straight bat would probably still have edged it rather than kept it out.

Panesar’s next wicket was Virat Kohli and it brought a good diving catch from Nick Compton at extra cover. Offered a wide one to free his arms to Kohli did just that but failed to shift his weight into the shot.

At this point the pattern was broken, both in the wicket-taking and the type of batsman, with the left-handed Yuvraj Singh bowled by Swann for a duck, playing inside the line as the ball turned.

Swann bowled well enough from either end but the right-handers found it easier to counter him, and it was Panesar who struck next when he had Dhoni caught by Swann in the gully, a position Anderson had filled when Pujara offered a sharp chance off Panesar when he was on 60.

It was the only mistake he made as he and Ashwin put a dampener on England’s day, but not Panesar’s joyous return.

Watch Zlatan Ibrahimovic's stunning volley for Sweden against England

Zlatan Ibrahimovic has never scored a better goal than this overhead volley against England.

Maybe no one has.

10:14PM GMT 14 Nov 2012
 
Ibrahimovic, Sweden's captain, has made spectacular volleys his trademark over a stellar career. But this, in Sweden's 4-2 victory, was something else.

After England goalkeeper Joe Hart ran from his line to head the ball clear, there appeared to be little danger for the visitors. But within the blink of an eye, and before Hart could make it back into his penalty area, the ball was in the net.

Incredibly, the audacity was matched by the execution. Ibrahimovich's right boot was at least six feet from the ground when he made contact, after his astonishing leap and scissor kick, which combined the flexibility of Louis Smith and the leg strength of Chris Hoy.

"Sometimes, when he's doing these things, in training or in matches, you don't think it's possible," said Sweden coach Erik Hamren.

"Sometimes, you think you're watching a video game. Because it's not possible to do that - the fourth goal, for example."

Steven Gerrard, England's captain whose 100th cap was overshadowed by Ibrahimovic's four-goal recital, applauded the PSG star.

"His performance was world class and he just scored one of the best goals I seen live. It was his night."

Sweden v England preview:

manager Roy Hodgson has confidence in squad despite injuries

Rio Ferdinand in row with Sir Alex Ferguson over anti-racism campaign

Manchester United player declined to wear a Kick It Out T-shirt in a pre-match warm-up

 Cass Jones The Observer,

 Sunday 21 October 2012

Radical asks - Is it in Ferdinand's contract that he wears a "uniform" other than that of his club ?

Sir Alex Ferguson has warned defender Rio Ferdinand that he will be "dealt with" following his refusal to join his team-mates in wearing an anti-racism T-shirt on Saturday.

The Manchester United manager said he had been left "embarrassed" by the player's actions as he warmed up before his side's match against Stoke at Old Trafford and hinted that Ferdinand could be the subject of internal disciplinary action.

Speaking after Manchester United's 4-2 win, Ferguson said: "I am disappointed.

 I said yesterday that the players would be wearing it in support of the PFA [Professional Footballers' Association] and that every player should adhere to it.

And he goes and lets us down. We will deal with it, don't worry."

He later added: "I spoke to the press about it. It is embarrassing for me.

He will be dealt with, no doubt about that."

It is believed Ferdinand refused to support the Kick It Out campaign in protest against the punishment handed out by the Football Association to John Terry after he was found guilty of racially abusing Ferdinand's younger brother, Anton.

The Chelsea defender was issued with a four-match ban and fined £220,000 after the FA ruled that he had used racially offensive words against the QPR player when the two sides met at Loftus Road in October last year.

Ferguson had insisted all his players would wear the T-shirt to show a united front for the anti-racism group's period of action which started on Thursday and runs until 29 October.

His criticism follows his harsh words for Reading striker Jason Roberts, who also refused to wear the T-shirt in protest at what he perceives to be the campaign group's lack of action in combating racism in football.

But others have come out in support of Ferdinand, claiming he has the right to make a personal stand and have questioned Ferguson's highly critical comments of the defender.

Speaking on Radio 5, former Wales international Robbie Savage said: "I respect Jason Roberts for coming out and standing up for what he believes in, same with Rio Ferdinand.

The more you think about it, it is a shocking statement from Sir Alex Ferguson.

He says it has embarrassed him.

It is not about him. Fergie is the greatest manager in history, but for me it is up to Rio if he wears the shirt."

Rio Ferdinand has he put in a transfer request ?

Or does he intend too ?

Or has Ferguson made up his mind to off load him ?

Which ever way Ferdinand should never have left Leeds United

Maybe he will ask to return as senior player ?

He would be welcomed as long as he passes a fitness test….

Bring Anton and or a few friends with him? They would make a great defence.

And what are Leeds doing in the Championship

For that matter what is Ferguson doing still at Man U ?

Are they frightened the bubble will burst ?

Sure they are !

Crowd Racism Mars England U21 Win Over Serbia

Sky News – 7 hours ago

Crowd Racism Mars England U21 Win Over Serbia

England's U21 side were subjected to racist chants and pelted with seats, coins and stones during their European Championship play-off in Serbia.

Captain Jordan Henderson praised his players for their reaction to the alleged racist abuse and called on Uefa to take the appropriate action.

The Football Association reported "a number of incidents of racism" to Uefa after ugly scenes marred a 1-0 win for Stuart Pearce's team in the second leg of their play-off in Krusevac.

Liverpool midfielder Henderson said on www.thefa.com : "There was a lot of racist abuse out there from the stands and a lot going on after the game, which is hard to take for the players."

Defender Danny Rose was sent off after the final whistle after apparently responding angrily to monkey taunts from the crowd.

Scuffles also broke out when supporters invaded the field moments after Connor Wickham's stoppage-time goal secured a 2-0 aggregate success and a place at next year's finals in Israel.

Henderson added: "The players coped with the abuse really well. It's not nice. They kept their heads and were professional.

"I thought our players were brilliant and conducted themselves very well. The players completely condemn what happened.

"There were also stones, coins and seats getting thrown at us. I didn't understand why Danny Rose was sent off at the end - I didn't see he did anything wrong, other than get abused."

A statement from the FA read: "The FA condemns both the scenes of racism and the confrontation at the final whistle during which time our players and staff were under extreme provocation.

"The FA has reported a number of incidents of racism to Uefa following the fixture.

"These were seemingly aimed at a number of black England players by the crowd. The matter is now with Uefa."

England manager Stuart Pearce said Serbia's technical director Savo Milosevic had visited the England dressing room to apologise.

"I never like to see any football matches end like that," Pearce told ESPN.

"I think there were one or two racist incidents that came on from the crowd. It's in (Uefa's) hands now.

"It's very sad, to be fair, but we're united as a team. I'm very proud of the reaction of our players."

Tawhid @ 7/1
Ikhtisas @ 13/2
Cufflink @ 4/1

Trixie, 4 bets * £0.50  EW

AN  EACH WAY TRIXIE is 3 eachway doubles and an each way treble

Because the Bookie only pays 1/5th the odds for a place

the returns are a scandal for the stake and risk taken

  Time of bet:  03/10/2012 11:23:08 

Selections

No. Selections Event Event Date E/W Terms Odds Result

1 Tawhid  1.30 Salisbury
(Win and Each Way)
Live Stream 
03/10/2012 3 Places
1/5 Odds 7/1 Placed

2 Ikhtisas  2.00 Salisbury
(Win and Each Way)
Live Stream 
03/10/2012 3 Places
1/5 Odds 13/2 Placed
  Best Odds applied, price updated to SP.

3 Cufflink  3.00 Salisbury
(Win and Each Way)
Live Stream 
03/10/2012 3 Places
1/5 Odds 4/1 Won
  Best Odds applied, price updated to SP.

Multiples

Bet Type No of Bets Unit Stake Stake To Win Returns
EW Trixie
4
0.50 4.00  11.96

Roy Hodgson says England were better against Ukraine than in Euro 2012• '

We asked more questions of them tonight than we did before'

• 'I'm very pleased with the way we stuck at it'

 Dominic Fifield at Wembley

The Guardian, Wednesday 12 September 2012 

Roy Hodgson admitted he was "relieved" after England salvaged a late draw against Ukraine but praised his players' perseverance and insisted the performance had been better than that which yielded a victory over these opponents at Euro 2012.

The England manager's only real complaints centred upon the display from the referee Cuneyt Cakir, with Hodgson seeking him out at the final whistle to ascertain why Jermain Defoe's first-half goal had been disallowed.

He was also unimpressed with the Turkish official's eagerness to flash yellow cards at his players, with the captain Steven Gerrard dismissed a minute from time having been penalised for fouls on Ruslan Rotan and Denys Garmash.

He will miss the visit of San Marino next month, as will the full-back Glen Johnson after his second booking of the group, with three other England players also cautioned.

"People saw us at the European Championships in Ukraine, when we beat them [in Donetsk], but that was a better performance tonight than that which actually gave us a 1-0 victory over there," said Hodgson.

"You can't allow the result to cloud your judgment of the performance.

We asked more questions of them tonight than we did over there, and had we lost it would have been harsh justice. As it was for them to have lost that game in Ukraine.

"In the end, I suppose you're always relieved when you're losing 1-0 and get a late equaliser. I'm not so certain I'm prepared to accept it wasn't a great performance.

 I didn't think we did that badly – we stuck to our task – even if we started very poorly but, once in our stride, we had control of the game.

We went 1-0 down to a wonder strike, but I was pleased with the way we kept probing, playing our football and taking chances. We deserved our equaliser.

I'm very pleased with the way we stuck at it and worked."

Asked if he had been offered any explanation for Defoe's goal being ruled out, the striker having appeared to push Andrii Iarmolenko lightly in the throat only for the Ukrainian to fall clutching his face, Hodgson added: "Not really, no.

It was disallowed for a foul, apparently, but we didn't see it on the bench.

"I thought all the yellow cards were very harsh. I don't think there were a lot of bad fouls – or fouls, full stop – so I'm going to react and say there were far too many cards for the fouls committed, and we got too many.

 Steven Gerrard is extremely unlucky to be sent off.

The two fouls he was adjudged to have committed were not worthy of them."

Gerrard said of his dismissal: "It's disappointing for me because it's a red card - my first one in 98 caps. But we play San Marino next.

 I'm sure the boys can do the job without me and then I'll be available for Poland. I'm gutted over the red, but happy with my performance."

The Ukraine coach Oleg Blokhin departed encouraged by his side's point, describing it as a "very big positive result" and reasserting that his team are ready to challenge England, Poland and Montenegro to force passage out of the group.

"Before the game we'd wanted to win but, in the circumstances and after having a goal disallowed, it showed great character to get a point," said Frank Lampard, whose 26th international goal from the penalty spot secured the late point.

"I don't think you can pin it all on anxiety. It is a long group and this was not an easy game, so it was good to get a point."

Joey Barton: Sweet and tender or nasty traitor?

By Eurosport | World of Sport – 2 hours 13 minutes agoEmail

Marseille fans had a special message for Joey Barton after he signed for the French club on loan from QPR.

Barton was in the stands to watch his new team go top of the table with a 3-1 victory over Rennes, and tweeted the above picture of a banner from the stands.

The banner said 'Welcome Sweet And Tender Hooligan' which is a reference to a song from Barton's favourite band The Smiths.

"I already love the fans of L'OM. The Smiths banner is impressive? Non?" wrote Barton on Twitter after posting the picture.

Barton said he was excited about playing in the French league after his troubled spell at QPR which saw him banned for 12 matches to start the season after his red card and subsequent behaviour in Rangers' final match of last season against Manchester City.

"I've come to Marseille to win trophies," Barton told French sports paper L'Equipe.

"I don't come for holidays or as a tourist. It is a challenge for me not only on a professional level but also personally, discovering a new culture.

"Did I have other contacts? Yes, I talked to Fenerbahce and Valencia. But I didn't hesitate long when Marseille came, it was a good challenge for me."

However, not everybody is happy to see Barton arrive in France.

His former team-mate at Manchester City, Ousmane Dabo, blasted his homeland for being so welcoming to Barton, calling the Liverpudlian 'a nasty traitor.'

Barton was handed a four-month suspended jail sentence in 2007 after assaulting Dabo during training.

"He is nasty, a traitor. Sometimes I get the impression we have rolled out the red carpet for him. I speak to remind people that Barton is a very violent player, far from the image he tries to portray since arriving at Marseille," Dabo told L'Equipe.

"We condemned Jeremy Menez, Samir Nasri and Yann M'Vila for little things and then the French media is very forgiving with someone who has committed horrible things, as recently as May. No one wanted him in England . . . that means there is probably a reason.

"(With our history) There was a trial, he pleaded guilty and accepted a four-month suspended sentence. When he speaks, he denies it, he said I initiated it. All the team members present during the assault testified in my favour.

"He says he is a man, a bad boy, but he is just a coward.

Champions League

The draw in full:

Group A: Porto, Dynamo Kiev, Paris Saint-Germain, Dinamo Zagreb

Group B: ARSENAL, Schalke, Olympiakos, Montpellier

Group C: AC Milan, Zenit St Petersburg, Anderlecht, Malaga

Group D: Real Madrid, MANCHESTER CITY, Ajax, Borussia Dortmund

Group E: CHELSEA, Shakhtar Donetsk, Juventus, Nordsjaelland

Group F: Bayern Munich, Valencia, Lille, BATE Borisov

Group G: Barcelona, Benfica, Spartak Moscow, Celtic

Group H: MANCHESTER UNITED, Braga, Galatasaray, Cluj

Football: Pay over pride?

by Miles Caston
Thu 30th Aug 2012

London Progressive Journal

Robin Van Persie’s £24 million moveto Manchester United is the latest high-profile transfer in the Barclays Premier League. Van Persie, 29, has signed a four-your deal with United, long-time rivals with his former club, Arsenal.

United boss Sir Alex Ferguson has stated that with his other attacking players, he’s close to having a:

“forward line like 1999…the best four strikers in Europe” (1).

Former Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp believes Van Persie’s prolific goal-scoring form may give United the edge in this season’s title race:

“If he performs like he did last year then him and Rooney will just be an incredible partnership” (2).

Arsenal were reportedly prepared to make Van Persie the club’s highest paid player ever, but didn’t offer him a new contract (3).

The Gunners have endured seven trophyless seasons, whereas United can boast being the most successful team in English football.

The Red Devils are said to have negotiated Van Persie’s salary in the region of £250,000 per week – the same as Wayne Rooney (4).

The transfer tempts the question on many sports fans minds – is contemporary football all about money?

Paul Tomkins’ Pay As You Play points to staunch evidence for this. In 2009/10, not only did the Premier League’s eight most expensive teams finish in the top eight positions, the three cheapest clubs in the division were all relegated (5).

Player-turned-pundit Robbie Savage was quick to defend his cohorts during a BBC Radio 5 Live 606 phone-in show: “It’s not so-and-so’s fault if he’s offered £100,000 a week.

You’d take it if it was offered to you!” (5).

Savage may have a point.

Arguably,the football world holds a microcosmic mentality of the wider western world. In today’s society, we’re all spoon fed adverts and marketing strategies that encourage us to consume.

Money may not be able to buy happiness, but if you buy this right now (insert latest product, accessory, gadget, or garment), you will be transformed into a state of near-nirvana.

Subsequently, if you don’t buy the latest big thing, you’re actually inferior to those who do have it.

Nobody likes feeling left out, so the consumer club keeps growing – as do the big boy football clubs who shell out millions for a squad of superstars.

Football clubs and their supporters from the lower leagues may not: “be banging on about money”, perhaps this is because they’re not affected by the big bucks.

Maybe they would if they could (5).

Top-flight football definitely appears to be a rich man’s world –

or according Piers Morgan – full of mercenaries, heartless, selfish little s***s. (6)

(1)    http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19287102
(2)    www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19277286
(3)    http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/mobile/football/19179833

(4)    http://www.tribalfootball.com/articles/van-persie-joining-man-utd-rooney-wages-3453761?utm_source=main_feed
(5)    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/competitions/premier-league/8113372/Sorry-Robbie-Savage-success-in-football-is-all-about-money-and-I-can-prove-it.html
(6)   http://www.smh.com.au/sport/football/sickening-betrayal-piers-morgan-vents-on-twitter-over-van-persie-move-20120816-24a32.html

Paralympics

GB Begins Hunt For Gold Medals

ParalympicsGB Begins Hunt For Gold Medals

Britain's Paralympians will be hoping for an early gold rush as the Games gets under way in earnest.

Last night saw a stunning opening to the London 2012 games as more than 62,000 fans packed into the Olympic Stadium in Stratford to officially open the event.

Now it is the turn of the competitors, with early medal hopes pinned on swimmer-turned cyclist Sarah Storey, shooter Di Coates and Ben Quilter, who will be going for gold in judo.

Paralympics veteran Storey, 34, has already achieved 18 medals - 16 of which were awarded as a swimmer before her switch from the pool to the bike ahead of Beijing 2008.

Storey, who was born with a deformed left hand, will appear at the velodrome in the C5 Individual Pursuit, having won the C4 in Beijing. This is her sixth Games and she is chasing her eighth gold.

Also appearing on the track is six-time Paralympic champion Darren Kenny, who has restricted movement down his right side following a car crash aged 18.

He defends his 1km Time Trial title alongside fellow Brit Rik Waddon.

Coates - who at 58 is taking part in a British record-equalling eighth games - will be gunning for her fourth title in the women's R2 10m Air Rifle standing event.

She is Britain's most experienced competitor and the star, who has spina bifida, is the only person to have competed in front of a British Paralympian crowd before.

The 1984 Paralympics was split between New York and England when wheelchair athletes with spinal injuries competed at Stoke Mandeville in Buckinghamshire.

UK Sport have set ParalympicsGB the minimum target of winning 103 medals from at least 12 different sports, with the overall goal of once again finishing second in the medal table.

Britain won 102 medals, including 42 golds, in Beijing four years ago to claim second place for a third consecutive Paralympic Games.

Ben Quilter, who is visually impaired, will be going for gold on the mat, as he takes part in the under 60kg category in judo.

Do you like a flutter ?

Bet 0.50p to win or place

Thats £1 bet

Get odds of 10/1

And the get £1.50 in return for a place only

15 horses in the race and your comes 2nd or 3rd

If this is not daylight robbery what is ?

Dropping Catches Loses Matches

Strauss, Cook, Taylor and Broad all let England down.

A team cannot carry that amount of baggage.

Added to this Bresnan should have played.He is a better and more consistent bowler than Finn and Broad

A spirited performance from Bairstow, Prior and Swann, helped England save its blushes,

but catches win matches and dropping catches loses matches.

Where do Englandgo from here? Strauss must take the blame and fall on his sword.

Cook is not Captain material and players must be selected not on past glory but current form.

The problem of who should be captain demonstrates

that there is no one current player ready to give that amount of confidence,

but Prior should be given his chance.

Congratulations to the South African team on their success in the series.

England v South Africa:

Jonny Bairstow steadies hosts with unbeaten 72 at Lord's

Day two, Lord's: England 208 for five in reply to South Africa's 309.

Cricket Correspondent, at Lord's
9:00PM BST 17 Aug 2012

Kevin Pietersen’s ‘A’ game was definitely missing when England batted at Lord’s on Friday, but the home side replaced it with three Bs instead - Bairstow, Bell and Bulldog spirit.

Combined, the trio have helped to keep England, who ended the second day on 208 for five, in this Investec Test after South Africa’s bowlers had threatened to overrun them.

The second new ball is due after eight overs this morning and will prove crucial to the outcome of a match England must win to stay top of the rankings.

Jonny Bairstow, with an already crucial contribution, is still there on 72, an innings that truly was a triumph over adversity given his travails against the short ball earlier in the summer.

Matt Prior, the England player most capable of matching Pietersen’s scoring rate, will start with him.

Together, and with those still to come, they must take their team, trailing by 101 runs, into significant lead before close on Saturday to have any chance of victory. If they don’t, they will need the heatwave forecast to open up the cracks on the pitch enough to make batting tricky, though, as they must bat last, that option is filled with danger.

For now, let us rejoice in the fighting spirit of two men at different ends of the experience spectrum in international cricket.

Bairstow, 22, would not have even been here this week but for the Pietersen text crisis. His three Tests against the West Indies earlier in the summer had highlighted shortcomings against the short ball and the selectors would have been reluctant to accelerate his learning curve against South Africa’s mean trio of fast bowlers.

But, with Pietersen rusticated and Ravi Bopara still attending to a personal matter (both are scheduled to play for their counties in the CB40 on Sunday), Bairstow was summoned to face his personal demons and find a solution.

And find one he did, cautiously and with good fortune, at first, but eventually burgeoning to the point where he looked in total control, no small feat for a player in his fourth Test against such an intimidating bowling attack.

A blitz of bouncers would have been South Africa’s plan to him and they did not disappoint. The pitch was true and not especially quick, even if Morne Morkel and Dale Steyn were. After a hectic period of ducking and swaying, he began to swat the odd one for four with enough control to suggest his emotions had not been shredded by the experience. Andy Flower had already seen something special in Bairstow’s character from a handful of one-day knocks and this transferred to the Test stage at a crucial period for England.

Ian Bell offered vital support to his young charge, urging, encouraging and cajoling in equal measure. His languid style helped calm Bairstow, who soon began to match him shot for shot, though one of Bell’s, a cover drive off Steyn on the up for four, remained unsurpassable, even moving the bowler to admiration.

South Africa’s resilience means you can never presume control of the situation and, just when it looked as if Bairstow and Bell had put the day to bed with a staunch England fightback, their 124-run partnership was ended when Vernon Philander forced the latter to slice his drive to Alviro Petersen in the gully. As is Bell’s wont, it was impossible to say why it had happened, only that an unexceptional ball had been met by an indifferent shot.

A very different set of circumstances had surrounded Andrew Strauss’s dismissal on the last ball before lunch. Strauss had begun his innings with fluent aplomb until Morkel began to work him over with judicious use of the bouncer. Struck in the chest once, and forced to take evasive action at other times, the pounding had the desired effect of disturbing his balance, so that when Morkel suddenly pitched one up, bat and pad was not in its usual place to prevent the ball knocking out middle stump.

It was a classic exposition of the fast bowlers’ art if you can so describe something so brutal, and Steyn followed it soon after with his own version. Skiddier and just that little bit quicker than Morkel, he beat Jonathan Trott for pace to have him lbw, a decision that only fell after South Africa reviewed.

Steyn uses guile as much as his pace and he next went to work on Alastair Cook, drying up his runs to the point where the left-hander had scored just a single in 31 balls. With the pressure trap set, he sprung it with a nice juicy wide half-volley that was going even further away as Cook, forgetting his strengths, pushed away from his body to edge to an expectant Jacques Kallis at second slip.

It was wonderful bowling and England looked in jeopardy when Morkel had James Taylor caught at first slip to leave them reeling on 54 for four. At that point the Pietersen supporters began to crow on Twitter, perhaps ignorant that the man who had replaced their precious had just come to the crease.

Fifty overs later there was not a peep out of them, as Bairstow acknowledged the plaudits from the sell-out crowd.

The spectators were also in good voice when England began the day needing to take three wickets, a process Stuart Broad began when he drew Steyn into slashing at an outswinger, the resulting edge ending up in Swann’s hands at second slip.

One irritant to England’s ambitions was replaced by another, though, with Morkel giving life to the cricketing expression ‘give it the long handle’. With Philander reaching a fine 50, another 37 runs were added until Prior ended the partnership with a stunning one-handed diving catch off Steve Finn to dismiss Morkel.

Prior struck again in the next over to stump Philander off Swann for 61, his sixth assist of the innings, an achievement equalled but not bettered by Middlesex’s John Murray, who snaffled six catches here against India in 1967. If Prior can manage the batting equivalent today, an England win may not be as fanciful as it seems

Lord's details

England (probable): A J Strauss (capt), A N Cook, I J L Trott, J M Bairstow, I R Bell, J W A Taylor, M J Prior (wkt), S C J Broad, G P Swann, J M Anderson. S T Finn.

South Africa (probable): G C Smith (capt), A N Petersen, H M Amla, J H Kallis, A B de Villiers (wkt), J A Rudolph, J P Duminy, V D Philander, D W Steyn, M Morkel, I Tahir.

Pitch report Likely to be a typically true Lord's surface, perhaps with slightly extra spice and carry given the grass that has been left. Outfield will not be as pristine as usual due to scars left by Olympic archery.

Weather Today: Cloudy with sunny intervals. Tomorrow: Dry and cloudy. Saturday: Warm, some sun. Sunday: Sun and showers. Monday: Overcast.

Umpires S Taufel & K Dharmasena.

TV Sky Sports 1, 10.30am-7pm. Highlights: Channel Five, 7-8pm.

Its still Players v Gentlemen in the Long Room.

Who you are not what you can do !

Pietersen is nobody's poodle, but he thrills the crowds who pay the bills.

By dropping him, the ECB is shooting itself in the foot, but the they always have.

I question Strauss's leadership skills by his actions on the field.

How the chosen ones ended Australia's sporting prowess

and revealed its secret past

by John Pilger

Fri 10th Aug 2012

The ferries that ply the river west of Sydney Harbour bear the names of Australia's world champion sportswomen.

They include the Olympic swimming gold-medalists Dawn Fraser and Shane Gould, and runners Betty Cuthbert and Majorie Jackson.

 As you board, there is a photograph of the athlete in her prime, and a record of her achievements.

This is vintage Australia.

Often shy and never rich, sporting heroes were nourished by a society that, long before most other countries, won victories for ordinary people: the first 35-hour working week, child benefits, pensions, secret ballots and, with New Zealand, the vote for women.

By the 1960s, Australians had the most equitable spread of personal income in the world.

In modern-day corporate Australia, this is long forgotten.

"We are the chosen ones," sang a choir promoting the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

One of the ferries is named after Evonne Goolagong, the tennis star who won Wimbledon in 1971 and 1980. She is Aboriginal, like Cathy Freeman, who won a gold medal in the 400 metres at Sydney.

For all their talent, both belong to a carefully constructed facade, behind which Australia's secret indigenous history is suppressed and denied.

The late Charlie Perkins, an Aboriginal leader who played first-division football in England, told me, "There's an ambivalence that consumes many of us.

 I was so pleased to be back home, seeing that wonderful light, hearing the birds, seeing my mates, but I felt the racism more than ever.

For one thing, no white person ever invited me home for a meal, for anything.

Blacks weren't even allowed in the grandstands, not even in the blacks-only sections."

In the 1960s, Charlie led "freedom rides" into the north-west of New South Wales, where "nigger hunts" were still not uncommon.

Abused and spat at, he stood at the turnstiles of local swimming pools and sports fields and demanded that a race bar be lifted.

 "In South Africa, at least you knew where you stood," he said.

"In Australia, you can have a friend and an enemy all in one person, especially if you're like me, of mixed blood.

Someone will call you his mate one minute, then before you know it, you feel an indifference, a coldness you can't explain.

It's what drove my brother to kill himself."

Wally MacArthur was one of the "stolen generation".

The victim of a eugenics-inspired campaign to "breed out the black", Wally was taken from his mother as a small boy and was destined to become a servant in white society. His gift was speed.

 Running without shoes, he was the Usain Bolt of his day.

Wally was never selected in a state or national team.

Eddie Gilbert's story is similar.

A dazzling fast bowler, he was given special permission to play outside his Queensland "reserve" and took five wickets for 65 runs against the West Indies.

 He later faced Donald Bradman, the world's greatest batsman, and bowled him for a duck.

Thereafter, the secretary of the Queensland Cricket Association wrote to the Protector of Aborigines: "The matter of Eddie Gilbert has been fully discussed by my executive committee and it was decided, with your concurrence, to return Gilbert to the settlement."

The letter noted that his cricketing whites "should be laundered and returned". Eddie was committed to an asylum where he was mistreated, and died.

The great Aboriginal boxer, Ron Richards, died a prisoner on Palm Island off the Queensland coast.

He had won most Australian titles, and when he became British Empire middleweight champion, the Chief Protector stepped in.

 "Like many other crossbreeds," he wrote, "he is unstable of character and inclined to be gullible."

On 30 July, in London, the Aboriginal light-heavyweight Damien Hooper stepped into the ring for his Olympic bout wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the Aboriginal flag: the same flag now approved to fly on public buildings in Australia.

The Australian Olympic Committee demanded he make a public apology - itself a profanity in keeping with the enduring humiliation of Aboriginal people.

Wearing the shirt was said to have breached the Olympic Charter; Coca Cola would have been acceptable.

The sports writer for the Sydney Morning Herald sneered that it was "a stunt" by an opportunist.

"I'm representing my culture, not only my country," said Hooper. "I'm proud of what I did."

In his 1995 book, Obstacle Race, Professor Colin Tatz, who has charted Australia's genocidal history, says that of the 1,200 Aboriginal sportsmen and women he studied, only six - 0.5% - had access to the same opportunities and sporting facilities as whites.

 I asked him what had changed. "A few things are better." he wrote, "The figure now is about one per cent."

On the day Damien Hooper was forced to apologise, Australian swimmer Nick D'Arcy failed to make the final of the 200 metres butterfly.

Few in the crowd were aware that this "chosen one" was a convicted thug who smashed the face of fellow swimmer Simon Cowley in an unprovoked assault in 2008.

Ordered to pay his victim A$180,000 in damages, D'Arcy declared himself bankrupt and paid not a cent, nor showed any remorse.

Yet, the Australian swimming authorities duly lifted his ban and allowed him to compete in London. After all, said a Liberal MP, " Nick has paid a terrible price for his indiscretions".

Josh Booth rowed in Australia's eight that came last in the final. To a Chosen One, last is unacceptable, so Booth went on a rampage in Egham in Surrey, smashing windows.

He later described it as an "emotional outburst".

 The Sydney Morning Herald shed a tear for "the pain of a young man who lost in an event that comes along every four years".

Unlike those original Australians forced to defend their basic human rights and apologise for their distinctiveness, both D'Arcy and Booth have enjoyed every advantage and privilege.

Their "indiscretions" and victimhood are accompanied by a sense of entitlement that has shredded the national myth of "fair go", not to mention an Olympic prowess of which we all were once proud.

This article first appeared in the New Statesman.

Olympic Heights and Economic lows

A reality check – possibly ?

Sour grapes? not me !

An Economic soft landing- no chance

Congratulations – are in order

To the participants – a well done

To the staff - redundancy and despair ?

To the sponsors –advertising pays some ?

To the audience- God Save the Queen -29 times + 1= terrible

To the medalists – what next ? emptiness ?

To all- an anti-climax ?

And the morning after feeling

“Greater” Britain – I doubt it very much- London has the venues ?

There were many for whom the Olympics meant very little

Never turned on the “box”

Refused to buy a rag

Spent the days oblivious to the Olympic events.

Had other things to do.

Far to many “Fantastics”with “Incredibles" not far behind- on the BBC

And these came from the experts too

So all in all a transient, if lavish event

£12 (something) billion

I know some local infrastructure improvements, here, that could have made more permanent benefits

There are those who spent a small fortune on visits

Was it worth it ?

For them-  certainly.

Then there were the invited – including Despots And Dictators

Honours – probably

Pay Cheques – very large – for the few

Volunteers - very little

A debt owed by so many ?

To so few ?

A sort of holy sports war !

To the God Zeus

Well a God had to come into it somewhere ?

Wars went on

On to Brazil for more “Bread and Circuses”

Another diversion from reality

The Radical

Man arrested at London Olympics for ‘failing to smile’

Fri Aug 10, 2012 5:16AM GMT

The police grabbed me off this seven-foot wall, threw me to the floor and cuffed me.”

Mark Worsfold, a 54-year-old Parkinson’s disease sufferer

A British man suffering from Parkinson’s disease has been detained because he “failed to smile and look like he was enjoying himself” while watching the Olympic cycling road race.

The British police threw the 54-year-old to the floor and handcuffed him just as cyclists passed by, reported The Daily Mail.

“I was sitting minding my own business. Before I knew anything the police grabbed me off this seven-foot wall, threw me to the floor and cuffed me so all I saw of the cycle race was between the feet of people from the pavement”, said Mark Worsfold, a martial arts trainer and former soldier.

“It could have been done better. I was arrested for not smiling. I have Parkinson’s”, he added.

The British police said that he was arrested on suspicion of a public order offence “based on his manner, his state of dress and his proximity to the course” and “a group of protesters”.

However, Worsfold said officers told him that he had been arrested and questioned because he was not smiling.

On 27 July, the British police also arrested 182 activist cyclists as the 2012 London Olympics opening ceremony was being held in London.

The British police said Worsfold’s arrest was a result of “the heightened level of security due to the high profile nature of the event and the sheer number of spectators”.

London 2012 Olympics ‘hall of shame’

Wed Aug 8, 2012 5:22PM GMT

Press TV

Britain’s red carpet is being prepared to welcome an Olympic “hall of shame” of corrupt Games officials and foreign dictators.

Millions of pounds are being spent giving questionable politicians and fraudster delegates from the International Olympic Committee the VIP treatment in London.

They will be housed in luxury hotels and given personal chauffeured cars throughout the capital by Lord Coe’s organising team.

The VIPs will also include the bosses of top-level corporate sponsors whose business practices have infuriated protesters.

Human rights activists are appalled by the imminent arrival of one dictator in particular.

Ilham Aliyev is the president of oil rich Azerbaijan and also heads his country’s National Olympic Committee.

Campaign group Human Rights Watch say he has a “terrible record on freedom of expression”, with six journalists in prison on “spurious charges” and several dozen opposition political activists also behind bars. Earlier this year, respected reporter Idrak Abbasov was beaten unconscious after he filmed forced evictions and house demolitions by the country’s state oil company.

The company’s security officials and police were thought to be behind the assault.

However, it is not just notorious foreign leaders who will take the Games’ best seats: controversial members of the International Olympic Committee will also revel in luxury hospitality.

They include former French sports minister Guy Drut, who was also an Olympic hurdler. In 2005, he was given a 15-month suspended prison sentence for fraudulently accepting a salary for a fictitious job created as part of a wider Paris City Hall scam. A suspension on his IOC membership was lifted when Drut’s friend and then French President Jacques Chirac controversially pardoned him as he left office in 2005. He remains a senior member of the IOC.

Billionaire Lee Kun-Hee, an IOC delegate from South Korea, is also likely to be an Olympic guest.
He remains the chairman of Olympic sponsor Samsung, having resigned from the position in 2008 amid a massive slush funds scandal involving bribes to judges and other public officials.

He was convicted of evading £25million in taxes but was pardoned by the Korean government in 2009 as he helped the country win the right to stage the 2018 Winter Olympics.

Controversial corporate sponsors will also be driven around in top-of-the range BMWs.

They include bosses of General Electric, which has attracted critics in the US for avoiding corporate taxes, and of Dow Chemical which is linked to the 1984 Bhopal gas disaster.

The British government is also up for questioning from Parliament over why it has handed over the Olympic Games' security to a company accused of human rights abuses in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories.
­
The UK-based G4S, which describes itself as the “world’s leading international security solutions group,” was selected as the “official provider of security and cash services for the Olympics.”

Moreover, it has already taken on 10,400 new employees for the 2012 Olympiad.

However, the company’s activities in Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem (al-Quds), which the UK considers illegal, have raised questions in Westminster.

The matter of fact is that G4S is a known provider of equipment for several Israeli military checkpoints in the occupied West Bank as well as for security systems at the Ofer detention center in Ramallah.

That facility houses a jail and a military court, where Palestinian political prisoners, including children, are held and tortured. British Parliament strongly criticized the detention center for human rights abuses in 2010.

G4S also provides equipment to and secures the perimeter of several other Israeli prisons in which prisoners, illegally transferred from Palestinian territories, are held in breach of Article 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

It remains unclear how a company with such a questionable reputation could have been chosen to provide security during the London Olympics.

G4S already runs six private prisons in the UK, where several hundred detainees are hired for full-time work paying under $3 a day.

The privatization of prisons by companies like G4S creates a very dangerous financial incentive to criminalize poor people and "incarcerate them for private profit," according to Gosling.

G4S, the firm at the center of the debacle over security for the London 2012 Olympics, is also helping Israeli regime secure facilities where Palestinian children are imprisoned and severely abused.

Defence for Children-Palestine (DCI-Palestine) has released an urgent appeal to end the practice of holding Palestinian children from the West Bank in solitary confinement in facilities in Israel.

The organization has documented 53 such cases since 2008.

The children have been held in solitary confinement mainly in Al Jalame and Petah Tikva interrogation centers.

The security systems for Al Jalame detention facilities were provided by G4S Israel, according to a March 2011 report on the firm by Who Profits.

G4S Israel is a subsidiary of British-Danish security firm G4S and it is deeply involved in Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories, as well as in Israeli prisons and detention centers.

Meanwhile, activists have challenged the London games to bar entry to countries that discriminate against their athletes and betray the Olympics' human rights charter.

Peter Tatchell, director of the Peter Tatchell Foundation, has written an open letter to Lord Coe demanding the UK to ban countries like Saudi Arabia and India from competing.

"Many nations deny equal opportunities to women and to ethnic, religious and sexual minorities," Tatchell argued.

"They violate the Olympic spirit of equality. This discrimination takes the form of a lack of equal access to sports facilities, competitions and the Olympic selection process."

The letter is written amid numerous complaints that many of the competing countries are tainting the Olympics' commitment to equal rights.

Saudi Arabia is criticised for not allowing women to compete, and India for marginalising Dalits.

The UK government is also giving host to the Bahraini regime, another human rights abuser whose records on rights issues, particularly in the past year are peculiarly dark.

At the same time, it has blacklisted Syria, which is fighting an armed insurgency inside its country, on human rights grounds.

There are other conditions under which the UK government is domestically abusing the rights of its own citizens or foreign workers.

The living conditions for the 2012 Olympic workers have been described as “prison-like slums” since they are overcrowded and unhygienic. 75 Olympic cleaners are expected to share one shower.

Every 25 staff members must share one toilet, and ten people are living in each room.

Many of the workers traveled from abroad in search of work.

It was not until they arrived in London that they were informed there would be no work for the first two weeks, but they were expected to pay a total rent of over £550 a month to sleep in the miserable camps.

Many of London’s 25,000 cab drivers say they hate the Olympic Games Lanes, a network of roads reserved for the exclusive use of Olympic officials and sponsors.

With cabbies forced to ply their trade mostly in the minor roads of London, they believe that their takings will be way down, and that people just won’t take taxis. So they are protesting.

Hundreds of taxi drivers brought the streets around parliament and Big Ben to a standstill this week, hooting their horns and moving at a snail’s pace.

They are threatening to hold more protests before the Games begin on Friday.

About 23,700 security guards had been due to protect venues as part of Britain’s biggest peacetime security operation, with 13,500 military personnel already earmarked to contribute.

But last week, Britain put an extra 3,500 soldiers on standby after the world’s biggest security firm G4S said it might not be able to supply the 10,400 security guards it had promised as part of a $441.93 million deal.

These additional 3,500 troops will take the overall tally at the Games to 17,000, more than the 9,500 currently deployed in Afghanistan.

Yes, security is important, but how will the enormous military presence affect the atmosphere at the Games?

It’s true that Britons, and Londoners in particular, love to complain, but what exactly is the city getting for its $15 billion investment in the Games?

According to Andrew Scott, who is the deputy dean of the London Business School and comes from the area where the Olympic Park is located, Britons should stop trying to kid themselves that they made a shrewd investment.

That’s because the most wildly optimistic estimate suggests that the Olympics will boost Britain’s GDP each year for a decade by no more than one-tenth of 1 percent.

On Your Marx for the People’s Games

The Olympics are well under way and the failure of the private sector G4S almost forgotten ?

The extravaganza that cost £ billions and which equates to £800,000 for every Olympic entrant will be remembered for the discrimination of the poor and poor countries who can compete in only the events that cost the least.

How many Ethiopians are involved in the horse trials, or working class in sailing, rowing or tennis even?

Never mind that women have struggled to be there at all.
The male chauvinism continues until there are far more mixed events competing on equal terms.

And why should the Para – Olympics be a second class and separate event ?

Eighty one years ago in 1931 the Socialist Workers Sports International organised an alternate Olympics in Red Vienna.

An antidote to the Capitalist’s sport of sponsorship, where 80,000 sports men and women participated and 250,000 watched the final days events.
(This is in comparison to the 124 who competed in Los Angeles at the time.)

So next time the Olympics come round to Britain maybe we should organise the alternative games and ban the drive for profit.

Instead of fake “gold” medals, we should have red ribbons and certificates and the more the merrier with each city hosting its own events and every participant getting a reward and no one considered a failure.

And a cry again for the slogan “Sport for All”

fan·tas·tic

adjective

1. conceived or appearing as if conceived by an unrestrained imagination;

odd and remarkable; bizarre; grotesque: fantastic rock formations; fantastic designs.

2. fanciful or capricious, as persons or their ideas or actions:

 We never know what that fantastic creature will say next.

3. imaginary or groundless in not being based on reality; foolish or irrational: fantastic fears.

4. extravagantly fanciful; marvelous.

5. incredibly great or extreme; exorbitant: to spend fantastic sums of money.

Rip up new Olympic sex test rules

23 July 2012

by Katrina Karkazis and Rebecca Jordan-Young

IT IS just days until the start of the Olympics - an exhilarating feast of elite competition watched by the world, a chance for athletes to demonstrate their extraordinary prowess in physical contests.

Imagine if, having proved to be the best, with the eyes of the world on you, the atmosphere sours and you face rumours and allegations of an unfair advantage and the condemnation of your competitors and the watching public.

 Imagine that this has nothing to do with cheating or doping, but is simply because of the biology you were born with.

We're talking about sex testing for elite female athletes, a highly charged issue that has been officially resurrected for the first time in more than a decade.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has just released new regulations (IOC 2012) for determining whether athletes should be allowed to compete as women, along the lines of those agreed by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) last year.

Both policies are based on the assertion that testosterone levels of male and female athletes are distinct and that women with testosterone levels typical for males have an "unfair" advantage - assumptions that are scientifically flawed and render the policies and their effects ethically dubious.

Both bodies were forced to confront the problems with sex determination policies in the wake of runner Caster Semenya's case.

Competitors challenged the young South African's sex after she won the 800 metres world title in 2009. Her outstanding victory and powerful physique fuelled a frenzy of speculation.

The IAAF was roundly criticised for its poorly defined approach to sex determination and handling of the case. Semenya was driven into hiding to escape the resulting scrutiny and humiliation.

As a result, the IAAF and IOC faced calls to rethink their approach.

Unfortunately, the resulting policies, in our view, are flawed.

In a shift from earlier routine sex testing for female athletes, which the IAAF and the IOC abandoned in the 1990s, the sports bodies no longer overtly aim to determine whether someone is "really" a woman. Instead, they focus on women with hyperandrogenism - naturally raised testosterone levels.

The new rules effectively say they are too masculine to compete in the female category, based on the idea testosterone is the key reason for men's often superior strength and speed.

But does naturally occurring testosterone really confer athletic advantage in a predictable way, as suggested? There is little evidence and what evidence exists points away from such conclusions.

And even if such an advantage exists, is that really unfair?

Elite athletes are different from most of us in many ways, such as rare genetic mutations that confer enhanced aerobic capacity.

So is the difference in athletic performance between males and females chiefly "due to higher levels of androgenic hormones in males" as the IAAF puts it?

Although it may be surprising, given that this is a popular belief and is stated as fact in both the IAAF and IOC policies, there is no evidence showing that successful athletes have higher testosterone levels than less successful ones.

Clinical studies do confirm that testosterone, among many other factors, helps improve muscle size, strength and endurance (New England Journal of Medicine, vol 335, p 1; European Journal of Applied Physiology, vol 111, p 2249). It may seem logical to infer, then, that having more testosterone gives an athletic advantage.

But responses to it differ dramatically between individuals, and testosterone is just one factor in a complex feedback system.

A striking counter example to the idea that testosterone is the key factor in athleticism is women with complete androgen insensitivity syndrome, whose cells are totally unresponsive to testosterone but who are overrepresented among elite athletes (The Journal of the American Medical Association, vol 284, p 1568).

Some women with androgen insensitivity are, under the new rules, exempt from a ban.

And a quarter of elite male athletes might have testosterone levels below the typical male range, with many in the typical female range, according to endocrinologist Peter Sönksen.

Add the fact that most relevant studies have focused on men and that testosterone levels for elite athletes have not been extensively studied and it is clear to us that relying on testosterone levels oversimplifies and misrepresents what contributes to athletic excellence and suggests far more certainty than is justified.

Even if a decisive link had been established, should it be viewed as any different to other biological advantages broadly accepted in some elite athletes?

For example, several runners have mitochondrial conditions that enhance aerobic ability (Mitochondrion, vol 11, p 774). Some basketball players have acromegaly, a hormonal condition that results in enlarged hands and feet.

Hyperandrogenism is also a naturally occurring condition, no different from other exceptional biological variation in humans. So what makes this difference important?

Well, as Hida Viloria, an intersex representative at the IOC meetings, noted in a letter to The New York Times, when the IOC was asked about the issue it said that these other physical and medical differences do not call the athlete's sex into question.

While the IOC is adamant that these new regulations are not "intended to make any determination of sex", this looks a lot like sex testing.

Sports organisations need to stop policing biologically natural bodies, which can lead to harmful scrutiny of less feminine women, and allow all to compete, regardless of the level of naturally occurring hormones.

In short, these new sex testing policies must be scrapped.

Katrina Karkazis is an anthropologist at Stanford University's Center for Biomedical Ethics.

Rebecca Jordan-Young is a sociomedical scientist at Barnard College, Columbia University. This essay is based on an article written with Silvia Camporesi and Georgiann Davis in The American Journal of Bioethics

The diver: Tom Daley

01 March 2012 by Henry Taylor

Mens Health 

Tom Daley isn't your average 17-year-old.

For starters, he squats 125kg and does press-ups with the equivalent of a 13-stone man on his back.

Victory in the 10m platform diving event at the 2009 World Aquatics Championships made him the youngest ever British world champion in any sport – and the following year he took home another two gold medals at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi.

All this while studying for his A-levels.

In the run up to the London 2012 Olympics, MH reveals the new Adidas bodycare ambassador's training and nutrition regime.

7.30am Wake up and shower.

8am Breakfast. Either beans or scrambled eggs on toast, or a bowl of iron-rich cereal such as Bran Flakes.

Training tip A 30g serving of Kellogg's Bran Flakes contains 50% of your GDA of iron, which is vital for optimum athletic performance.

Lack of iron can cause a decrease in your body's stores of haemoglobin and negatively affect the transport of oxygen to your muscles.

9am School for two lessons.

10.15am-12.15am Morning training session.

Warm up with static stretches, before practicing somersaults in a gym for an hour.

Work on take-offs and flips from a standing block, landing on a crash mat.

Also run through flips and somersaults on a trampoline.

Build cores strength through performing bodyweight conditioning exercises, such as planks and static pushes.

Do some dumbbell wrist curls to bulk up your forearms and mediate the strain they are under when hitting the water at speed.

Do some exercises for your shoulders using a Thera-band, such as overhead extensions and lateral raises.

These will strengthen stabiliser muscles in your shoulders, such as your rotator cuffs.

From 11.15, do more static stretches, then spend an hour in the pool practising lower-height board work – 1m, 3m, and 5m dives. Focus on take-offs, entries, and handstands

Training tip A recent study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research found men who underwent seven weeks of training using resistance bands increased their squat and bench-press one-rep-maxes by 240% and 200% respectively in comparison to men who underwent the same seven weeks of training using only free weights.

12.30pm Post-training snack. Cereal bar and chocolate milkshake. Sometimes a piece of fruit.

Training tip Researchers at Kean University, USA, found low-fat chocolate milk facilitates post-exercise recovery as effectively as a dedicated carbohydrate-electrolyte drink.

12.45pm Post-training recovery.

Sometimes ice the triceps, or sometimes a massage if there's time before lunch.

1pm Jacket potato and some chicken to replenish protein levels during the recovery period.

2pm Back to school for another couple of lessons.

4.30pm Dinner/pre-training meal. Chicken or lean protein, steamed vegetables (broccoli, green beans) and some complex carbohydrates (sweet potato, brown rice, brown pasta).

5.30pm Afternoon training session. Resistance training in the gym for two hours.

 During the heavy phase of the training cycle, use big weights with compound exercises such as squats, deadlifts, press-ups, and pull-ups. Perform 4 sets of 5 reps for each exercise to build raw strength.

Gradually increase the weight for each set, building up to a final set of 125kg for squats.

Do loaded press-ups with someone piling weights on your back up to 85kg, and weighted pull-ups with a 20kg plate.

Six weeks before competition, switch to lighter loads and a faster tempo to concentrate on converting strength to explosive power.

Switch from squats to squat jumps and from deadlifts to cleans, for example.

After the workout, do another pool session.

Practice higher 10m dives, specifically the handstand, take-off, and entry parts of the dives. Focus on form.

Training tip Squats don't just build muscle.

A 2012 study in the Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research found following 8 weeks of dedicated squat training, nineteen professional rugby players all recorded considerably faster sprint performances over 5m (7.5% faster), 10m (7.5% faster), and 20m (6% faster).

9.15pm Post-training snack. Chocolate milkshake followed by some toast and chocolate spread to replenish carbohydrate stores.

Occasionally a vegetable soup using sweet potato and plenty of green vegetables.

9.30pm Post-training recovery.

Stretches to work off lactic acid build-up.

Massage 2-3 times a week, focusing on triceps. Sometimes ice the triceps, too.

Training tip Recent research in the journal Science Translational Medicine found that massage of muscles that have been damaged through exercise is clinically beneficial in reducing inflammation.

10.30pm Lights out