Tour de France for Dummies

Hopefully we will be seeing this again in a few weeks

So who better to preview the world’s greatest bike race than a guy who can’t ride a bike? Frankly I’m not good at doing most of the sporting activities I write about, but it doesn’t mean I don’t know stuff. You know what they say... Those who can’t do; teach.

If you are reading this I’m going to at least assume you know what the Tour de France is and that it takes about three weeks, has a bunch of sprint stages and mountain stages as well as a prologue time trial and an individual time trial that will decide the winner on the penultimate stage.

But this year some of the big names are out for various reasons and I think we could be in for one of the most exciting Tours yet. Not that they haven’t been enthralling in recent years anyway. In particular it’s a great year to follow Le Tour as an Australian with not only Cadel Evans returning to defend his title, but also for the first time ever, an Australian team in OricaGreenEDGE will compete.

If Cadel manages to repeat as champion and we get some solid performances from the GreenEDGE boys, plus other top Aussies on other teams, it could be a banner year for our boys.

For those who haven’t been following the news before Le Tour begins, don’t expect to see Alberto Contador or Andy Schleck competing with Cadel for the Maillot Jaune this year, as Schleck is out injured with a broken pelvis (OUCH!) and Contador, finally, has been banned from competition for performance enhancing drugs. It took them a while to get rid of him, but at least they got around to doing what we all knew had to happen eventually.

Also absent from Le Tour this year is the God of Thunder. No, he isn’t missing due to promoting the Avengers, but rather, Thor Hushovd is sick with a viral infection that also kept him out of the Giro d’Italia. I don’t know any fan who doesn’t love Thor and the Tour will surely miss him.

The Manx Missile and Tour bad boy Mark Cavendish will be there, but with the Olympics looming right after the Tour ends, many suspect he won’t be competing as hard for stage wins and might even pull out early. Thus, I personally have avoided him in the SBS Fantasy competition. Bit pricey for a guy with his eyes on another prize if you ask me.

So who should you keep your eyes out for this year?

Well first and foremost it will be fascinating to see how Cadel goes with the target on his back that comes with being the reigning champion. Since moving to BMC, Cadel has a team that can actually support him, even if not quite to the level of Team Sky. Whether or not he stands on the top step of the podium in Paris again in 2012, Evans will surely be there or thereabouts, barring injury or stray Labrador.

Many consider his main rival this year to be Britain’s Bradley Wiggins. The three time Olympic gold medallist has been very competitive in previous Tours without challenging for the title. But without Schleck and Contador and with his current form and team, he is the standout challenger to Cadel’s crown. In terms of Australian interests, two of Wiggins best “domestiques” are Michael Rogers and Richie Porte. Both are great riders in their own right and might have a crack at a stage win or two, but overall their job will be to get Wiggins to the top of the podium.

Team GreenEDGE will be fascinating to watch in their first tour. Simon Gerrans is a Tour veteran and I think you’ll hear his name quite a lot during the Tour, whether it’s in breakaways or perhaps a decent performance in the general classification. Also keep an eye on sprinter Matt Goss. Without Thor there and with Cav possibly not competing as hard, the Green Jersey is open to a field of sprinters. Goss is a real shot after finishing in second to Cavendish at the 2011 World Championships.

But what about some other teams I pretend to hear you say...

Canadian Ryder Hesjedal has just won the Giro d’Italia and is going to be very competitive if he isn’t exhausted after seeing the Italian sights. I also have a huge wrap on Pierre Rolland, who as the lead domestique for Thomas Voeckler last year showed he has what it takes to be a Tour contender in his own right. Also watch out for Evans’ BMC teammate Philippe Gilbert. He is more of a one-day classic specialist, but he did finish third in the points classification last year and will be looking to win a stage or two.

If Sammy Sanchez can put in a decent time trial he is another who will be looking to claim a podium spot and watch out for Estonian Rein Taaramäe who was second to Rolland for best young rider last year.

Finally as always, during the time trials the big guns to watch will be Fabian Cancellara and Tony Martin. Neither are expected to challenge for the yellow jersey overall, but expect one of them to be wearing it for about the first week or so.

So if you are still reading this and I haven’t put you to sleep, I can’t wait to hear the wonderful voice of Phil Liggett and I’ll be sure to write more as the great race unfolds.

À la prochaine.

I Wish I Still Loved Rugby Union

Once upon a time rugby union was my favourite code of football. It was the only type of football I played in high school (very poorly admittedly) and the Wallabies winning the 1999 World Cup, along with the amazing Bledisloe/Tri-Nations victories in that era, remain some of my favourite moments as a sports fan.

In recent years however I have found myself slowly drifting away from the sport. I still watch some Wallabies games, I still watch the occasional Waratahs game and of course I follow the World Cup. But besides the spectacle that is the World Cup every four years, to me rugby has been falling further and further behind other sports. Hardcore rugby fans might not like this article but based on the statistics related to Super Rugby ratings on Foxtel, as well as diminishing crowd numbers, at least for the Australian teams, I clearly am not alone.

The Wallabies do still draw a crowd and have sold out the upcoming 3^rd Test against Wales here in Sydney, but rugby certainly is nowhere near where it used to be and in my opinion it’s because the game itself has dramatically regressed.

As rugby became a faster game with better athletes and better goal kickers, the amount of penalties at the ruck seemed to increase and has lead to the game basically being played between the 22s, with penalty kicking becoming the primary way to score. As soon as a team crosses halfway, they are happy to pick and drive until the opposition inevitably infringes and they get a shot at goal from distance. Try scoring on the other hand seems to be a secondary luxury. Hell, even George Gregan who began his career as an exciting player, started to stand around trying to talk the referee into giving a penalty rather than delivering quick ball to his backline for an attacking move. By the end of his career I despised Gregan.

Obviously this is a huge problem as what fans want, particularly casual fans, is attacking football with teams looking to score tries rather than chip away with shots at goal. But as the rules currently stand, there is no incentive for the teams to do so and thus I think it’s once again time to make some changes to rugby’s rules to encourage more attractive football.

The main change is to reduce the value of penalty shots from 3 to 2. This would mean it would take four successful penalty goals to beat one converted try. Teams would have to weigh up if they are better off kicking for touch, getting field position and going for 7 rather than settling for 2 and I think they’d become inclined to go for 7. I’m happy to leave field goals as 3, as they are difficult to execute and occur during open play, however if others think they should be reduced too I would be fine with it.

In conjunction with the scoring change, I’d start making a lot of infringements, particularly at scrums, only short arm penalties rather than full arm penalties. They already have started doing this in Super Rugby and it should be explored more and extended across all forms. Along with this, scrums should only be allowed to pack once. If the referee sees a problem, then he should call a short arm penalty straight away. The amount of game time lost to referees acting as scrum coaches is unbearable.

Some rugby purists might take issue with this, but honestly it’s not like rugby rules haven’t been changed a lot already. It wasn’t long ago that tries were increased from 4 to 5 and it also wasn’t that long ago where lifting in lineouts was illegal. The game needs to adapt or die and if some people can’t see that right now it is doing the latter, than they really won’t see it coming when the sport has serious financial problems in the future due to revenues drying up, at least in Australia.

Rugby will never lose its hardcore fan base, but that’s true for every sport and in that sense the hardcore fans actually don’t matter. What matters are the rest of us who should be rugby fans but no longer have the level of interest we used to. What matters are the kids who are growing up following only rugby league rather than both league and union.

I desperately want rugby to survive and I want to care about it as much as I once did, but until changes are made to make it entertaining again, I’m afraid it’s just too difficult to watch.

Never Let It Go to the Judges

Pacquiao rocking Bradley

There’s a saying in the fight sports like boxing and MMA. They say ‘never let it go to the judges’. The saying has always been true as you never want to leave the decision of your livelihood to the opinions of three people.

Many decisions in boxing and UFC have been 50/50 calls where you could argue both fighters won and that’s why it’s not uncommon to see split decisions or the occasional draw. There also has been no shortage of controversial decisions where fans and experts are left perplexed by the decision of the judges.

Normally when a fight goes to the judges’ scorecards, the confidence and arrogant attitudes that are necessary for a fighter to perform to their best, means that both fighters believe they deserve to get the decision in their favour. Yesterday was not one of those fights.

Manny Pacquiao’s split decision loss has been obviously getting the media coverage it deserves for the absolute travesty of a decision it was. Watching the fight there was just an assumption not only from the commentators but also from everyone in the ring, that the decision was rightfully going to be awarded to Pacquiao for his dominance over a very game but outmatched Timothy Bradley.

Bradley and his own crew supposedly admitted they knew they lost the fight and were as shocked as anyone when he was awarded the decision. His post fight interview where he admitted he had to watch the tape to see if he won is as close as I’ve ever seen a winning fighter come to admitting he thought he lost.

By now conspiracy theories are running wild. The main two I’ve seen relate to a late betting plunge on Bradley, suggesting the judges were in on the fix. The other is that with Floyd Mayweather in jail, boxing needed Bradley to win to force a rematch and give boxing another big money fight without having to wait for Pacquiao vs. Mayweather.

I don’t buy the second of those theories as I think people in the know realise that fans don’t want to see the rematch and might even have to deal with a boycott, probably driven via social media, which will have people go out of their way not to support or watch a rematch of this debacle.

I also am not sure how I feel about the idea that the judges were in on the fix. It’s certainly not impossible and wouldn’t be the first time something like that has happened. Roy Jones Jr was screwed out of the gold medal at the 1988 Seoul Olympics for example. I am leaning towards believing it was incompetence rather than something more malicious at play here, but either way, fight fans worldwide are disillusioned with a sport that was already on life support.

MMA and more specifically the UFC has been doing a superb job of overtaking boxing as the premier fight sport on the planet and after yesterday’s decision, I think the torch has officially been passed. Boxing just doesn’t have the credibility anymore and with only two drawcards in Pacquiao and Mayweather remaining and even their fights feeling contrived; it’s time for me and many others to move on for good.

For me personally, I’m now done with boxing. I can’t pretend I wouldn’t watch Pacquiao vs. Mayweather if they ever finally get around to fighting each other, but besides that one fight, I am saying goodbye to a sport I started watching as a child when Mike Tyson was the man and Jeff Fenech was the pride of Australia.

So to Dana White and UFC, I’m all yours.

Daniel Cousens: NRL CEO

Outgoing NRL CEO David Gallop looking delighted

So with David Gallop “stepping down” and no obvious replacement candidates really standing out to take the position, I’ve decided to throw my hat in the ring to become the new CEO of the ARLC/NRL.

I think I’m a perfect candidate. Not only do I love the game and know so much about it, but the NRL needs to inject some youth into their administration to get some fresh ideas.

OK so I’m not a lawyer and I’ve never negotiated a billion dollar TV deal or managed staff. Plus I don’t like high stress environments or working in an office. Whatever, we can work around it... I’ll work from home. And sure when I did have a job in football I lasted all of six weeks before quitting, but I have a good feeling about this one!

It’s a perfect job for me, I get to not only complain about all the things I’d want improved in the game, but actually change them.

The first thing I’d do as CEO is demand that the Bon Jovi “This is our House” theme song was never played again in an NRL setting. Ideally we’d bring back “Simply the Best”, but that’s secondary to getting rid of the crime against humanity that is this Bon Jovi debacle.

After that I’d launch some sort of huge, expensive investigation into the standard of refereeing. To be honest the NRL is no worse than every other sport in this regard, but if only someone could fix it in one sport, maybe all the rest would find a way to follow.

I’d also demand that video refs were provided with a TV built after 1998 when the NRL first launched, preferably at a size bigger than an iPad as well. Might make their job a bit easier if they were watching the replays on the same screens everyone at home had.

After that I’d demand that we either got rid of Toyota Cup and went back to the old Reserve Grade/Jersey Flegg system, or alternatively change the age limit on Toyota Cup from 20 to either 21 or 23. That way we keep Toyota’s sponsorship money.

I’d also look to tinker with the salary cap to find a way to reward teams for developing their own players. Whether that means the player is local, or maybe if they at least came up through their Toyota Cup team and played their first grade debut at the club, there should be some sort of salary cap concession for this. However it can’t be such a huge concession that the Broncos, Warriors and Storm win every single year. We’d find a happy medium.

I would also have to be talked out of making every Rabbitohs win worth four points rather than the usual two, but I’d seriously consider it.

Other ideas as NRL CEO might include changing Golden Point to Golden Try, an ice hockey sinbin system as mentioned in a previous blog and I’m sure many other great innovations.

Plus somewhere along the way I’d talk someone into giving us a billion dollars to show the game on TV... you know that old chestnut.

If you have ideas for what I should implement as NRL CEO, feel free to comment and pass on your suggestions. I might even hire you as my 2IC.