Swiss Prosecutor Says FIFA Took Bribes
It would appear from these statements by Swiss prosecutors, that FIFA was as bent as a nine-bob note when it was run by Joao Havelange. In a well-crafted phrase by an old accountancy mate, many at the top in FIFA have been screwed, glued and tattooed.
How far is this investigation going to go?
I Didn’t Have A Bad Weekend
It could have been better, if Murray had won, instead of lost to Federer, but I doubt there is any player, who on his best form could have beaten Federer on Sunday. But as Jeff Tarango predicted, the roof issue was against Murray.
But then we did have the wonderful victory of Marray and Neilsen winning the Mens Doubles.
We did at least thrash the Aussies again, during breaks in the rain at Chester-le-Street.
I did enjoy the cable-car in the rain too.
And especially, the pop-up museum about Crossrail and the archaeology.
But otherwise I was just reading the papers, feeding myself and watching television.
At least we have the Olympics coming up.
What Happened When The Torch Relay Went Into Windsor Castle To Meet The Queen
It rained of course. And heavily too. this was taken from the BBC’s text commentary.
Gina is then taken to meet the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh. After curtseying she says: “It’s English weather isn’t it. You can’t do anything about it.”
To which the Queen, dressed wisely in a camel overcoat, responds: “No nothing.” She then breaks into a wide smile and later enquires of the torch: “What keeps it going?”
The Duke of Edinburgh then seemed to test the weight of the torch before asking Gina, “Are you going to take it home?”
So it seems the Queen may be fed up with the weather too!
Aren’t we all?
Sir Roger Returns
This morning Sir Roger Bannister carried the Olympic flame round the same track in Oxford, where he ran the first mile in under four minutes. There’s a report here from the Oxford Mail. He was also interviewed on BBC Breakfast. They then talked about how Bradley Wiggins demolised the field in the time trial yesterday to take a good lead in the Tour de France. Susanna Reid, one of the presenters, used a classic quote of Sir Roger’s as a link between the two stories.
The man who can drive himself further once the effort gets painful is the man who will win.
Sir Roger is 83 now and seems to be driving himself into the future as he can.
Team GB Chooses Fire
Team GB has announced two captains for the Olympics; Ryan Giggs and Dai Greene.
Both are Welsh and hopefully they’ll be able to put some fire into the teams. Admittedly, the football team has a strong Welsh presence with five members, including two of the three overage members of the team.
The only problem, I can see is it makes it even more urgent to find somewhere to park the dragon.
Mickey Arthur Shocked By Aussie Performances
And he’s the coach, so surely he’s shocked at himself as well. The story is here on the BBC web site.
And Now For The Olympic Tennis
Out of curiosity, I looked up the Swiss performance in the 2008 Olympics. I found this informing report on the Swiss in the 2008 and 2004 games, where they got 6 and 5 medals respectively. The report is both ambitious and optimistic and I suspect that Roger Federer is looking to improve on the doubles gold he got in Beijing. After all, he will be carrying the Swiss flag in the opening ceremony, but he hasn’t won an Olympic gold in the singles.
So Federer must start favourite on his favourite surface. He will also be carrying a lot of the weight of the Swiss nation, to get a medal.
So who will meet him in the final?
Jeff Tarango Gets It Right
I sent this in an e-mail to a friend last night, after hearing Jeff Tarango on BBC Radio 5.
Jeff Tarango has made an interesting point about the match tomorrow.
Murray played his semi-final with the roof open and Federer played with it closed. Tarango also said Federer may prefer the roof closed as it’s more like an indoor court. So the weather could have a big effect on the match.
I watched the match today, and both players were very different after the rain break, when the roof was closed.
There could be a case for not changing the position of the roof, once a match starts.
So how do the Welsh handle their roof at the Millenium stadium in Cardiff? This extract from a report here, shows it not all plain sailing.
The French coach’s stance led Wales coach Warren Gatland to demand Six Nations power-brokers change tournament rules and back Wales over the issue of the roof.
As it stands, both participating teams have to be in agreement for the roof to be closed.
If they cannot agree, it stays open unless there are exceptional weather conditions and the match is in danger of being postponed.
“If it’s our stadium and we have the ability to open and close the roof, then maybe we should be the team that decides,” said Gatland.
“I would hate to think that on Saturday, if it is pouring down with rain and we’ve got the chance to close the roof that we don’t.
But the row was because it interfered with a French player-tracking system, that seems to be a bit close to the rules to me.
It strikes me though that the fairest system, is that in any sport, if the roof is closed at the start it should stay closed and vice-versa.
Scotland Has A Better Wimbledon Than Australia
I can remember as a child, when Mens tennis was dominated by Australians. But this year, those small countries; Scotland and Yorkshire had a better Wimbledon.
What’s gone wrong?
I suppose that Aussies can argue they have a world-class driver in Mark Webber, but even he, needs to drive a car designed and made in the UK.
Mitchell Johnson’s Nightmare
It seems Mitchell Johnson‘s tour is not going well and this article in the Daily Mail is a good bit of fun. This is the first couple of paragraphs.
A low-grade rumble went round The Oval on Sunday afternoon. It was the sound of schadenfreude, which until then had always felt like a concept, not a noise. But Mitchell Johnson had just overstepped in his first over – and few things titillate an English crowd more than a Johnson transgression.
Johnson is usually a self-contained problem, a pet project that Cricket Australia keeps telling us is almost there (and God help the rest of the world when he finally cracks it). But on Sunday he was symptomatic. And it was curious to watch.
There’s a lot more in the same vein.
The Anonymous Widower 