Grandstand

I'm aware I've been somewhat remiss in keeping this blog updated, of late. This has mainly been due to pesky thesis-related stuff, but also my occasional presence here; at some point I'm going to work out how to consolidate the two, given that reconciling the sport-loving and academic sides of my character was rather the point of this blog.

Anyway, to make up for lost attentiveness, here's a post that attempts to cover all bases in the various worlds of sport at the moment (a la Des Lynam, circa 1990).


Golf

I know, I know: starting a sports round-up with something that -- physically speaking, for the most part -- is barely more than a pastime may be controversial. But the first prize on offer to the winner at Sandwich this afternoon -- which looks like being the lovably rotund figure of Darren Clarke [insert Sandwich-related joke here] -- is close to £1M, so it's a fairly big occasion, regardless.

The sport/game debate is one for another day, though. What I want to mention is an extraordinary attitude from one Rory McProdigy, speaking after his less-than-stellar weekend came to a close earlier today.

(NB: 'Links golf', for those of you as in the dark about this as I was until about 90 minutes ago, refers to golf played on a 'links' -- a course situated on or very near to a coast, so named because it was a region 'linking' land and sea, and thus famous for blustery conditions, a dearth of trees, and fairly hostile scrubland environments.)

In an interview shortly after stepping off the 18th -- and subsequently reported in online feeds -- the talented young golfer McIlroy's reaction to his relative failure was given as follows:

'He is not going to change his game to suit the links as he only plays one week a year. He also believes he can win The Open, he just needs to wait for a year that the weather is good.'

Can you imagine Roger Federer, say, deciding there was no point practising his clay-court game, because Roland Garros only comes round once a year? Surely, if your aim is to be the best in the world -- as is the case, presumably, for all top professionals in sport -- then you don't just shrug your shoulders and say 'well, I don't play in conditions like that'?

To switch ill-advised cross-sporting metaphors, McIlroy cannot be serious.

Cycling

No question: this is a proper sport. The 98th annual Tour de France comes to an end this week, after a gruelling contest that some have likened to having to run a marathon every day for 3 weeks.

More than stamina is required, though: at the end of last week, a careless bit of driving on the part of someone in charge of a TV car led to a multi-bike pile-up (clip a tree with my wing-mirror? no, I'd rather endanger the lives of half-a-dozen flimsily-protected, lycra-clad human beings, thanks). The most serious casualty was Johnny Hoogerland, who was flipped off his bike, over a hedge, and onto a barbed-wire fence.

Never mind: he was helped off said fence, climbed back into the saddle, finished the stage, and only then sought medical help. Whereupon he was promptly taken to hospital for 33 stiches.

A certain Northern Irishman might like to watch this video and take a few notes about commitment to one's sport...

Rugby Union

It was announced this week that the New Zealand RFU had taken significant umbrage with an English RFU decision to send the England rugby union team out in black shirts in a couple of games this summer, to prevent colour clashes with other teams.

Here are the thoughts of one irate Kiwi:

'The Poms are trying to steal our heritage by having their rugby team swap to an all black strip. Not acceptable to us real All Black fans. Poms will not be welcomed in NZ for the RWC2011.'

Hmmm. Why such a fuss over a shirt colour? 'Heritage'? Really?? It's not like the England team have decided to choreograph their own version of the haka. (Suggestions on a postcard for what that would look like...)

In any case, there have numerous stories over the years suggesting that the tradition of an 'all black' moniker may have rather prosaic origins, with a printer's error the most likely reason for the team's name. Furthermore, the all black colouring may have even been adopted after seeing an all-black strip worn by a home team on an early-twentieth-century overseas tour. The location? South-west England.

Cricket

Finally, it's back on home turf for this blog. This Thursday sees the start of the 2000th ever Test match, and England's 991st, at Lord's, against India.

If England can beat India by a margin of two in this series, they'll go top of the ICC Test rankings. (Incidentally, this ICC ranking predictor is a lot of fun...) It's one enormous if, though -- bigger than either Rory McIlroy's ego or Darren Clarke's stomach (which now, along with its owner, is busy hoisting the claret jug). So what's it going to take?

Here's a player-by-player face-off, with ratings, for the likely XIs to take the field on Thursday; the Indian XI, as a result of my appalling knowledge of Indian cricket at present, is the same team who lined up against Somerset this week (plus Dhoni, of course).

1. Strauss (assured captain; not in great form with the bat, but will have taken heart from a fluent 78 this week: 7/10) v Mukund (talented young opener; as yet unproven on English wickets: 6)



2. Cook (back in the longer form after a more-or-less-successful stint as ODI captain; behind Ian Bell in the 'most technically gifted batsman in the England team' stakes, but not by much; apologies for forgetting his phenomenal Ashes series, which means that he's of course worthy of an: 8) v Gambhir (no spring chicken at just shy of 30, but a whippersnapper compared to Tendulkar, Dravid, and Khan; devastating opener: 8)



3. Trott (understated yet phenomenally successful, England's tower of strength; perfectly at home on English wickets: given the context, 9) v Dravid (over 12000 Test runs, averaging over 50; need I say more? 9)



4. Pietersen (always flattering to deceive; he should really be a 10/10 showman, but he's too often a bit of a flop; I really hope he proves me wrong, but on current form: 5) v Tendulkar (The Little Master; I'm not sure you'd get particularly good odds against him scoring his hundredth hundred at Lord's this week: 10)



5. Morgan (rising star; hard-hitting, takes no prisoners, and spares KP's blushes as much as the supposed superstar's predecessor in the order: 8) v Yuvraj (not as young as he once was, but who is on the Indian team? when on form, no one can touch him; if Jimmy can get under his skin, though, he's often a damp squib: 6)



6. Bell (supremely gifted technical batsman, settling in at #6 after some ill-advised moves up the order [the fault of selectors rather than Bell himself]; still not a crowd favourite -- can he change that this summer? 8) v Raina (off the back of a 150-ball hundred against Somerset, so in fine form; India will welcome his sharp fielding in the circle: 7)



7. Prior (his 'keeping is unremarkable: Hallelujah for that; some fine attacking batting, too: 7) v Dhoni (this one-on-one should really be against Strauss, but no matter; great batting, 'keeping, and captaincy: 9)



8. Broad (ok, so this may be Bresnan, but I reckon the Andies will go for Broad's greater menace; promised much, but yet to really live up to that with both bat and ball; some shoddy form of late, too: 6) v Zaheer (might well be KP's downfall, given his southpaw-ness; could be the undoing of quite a few England batsman, with his prodigious swing and control: 8)



9. Swann (Strauss's go-to man; now the most potent spinner in world cricket; if he's on song, so are England: 9) v Mishra/Harbajhan (unsure which spinner India will go with; the older man's influence in Test matches may be waning, but then Mishra had a fairly unsuccessful time against Somerset last time out: 6)



10. Anderson (leader of the pack; on his day, in English conditions, completely unplayable: 8) v Sreesanth (a bit of an enigma, both on and off the field: 7)



11. Tremlett (in and out of the England set-up in recent years, but more of a fixture now; a dependable back-up to the swing of Anderson and bounce of Broad; a few more spells like his stint at the Rose Bowl, and he'll undoubtedly move up: 6) v Patel (often injured, and something of an unknown quantity in English conditions: 6)

TOTALS: England (81) v India (82)

So pretty close, then...(Promise I didn't fiddle those!) I think it's a case of heart saying England and head saying India. I might overrule my head, though -- overrated -- and stick my neck out (there's a strange compound mental image): 2-1, England.

Turning Points

From what I remember of sporting events in the mid-'90s, they were all pretty poor. Perhaps my judgement was clouded by the usual teenage angst, but I just don't feel there was anything to compare with the drama of, say, the great Lewis vs Powell World Championships in 1991 or, eleven years on, Brazil's 'pentacampeão' romp to the football world title.

Baggio's penalty miss in '94 was fairly dramatic, but it did come at the end of a mind-bogglingly dull 120-minute slog through the Pasadena heat. Gazza's goal at Euro '96 was sublime, and England beating the Netherlands 4-1 was special, but the rest of that tournament -- at least from the point of view of a 12-year-old England fan -- was forgettable enough.

One sporting occasion that does stand out from this rather fallow period, however, is the '95 Rugby World Cup. The political significance of this -- the recent emergence from apartheid, South Africa returning to the international sporting fold, Nelsen Mandela and Francois Pienaar -- has been covered in the recent film Invictus; suffice to say, then, this was an event the ramifications of which went far beyond the white lines.

Positioned halfway through the decade, and at the beginning of a new chapter in both international political and sporting relations with South Africa, this was a whole tournament of turning points.

This is not what I want to write about, however -- Matt Damon & co. have already covered all that. My turning point -- for English rugby, which spiralled into an 8-period of underachievement known as the 'we were waiting for JW's left foot' years; for international rugby itself; for a 6'5", 20 stone 20 year-old, who could have quite easily based a career on this one match, had he achieved nothing else -- came in the semi-final between England and New Zealand.

As I remember it, it was the first kick-off of the match; internet records inform me my memory is playing tricks.

Before I go any further, though, I should provide a little background for those of you unfamiliar with the niceties of the rugby union restart, or those of you who started watching the sport later, when what happened would have been nothing out of the ordinary.

When a game is (re-)started in full-XV rugby union (not Sevens, but that's another thing entirely), the fly half (or first five-eighth) kicks the ball diagonally forwards, the idea being to return it to the opposition team, but also to hang the ball up in the air long enough to give members of your team the time to run and put pressure on the catcher.

Rugby union was, for years, a rather genteel sport. When, in the late nineteenth century, a group of players at northern clubs thought to make polite enquiries as to the possibility of supplementing their meagre everyday incomes with money from the games they played in at the weekends, the southern clubs -- staffed in the main by rather-more-well-off types, who could afford to not receive remuneration for their rugby -- insisted that the Rugby Football Union was to remain amateur.

While Rugby League has been professional ever since -- and has indeed evolved almost into a separate sport -- Rugby Union spent much of the twentieth century an amateur endeavour. Which rather suited it.

Rugby Union is full of rules and regulations regarding 'set pieces' that essentially involve creating an elaborate ballet on the field of play. Where association football has one man throwing the ball in after it goes out of play, in union they involve up to 16 players in a cross between a morris dance, a synchronised swimming display, and a wrestling match. League have a perfunctory scrum that sees three players from each team linking arms, and waiting for the scrum-half to recycle the ball; in union the scrum has the sense of a ritual that must be performed in a certain way. When Gareth Edwards, say (like a Welsh Ben Youngs from the '70s, for younger readers), clipped the ball over the top and raced down the blindside, rather than passing it out across the field, you could hear The Guardians of the Game struggling to prevent their appreciation of his genius being tainted by a strong 'that's just not cricket' disapproval.

The hanging kick at the re-start is one of these performances -- 'things which must be done in a certain way before we can start playing the game'. The fly-half's kick is directed towards the opposition's heavier, slower forwards, who are in turn faced by the kicking team's forwards. The opposing catcher would either collect the ball and take it into contact or pass it straight to his own backs, or he would spill it (either under pressure or not). The game didn't really get going, in other words, until this 'kick to the forwards' had been got out of the way.

What, though, if this wasn't something that had to be done? Why not start playing the game much earlier?

20 minutes into the first half, Andrew Mehrtens -- the Kiwi #10 -- stepped up to take the re-start after a Rob Andrew penalty. The England forwards were lined up to the right of the right-footed Mehrtens, facing their All Black counterparts, and braced to receive the ball.

Mehrtens kicked left.

This had two repercussions: the England backs were completely unprepared for this, and so the advancing All Black backs reached the ball before they did; and the player who caught the ball -- the 20-year-old left winger making only his 5th appearance for the team -- had the bulk to brush aside the confused England defenders while they were still trying to work out which sport they were meant to be playing.

This wasn't what was meant to happen! They'd cheated!! By being fast, and quick-thinking, and powerful, and....generally better than England.

1995 is the year that Rugby Union turned professional, and I like to connect this with that moment, in which Jonah Lomu walked over poor little (as he looked) Tony Underwood. Gone was a time in which re-starts went in an expected direction, and wingers were the weedy members of the XV: in came the professional era, and daily training, and nutrition programmes, and back lines with an average weight north of 15 stone.

Perhaps my memory of the event is significant in its faultiness: it felt like the beginning of the match; New Zealand's dominance throughout deserved a first-minute try. It was a defining moment. English rugby was not going to be the same again; Tony Underwood certainly wasn't.

What's your sporting turning point? Leave a comment below, and we can continue the nostalgia-fest.

Getting a Grip

Ok, so being beaten by Bangladesh for the first time in all competitive cricket isn't great; but it isn't the end of the world. Amid the storms of gnashing and wailing that may well follow the second failure of a national (male) sports team inside 3 weeks, here's a rather un-English suggestion: let's have a think about the positives to be gleaned from the wreckage of Ian Bell's left foot and another braking of the Craig Kieswetter bandwagon.

It had to be coming

New Zealand, the fifth nation to assume test-playing status, started their first game of international cricket on the 10th of January 1930. Twenty-six years passed before, in Auckland in March 1956, they recorded their first win over a touring West Indies team. Bangladesh's first foray into international cricket came, appropriately enough, in England, in the 1979 ICC Trophy; their first victory over England was thus 31 years in the making. So basically -- even though we're talking about the first victory ever, rather than simply over England, and disregarding the fact that the more recent span will have included far more games of cricket -- it was about time.

We haven't won the Ashes

After the first three matches of the most recent series of ODIs, an uninformed observer could have been forgiven for thinking the England team had managed a repeat of a certain 2005 and 2009 achievement, and a little replica urn was already in the bag (or trophy cabinet, depending on how mixed you like your metaphors). While the final two rubbers dampened the spirits slightly, momentum is a powerful force: a 3-2 scoreline provided ample evidence -- so the thinking inevitably went -- for a surge in English power in the game. This result may just remind the sporting hack fraternity that Brisbane in November is still a long way away.

Calm down, dear

Following on from that last point, it's less than two short months since England's much-praised victory in Barbados, and already cricket journos are talking in animated terms about England's chances in next year's World Cup. Surely a little sense of perspective is a good thing?