And Now We Lose Cahill
What was it Napoleon said about generals? Something like?
“I have plenty of clever generals, give me a lucky one.”
I can’t find the exact quote, but you get the drift.
Roy Hodgson may be a good manager for England. But he is not blessed with good luck.
Especially now he’s lost Gary Cahill to a double fracture of the jaw.
He is now being criticised for not bringing in Rio Ferdinand or Micah Richards, but adding Martin Kelly.
Only time will tell if he’s right. But at the moment I think he is.
I don’t think I’d like either John Terry or Rio Ferdinand in my team and I think it’s one and not both. And he’s already chosen Terry. So for centre backs it’s Terry plus Jagielka or Joleon Lescott.
He may not have the best team in terms of playing skills, but has he chosen players, who might step up to plate and perform. Terry definitely has something to prove, what with the criminal case of racial abuse and missing the Champions League final. Jagielka might just like to win something.
So although, Roy’s luck may have deserted him, ~I think he’s using his brain to create a team with its own built-in ambition.
The defence doesn’t seem to leak goals and the attack seems to be able to score enough to win the game.
The crucial match is the game against France. I think, that both teams with half a dozen black players each and very few of their fans there to support them, could get a lot of abuse from the locals who turn up. I hope not, but if it does has England got the strength to weather the storm. I would hope so!
The Last Corinthian
Colin Murray has been visiting all of Great Britain’s Olympic gold medallists and I may have missed it or he could have been referring to a previous program, but he closed by talking about Jim Fox. As he won his gold medal in the modern pentathlon way back in the 1976 Olympics in Montreal, he has probably dropped off the sporting radar a bit. However this article in the Independent from 1998 gives a lot more details about Jim and his various fights, against Russian cheats, bureaucracy and Parkinson’s Disease.
This the first paragraph from the Independent.
One figure stood out among the galaxy of personalities on parade at the 50th anniversary bash of the Sports Writer’s Association last week. Indeed, Jim Fox stood out because he insisted on standing, albeit more stiffly than the rest, declining a proffered seat, his dignified presence a sobering reminder of a gentler, more romantic era before the pursuit of sporting glory became suffused by greed, drugs and duplicity.
Remember Foxy? Once he led the charge down sport’s superhighway, a swashbuckling, Corinthian hero in an age when sportsmen were men, and women seemed happy to be ladies. And Foxy was a ladies’ man, a ruggedly handsome, 6ft 3in dashing white sergeant, single, and single-minded who, on his own admission was a bit of a stud; swordsman supreme, in every sense. Now, at 57, the old soldier who was, arguably, Britain’s outstanding all- round sportsman is a victim of Parkinson’s Disease and fights on two fronts – for his own future and that of the sport with which he became identified.
I met him in the early 1990’s, when he was making a comeback and attempted to get into the British Eventing Team. We just chatted about the horses and he talked about his problems, which he put down to falling off too many horses. I don’t know whether the real diagnosis had been made.
He was an impressive man and that meeting left an indelible mark on my mind.
He must be the Last Corinthian, as sport now is just too well-funded and professional, so another will not come along. Fox was as professional in the five disciplines of modern pentathlon as anybody, but he competed in the true Corinthian spirit in the tradition of those like C. B. Fry.
I am afraid, that we won’t see the mavericks too at the Olympics in the future.
Australia has one of the bravest in Bill Roycroft. All it says in Wikipedia about his winning of the gold medal in eventing is this.
Although seriously injured during the 1960 Olympics in Rome, he left his hospital bed to compete in Show Jumping, which was the final event. He rode a flawless round, and Australia won the Gold Medal.
The truth, is more out of Aussie versions of Greek Heroic Myths.
The deed for which Bill Roycroft will forever be renowned occurred at the Rome Olympics in 1960. On the last day of the three-day equestrian event, Australia faced a grim predicament. Two riders, Laurie Morgan and Neale Lavis, were doing well; Brian Crago’s horse had broken down, and the fourth member of the team, Bill Roycroft, was in hospital – concussed, sedated, with extensive bruising and muscle damage. Doctors refused to sanction his release from hospital. The problem was that, if Australia was to win the team event, it needed three finishers. Roycroft had fallen during the steeplechase phase the previous day after his horse, Our Solo, somersaulted over pipes and landed on him. He had climbed groggily back, finished the course, then been given oxygen (and whisky) and flown by helicopter to a hospital outside Rome.
Next morning, with the final phase, the show-jumping, due to start soon, Roycroft insisted on signing himself out of hospital. The doctors said no, and refused to give him his clothes; he then threatened to leave in his underpants. Finally, he signed a document taking responsibility for his safety, and was allowed to go. He was 45, laced heavily with pain-killers, unable to bend, and his comrades had to dress him for the last ride. He was virtually folded onto Our Solo, and the reins were placed in his hands. Stiffly, flawlessly, he completed the round of 12 jumps, ensuring team gold for Australia. (Morgan also won the individual event). Roycroft, patriarch of a legendary riding family, competed in four more Olympics, winning team bronze in 1968 and 1976. He also carried the flag at the Mexico Opening Ceremony in 1968.
It can’t be a myth as it’s on the Internet. But even the author, left out the bit about jumping the round with his arm in a sling. Roycroft won his bronze medal in 1976 at over sixty.
Mavericks too, must include Dick Fosbury, who developed a new method of high-jumping and then turned up at the US Olympic Trials in 1968, won it and then went on to win the gold medal at the Olympics in Mexico. Without his method, Mary Peters would never have got her gold in Munich.
It’s Backs to the Wall Lads!
England at Euro-2012 are starting to look like the last time we fought a war in the Ukraine. And I mean after the Charge of the Light Brigade. At least though the medical services are very much better.
I was listening to Sportsweek on Radio 5 Live and John Barnes, who probably knows more about suffering racism than most, was advising the players to concentrate on the football if the chants got bad in the Ukraine, like they might do. He advised against what Mario Balotelli had said he would do and walk off. He said “Let the referee and UEFA decide.” It might be difficult, but there are some strong characters in the England team. Remember too, in the first match against France, both teams will have quite a few black players and all of the players probably know each other well and will all stick together, if it turns ugly.
We Don’t Do High Jumpers Do We?
All the years, I’ve been following athletics, we have had very few high jumpers of note, despite having some good triple and long jumpers in that time.
I suppose there is one notable exception in that Mary Peters jumped herself to gold in the pentathlon in the high jump. I remember that night in 1972 vividly, as she kept clearing height after height, cheered on by a very passionate crowd, who seemed mainly to support her, despite the fact her rivals were a West and an East German. I think at the time it was said, that quite a few squaddies from the British Army of the Rhine were present and they willed her over. A difficult job, as to put it truthfully, she wasn’t built for high-jumping.
We’ve never won gold in the men’s high jump at the Olympics, but there is always a surprise medal in something and perhaps with a bit of luck it could be Robbie Grabraz, as reported here in the Telegraph. After losing his funding, he’s now number one in the world.
One-Nil to Ing-Er-Land
I’m just listening to the 606 phone in on BBC Radio 5. Everybody is being so negative.
I’ll admit that Roy has a problem, but it isn’t of his making. How many people would relish being dropped into the scenario he found himself, just a few weeks before a major tournament. Only a complete masochist! Or a Leo pig!
I remember 1966, when I was just 18. Were we optimistic? Of course not! We were looking forward to a good summer of football as the World Cup was going to be held in England.
We’re looking forward to a big summer of sport with the Olympics. And judging by the way the torch has been received in the last two weeks the country is getting fired up. If the players we’re sending to Euro 2012 aren’t getting turned on by that, they shouldn’t be going. They’ve also got three Chelsea players and Steven Gerrard, who’ve tasted European glory in the Champions League.
Going back to 1966, if you look at the side that won the World Cup, some were virtually unknown before the tournament. Jimmy Greaves was expected to be the man to score all the goals and Jimmy Armfield was supposed to be the right back. So is Rooney setting himself up for the Greaves role? We need some players to step up and be counted. I’ll put my money on Phil Jagielka, John Terry and Theo Walcott.
They’re still being negative on the phone-in.
The only positive thing I’ve heard is someone saying, he’d take a one-nil win in every game.
The Olympic Torch Goes By
I climbed the hill and then waited on the platform on which the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral is built.
The pictures are in the order I took them.
If I’d made a video, you would have heard the bells ring out. Just as they did, when the Relay passed the Anglican Cathedral.
A few thimgs to note in the various pictures :-
2 – This picture shows the platform at the right, where I took the pictures from.
3 – Lloyds Bank TSB’s publicity vehicle was a converted Bedford CF van, that started its life selling ice cream.
18, 19 – You can spot the Archbishop of Liverpool, the Most Reverend Patrick Kelly in full regalia. Admittedly, it was mainly red, white and blue. He seemed to be enjoying himself, but I don’t know whether he blessed the relay.
21, 26 – The giant puppets are from Hope Street Ltd. and represent Beatles characters.
23,24,25,26 – The building directly opposite is part of Liverpool John Moores University. In my day it was a Roman Catholic Teacher Training College. Opposite the building and behind the one with all the columns, used to be the Everyman Theatre, which is currently being rebuilt.
35 – Note the man on the crane.
36,37,38,39 – The torch and a kiss is in there somewhere.
40 – Walking back towards Brownlow Hill and the University.
What it was like at ground level is shown by this video.
If C Had Been in Liverpool, She’d Have Been Here
St Luke’s in Liverpool, was one of C’s favourite churches, as sitting there at the bottom of the hill, it says so much about the pointlessness of war.
Every time I go to Liverpool, I always pass the church and contemplate for a few moments about what might have been, had she not got the cancer.
Liverpool Waterfront in the Sun
It was a glorious sunny day yesterday in Liverpool.
The amazing waterfront, showed itself at its best.
It was a pity, that because of the evening celebrations surrounding the Olympic Torch Relay, the Pier Head was shut off.
The Queen on Industrial Language
They have just told this story on BBC Radio 5 Live. Apparently, after seeing some of her horses on the gallops, the lads came back in , in a bad mood using all forms of industrial language, not realising the Queen was there. The trainer apologised for the behaviour and the Queen replied. “Don’t forget, I’ve been married to a sailor for most of my life!”
Albert Hall Reverses Ban On Trustees Touting Seats
This has happened according to this report in the Telegraph.
It’s not the touting that annoys me, it’s the fact that sometimes you go to a venue and because those that own the seats aren’t interested in what’s going on, the seats are empty. You get this at Wembley, when there are some of the play-off finals, which those who’ve bought expensive trances of seats, feel are beneath them to watch. Why can’t these seats be rounded up and say given to kids in the town and perhaps a guardian each, many of whom will never get the chance to go to an iconic venue.
To me every empty seat is a disgrace, except possibly when say Norwich and Manchester United are playing, neither of whom, I’d watch, especially if you plied me with prawn sandwiches.
So perhaps if the touting is controlled, this would be to the benefit of all and sundry.
The Anonymous Widower 