The Crashes

Searching for answers

So we are now a couple of days into the Olympics and both Australia and Great Britain (sorry... Team GB I’m supposed to say right?) have had some disappointing results. For the Brits, the Men’s Road Race didn’t go as planned when they put all their eggs in the Cavendish and no one was going to let that one happen. They would have been better served to at least send one team member, maybe Millar, into the breakaway and give themselves another option when the inevitable lack of help eventuated.

Without medalling, Stuart O’Grady had a wonderful ride and finished 6^th, a great effort for a great statesman for the sport and Australia. The Brits just fell short of gold in the Women’s Road Race but couldn’t get past the amazing Marianne Vos from The Netherlands.

Both Australia and Great Britain have been disappointed in the pool as well. For the Brits, Rebecca Adlington couldn’t grab gold in the 400m freestyle and for Australia, I think we all know what happened in the 4x100 freestyle relay.

I can’t pretend to know for sure why the team failed to meet expectations. Were expectations of gold that unreasonable when we had the favourite and one of the other contenders for gold in the individual 100m? Not to mention two other highly rated swimmers in the other two spots. Was it all mental after there was such an air of expectancy that they couldn’t handle the pressure?

I think we’ll only really know the answers to that when we see what the Missile and Roberts can do in the individual 100m. I just hope they come out for redemption as opposed to breaking under the spotlight.

Meanwhile the Australian teams for the most part have not gotten off to the best of starts. The Hockeyroos, the Boomers, Men’s Volleyball, Men’s Water Polo all lost. I’m probably forgetting someone else too. The Opals won as they were expected to and whilst I didn’t see the game, I’m told it was a shaky performance. I expect them to find form and go into the gold medal match as a legitimate 50/50 chance.

I must admit the relay upset has shaken my confidence in Australia reaching double digit gold medal, but I guess that can all be fixed if the boys make up for it in individual events. I hope by the end of the swimming we take at least 4 gold from the pool. Emily Seebohm can certainly help out with that target tonight/tomorrow morning.

Also, yeah it goes without saying, but how good are China? They have kicked these Games off on fire. Every time I change the channel, which is a lot, there is a Chinese kid not only winning, but dominating their event. Weightlifting, shooting, diving, swimming... they just keep coming. I guess it’s a reflection on where we are headed as a planet in general. I, for one, welcome our new Chinese overlords. I’d like to remind them that as a trusted online personality, I can be helpful in rounding up others to toil in their underground sugar caves.

I’m exhausted already. So many more nights to go.

Two Weeks of Sports Fan Bliss

The Beast and Bolt can dance too

If you’ve been living under a rock the London Olympics are about to get underway this weekend and as you may well have guessed, I couldn’t be more excited. The Summer Olympics and the FIFA World Cup have to be the two biggest sporting events in the world and if you aren’t a football fan then you don’t even care about that one. Even the people I know who simply aren’t into sport have at least some interest in the Olympics.

To name every single event or athlete I’m excited to see would take forever, but I decided to go through several of the things I’m most looking forward to, both from an Australian perspective and also just as a sports fan in general.

First and foremost, you can’t go past the men’s 100m race where the amazing Usain Bolt looks to defend his title from Beijing. For the last 4 years everyone assumed the winner of this race was a mere formality and we just wanted to see what time Bolt would run and how he would celebrate. Not anymore. This race is absolutely up for grabs now after Bolt recently lost his national trials to his training partner Yohan “The Beast” Blake. Blake is also the reigning World Champion, but Bolt was DQed for a false start there.

Americans Tyson Gay and recently back from drug suspension Justin Gatlin (that’s his new full name) will look to play spoiler as well. I still expect Bolt to go to another level and win it, but this race is much more interesting than you might realise.

As a basketball junkie I always get excited to see how the Boomers perform as well as simply watching the American team. There has been a lot of trash talk lately about who would win between the 1992 Dream Team and this year’s team (the answer is the Dream Team and you need to give yourself an uppercut if you even doubt this). The Americans just won a warm up match against their biggest challengers Spain and anything less than gold in convincing fashion would be a shock. Spain, Argentina and France are all good teams as well and will be the biggest challengers.

The Boomers team goes in without our best player in Andrew Bogut and I think our history of making the quarter finals and then bowing out will continue. Hopefully some of our boys can perform well enough to get some international recognition and maybe even open the eyes of some NBA scouts.

Both the track and road cycling will be fascinating as the British hosts look to dominate, as they already began to do in Beijing. Australians have legit medal contenders in most cycling events and I’d love to see us kick it off with gold in the men’s road race, which is the opening event of the Games (not counting the football which has already started).

Everyone knows Australia has great medal chances in the pool and Sally Pearson in the hurdles, but also make sure to watch Mitchell Watt in the men’s long jump. I don’t know how or why, but ever since Jumpin’ Jai Taurima in Sydney we have become serious contenders in the long jump. Apparently white men can jump.

The media and experts seems to be predicting disaster for Australia in the medal tally this year, but I optimistically think we can get into double digits for gold. If the Aussies who are supposed to win, do win, I think people will be pleasantly surprised. Between swimming, diving, cycling, athletics, hockey, sailing, rowing, shooting, equestrian, kayaking, canoeing, beach volleyball and women’s basketball (and I’m sure I’m missing a couple random wins we might pick up like in martial arts or something) Australia has a chance to push 15 gold. I’m going to say 12 and hope I’m short.

I’m sure I’ll write more specifically about some of these events and our medal hopes and results during the event but for now I just feel sorry for all of you with day jobs who can’t stay up all night to watch.

Wiggins’ World. Party Time. Excellent.

A well earned glass of bubbly

So it is finally official and Bradley Wiggins is the first Brit to win the Tour de France. If he wasn’t the best man across the three weeks, then at worst he was maybe second to his teammate Chris Froome, although we’ll never know if Froome could have put enough time on Wiggins in the mountains to counter Wiggins in the time trial.

To me the real story of this year’s edition of Le Tour is the domination of the entire Sky Team rather than of their captain. They had not only the two best overall guys, but their domestiques were still chugging along when most teams were down to only their leaders, not to mention their ability to help Mark Cavendish win the stages he won. Even Wiggins took his turn in the lead out train to help Cav win his stages. Sky really were an all-star team and I can’t remember a performance like this.

Lance Armstrong was always blessed with amazing teammates, which maybe could rival this. But to watch as Sky climbed mountains with four or five men, doing the hard work as other teams sat behind just hanging on, it was quite staggering.

Question now is whether they can keep the band together for another go around. If they come back in 2013 with the same squad I can only see history repeating itself, however cycling teams rarely stay together too long. At some point Froome is going to not only want to be a team leader, but someone will pay him like one. If I had to predict, I’d say he sticks with Sky for now but by 2014 we might finally see Froome vs. Wiggins fighting for the yellow jersey. It’s also a delicate balance trying to have enough climbers to support the team leader whilst also trying to win sprint stages and support Cavendish.

Meanwhile there are rumours that Cadel Evans will drop out of the Olympics after he struggled in Le Tour. Whilst I’d love to see Cadel represent Australia, I don’t think anyone could blame him for pulling out and realistically, someone in better form coming in to replace him might be better for the team as well. I have to wonder whether Cadel simply had a bad tour or whether he is now simply declining and being past by younger, better riders. He has nothing left to prove and it wouldn’t surprise me if he is ready to hang it up. Then again he is the kind of guy who would read this (not that he will ever see it) and decide to prove everyone wrong, which frankly would be awesome.

But my favourite possible outcome would be for Cadel to realise that Tejay van Garderen is ready to lead and stick around another year to be the Froome to Tejay’s Wiggins. I think the only way to dethrone Sky now is to switch the Cadel/Tejay roles from this year and hope Tejay has the legs to get over the top.

For now, I don’t envy those boys. After three gruelling weeks they get a few days off and then have to compete at some little event called the Olympics. Oh man... the late nights just don’t end.

About Last Night

No caption necessary

As I write this, it is about 20 hours since Adam Reynolds scored the winning try for the Rabbitohs against the Roosters, in a match where the existence of karma and even maybe Newton’s third law were proven beyond reasonable doubt. Yes I know, we already knew about the Newton one.

When I woke up this morning I wanted to write something, anything, to sum up what being at the game last night was like for a Rabbitohs fan. Unfortunately, I sat down and was still speechless. How does one put into words something like this?

Having been on the losing end of the exact same loss in round 1, I know how it feels to be on the other end of this sense of euphoria and bliss. But, it’s having gone through that feeling, which makes this feeling all the more special.

There is a part of me that feels sorry for my friends who support the Roosters. I can empathise with how they felt last night and today, having been there only a few months ago. However, another part of me feels that they deserve to go through it, as the counter balance to their euphoria and joy from the previous encounter. Plus, they are Roosters fans; I never want them to be happy.

I wrote recently about going through the highs and lows of being a sports fan in a short period of time. That day it was in reference to Cadel Evans' failed attack, but it pales in comparison to the roller coaster of emotion that all 20,000 people at Allianz stadium went through last night.

Rabbitohs fans are not conditioned to believe that those sorts of results will happen in our favour. We are scarred not only by losses like round 1, but years of missed opportunities, bad bounces and players who didn’t know how to win. Not anymore. This really is “new Souths” and the fact that the 13 guys on the field wearing cardinal and myrtle did believe that result could happen; it has now spread to the entire fan base.

Watching the players embrace not only each other, but also the fans in the “Burrow” shows that in an industry where players often are just mercenaries, these guys not only get how much we as fans care, but they care equally as much.

It was fitting that the winning try (and goal) was scored by Adam Reynolds. Not only has he been a perfect reflection of the change and improvement in the club throughout this season, but you couldn’t find anyone in that stadium who was more of a Rabbitoh than he. It was a moment every fan grows up dreaming of and if it couldn’t be me wearing the 7 jersey and scoring that try (because I’m the obvious alternative.... maybe I’ll even fill in when he plays for NSW next year) then I’m so glad it was him.

Whatever happens through the rest of this season, whether we go all the way or simply bow out in the finals series, I will never forget being at that game last night and really, isn’t that what being a sports fan is all about?

Well There Goes That

Yeah.. pretty much

The highs and lows of sport were on full display in Stage 11 of the Tour de France when Cadel Evans made what looked like it would be a brilliant attacking move. Evans, who everyone and their dog knew needed to claw chunks of times back from Bradley Wiggins, timed his move to coincide with his teammates, particularly Tejay Van Garderen, slipping back from the early breakaway to “pick up” Cadel and do the pace making and dirty work.

As an Evans fan, as most of us Aussies are, it looked like team BMC has planned this to perfection and we were watching our boy put a move on that might well win him another yellow jersey. Very quickly though, it become clear it wasn’t going to work.

The minute Cadel couldn’t even keep up with young Tejay; it was obvious Cadel just didn’t quite have it. Whether it’s just that one day, or whether it’s in the entire Tour this year, we will find out. However the failed attack then meant Evans didn’t have the energy to keep up with Wiggins and co to the finish line and instead of clawing time back, now he is even further back from a guy he can’t beat in the time trial.

So now the Tour de France is likely a one horse race and we are only just over halfway. I personally hope Chris Froome says “f*ck the man!” and decides to attack himself and make this a Sky on Sky showdown. How awesome would it be to see Froome defy team orders and realise he is actually the best guy out there and should be winning the whole kit and caboodle.

Unfortunately that will never happen.... unless the reports that he already defied orders in Stage 11 prove to be true. But I doubt he does it again.

So instead I am left praying Cadel pulls a Floyd Landis (sans drugs... probably) and recovers from a horrible day to destroy everyone and win the Tour anyway. The problem with this is the “sans drugs” part and thus the only real hope for those of us who want to see a legitimate yellow jersey contest is for Wiggins to somehow struggle and bring all the other players back into the race. Let’s just all hope it’s not a crash that makes that happen. Or you know, a positive drug test, which would suck even more.

On another note, my fan boner for Pierre Rolland which began last year was back last night. It seems that at least once a year Rolland decides he is going to show just how strong he is climbing one of these ridiculous mountain passes and leaves everyone in his wake. If only he learnt to put in a time trial competitive enough to really give the GC a shake and we could be looking at a real contender for years to come.

Uphill climb for Cadel, Pun Intended

Wiggins and his sideburns celebrate

So I haven’t written about the Tour de France since my race preview. I figured blogging about the sprint stages wasn’t really worth it as it has no real impact on the race overall (besides the green jersey of course) and the main thing that happened in the first week was how many crashes and withdrawals the race has seen. The two biggest names out of the race now are Ryder Hejsedal and Olympic Champion Sammy Sanchez. It’s such a shame, but it does happen.

Until last night, Cadel and Wiggins had been sticking together, finishing every single stage in the same group and more often than not literally next to each other. The only gap between them was the 10 seconds Wiggins gained during the prologue.

Of course that all changed in the first full length time trial. Cadel did a good time trial, make no mistake about it. He paced himself in a way that got the best final time for him. At the first checkpoint it looked like he might be struggling but he knew the course suiting him on the back end and he finished the stage sixth overall. That’s a great job when it includes time trial specialists like Cancellara, who will beat him in the stage but don’t matter to the general classification.

The only problem for Evans is Bradley Wiggins, who damn sure does matter in the yellow jersey race, won the whole shebang. When a rider is as good a climber as anyone and then also is the best time trial rider, that’s a recipe for a yellow jersey in Paris. Not to mention that Wiggins has teammate Chris Froome sitting in third overall and they will work together in the high mountains to guarantee at least one of them wins the race.

Can Cadel still retain his crown? Absolutely. But he is going to need to break Wiggins in the high mountains, probably more than once. With the gap sitting at just under two minutes right now, it’s reasonable to suggest Wiggins will gain another two minutes or so in the last time trial. Therefore Cadel is going to need to go into that time trial with at least a two minute lead in yellow. For the mathematicians at home, that means Cadel needs to beat Wiggins by around four minutes in the mountains before they get to the last time trial on the penultimate day of Le Tour.

Also I need to comment on how good Kenyan/Brit Chris Froome has been. The guy looked stronger than both Wiggins and Evans in the two medium mountain stages we’ve had so far, came second overall in the time trial and is frankly just as much a chance to win the whole thing as Evans is. Yeah he will have to do work for Wiggins rather than the other way around, but they will expect Froome to be able to go with Wiggins and Cadel up the mountains, then it will just come down to that last time trial where it’s every man for himself.

The next 2 weeks will be fascinating and will have to bring out the attacking side to Cadel we all want to see, but right now, Wiggins biggest obstacles could be those sideburns.

SOO Game 3: So Close But Yet So Far

NSW dejection

Origin has come and gone for another year and yet again we have to endure a year without the shield or interstate bragging rights. Whilst we couldn’t get mathematically closer to winning, without actually winning, at the end of the day QLD were the ones left celebrating.

I could spend all day talking about the video refs and decisions that went against NSW in games 1 and 3 but they were there for all to see and NSW had opportunities to win anyway.

So where to now for the Blues?

Firstly I think Ricky Stuart has done a terrible job this year with the NSW team and whilst I don’t think his job will be in jeopardy, in my opinion it absolutely should be. There were some terrible team selections throughout the series which left NSW behind the 8-ball. The fixation on picking Dragons players, who even my friends who support the Dragons admit aren’t in great form and didn’t deserve to be there this year. Ben Creagh has never been great at Origin level and this season his NRL form has done nothing to deserve a shot in sky blue. Trent Merrin is decent but was coming off the bench for his club side and whilst he may have an Origin future, he wasn’t warranting selection. They eventually figured this out and left him out of the Game 3 side.

Beau Scott somehow got a call-up to replace Glenn Stewart in Game 3 and once again I’m baffled by it. A solid defender who offers little in attack, Scott too has not performed well enough this year to warrant selection in the position NSW is deepest in. Not to mention that if Tariq Sims had been rightfully picked in Game 1, he never would have been playing for the Cowboys to suffer his season ending injury. Plus, poor Aaron Woods deserved to play at least one game this series and instead we just kept getting more underperforming Dragons.

As much as I love Nathan Merritt and want him to play Origin, I had no issue with Brett Morris replacing Uate and he didn’t disappoint. Both Morris twins are classy players and were possibly NSW’s best in Game 3. If only ‘Slippery’ kept breeding and created a few more for us.

Then of course we come to the inclusion of Jamie Buhrer in Game 1. Whilst I understand NSW wanted someone in the utility role and with Gidley unavailable our options were limited. But Luke Lewis and Greg Bird were already in the team and both can cover most positions on the field. Then to only play him for 7 minutes and basically play a man short, that’s just poor decision making and bad coaching.

We also have the major issue that during the games themselves NSW seemed to lack direction or any semblance of a coherent game plan. I put this both down to a lack of coaching, preparation, as well as the fact our halves are so many levels below Queensland’s. Meninga may not be much of a tactician as a coach, but he and Hagan clearly have a game plan in place that his team know how to execute. NSW on the other hand look like they just met each other.

Mitchell Pearce was horrendous in Game 3 and not much better in Games 1 and 2. Todd Carney was horrendous in Game 1 and not much better in Games 2 and 3. Hopefully we aren’t too far away from seeing the likes of Adam Reynolds, Josh Reynolds and some of the next generation putting their hands up to get a shot at the NSW halves positions. We have the Stewart brothers, the Morris brothers... now let’s add the Reynolds “brothers” to the mix.

I really wish Phil Gould would find a way to settle his differences with the NSWRL and come back to save us. He is certainly the best candidate to put an end to the Queensland domination. However if he still refuses to work with the NSWRL, then I’d love for Peter Sterling to have a crack at the job. Everyone seems to be in agreement that he is one of the smartest football brains around and the only thing preventing him from getting a coaching job is his lack of interest.

But for three games a year I wonder if Sterlo could be talked into it.

Please Sterlo.

PS: Brent Tate is a cat.