Everybody's Sporting For the Weekend...

Yeah, this one's mostly about sport again, sorry about that. It was a rather hectic weekend of sport and most of my Saturday and Sunday were spent watching various sized men/women pushing/kicking/throwing balls/stones or travelling quickly downhill on skis/teatrays/bobsleighs.

Let me paint for you the picture of Saturday morning. I came home to find my beloved blues playing Manchester United on the tv. Ordinarily I avoid watching live games on TV as they invariable result in losses, but I was knackered and slumped down in the chair to see the expected happen- Man U went 1-0 up in the space of 16 minutes. Right, business as usual, I thought, seeing as Everton had won just 1 of their 28 Premier League meetings with SAF's team. The United faithful began singing a chant which would be sacrilege for me to even breathe on here (needless to say it raised my hackles) and I was fully prepared to head upstairs and cut myself off from all sources of sports news, when the ball fell to much-maligned winger Diniyar Bilyaletdinov (that's easy for you to say...) and he hammered an absolute purler past a static Van der Sar from 25 yards. The Mancs were silenced instantaneously by the Russian's stunner and hope began to return to the Goodison faithful. Before long Gwladys Street was rocking and we were acquitting ourselves well, despite a couple of shaky moments. Some heroic defending by captain Phil Neville prevented Rooney from smashing it into an open net after rounding Tim Howard. When the half-time whistle went, I'd had enough. I've seen enough Everton-United games in my time to know that we are always cruelly denied a draw in the final moments.

I retreated upstairs and had a lie-down, avoiding the feminine wiles of the internet super highway and it's easily accessible sports updates. I bided my time and returned downstairs to check the final result only to see young Jack Rodwell charging, upright and majestic towards the United box, he coolly bamboozled Jonny Evans and placed a terrific right-footed strike beyond a sprawling Van der Sar to make it 3-1! I couldn't believe my eyes. A shirtless Rodwell charged into the crowd to receive the adulation of the Evertonians. I fell to my knees, fearing the 'play injury time until Man United win' rule would be enforced by referee (and Sky 4 sympathizer) Howard Webb. "I'm not a praying man," I uttered, eyes firmly shut, "but if you're there, Big Dunc, for Christ's sake don't let them score!"

They did not score and we had earned a remarkably convincing victory over the champions, after having beaten title-race leaders Chelsea in our previous game. I was on a dizzying high for the remainder of Saturday and knuckled down to watch some Winter Olympics. The night previously skeleton-bobber Amy Williams had sealed Great Britain's first (and only - you'll see) gold medal of the games and the first individual gold since Robin Cousins danced on ice in 1980. Williams gave a superlative performance on her sled, Arthur and sealed the medal on the tricky Whistler circuit with consumate ease. The skeleton is just a ridiculous event (I know I'm not exactly the first one to point that out) and my personal favourite bit is where they crash into the foam sheets at the end- it's basically a glorified level of Pat Sharp's Fun House (that dates me...). As they waited for the final runs to get underway, Auntie showed some promo vids - Williams was basically Charlie from Top Gun with a teatray and a big hill. Again have a look at my Twitter feed for yet more details.

My true Winter Olympic obsession has however been the Curling, which has well and truly sucked me in. The weekend was somewhat of a mixed bag for the plucky Scots as 19 year old Skip, Eve Muirhead, played some dodgy stones to throw away what should have been a routine win over the Americans and David Murdoch's boys lost to Canada for the first time in 5 matches against the Canucks. There were however dramatic victories, with Murdoch triumphing over the Chinese and last night the Americans. It's not necessarily the action of Curling that is so very charming, but the presentation. The belt and slacks combo sported by every curler, Rhona Martin keeping Steve Cram in line in the commentary box, Byers and MacDonald sweeping furiously as Dave plays another smashing stone to clear the house. There was a bizarre point during yesterday's match when Rhona had (for reasons which I still don't fully understand) disappeared and Cram collared American track and field legend Carl Lewis to join him in the box- yup, you heard that right, for a surrealist ten minutes the Beeb's curling commentary team were Steve Cram and Carl Lewis. What next? Lord Coe sitting alongside Ed Leigh for the Women's Ski Cross?

I digress, the main point is that it is genuinely nailbiting stuff. The tactics are incredible and we have some tremendous players. Euan Byers (the British lead) has an astonishing accuracy rating for the tourney, I'd venture one of the best of any team and Murdoch is a tough, canny general, playing those oh so crucial final shots. As they took on the USA, featuring one player with a cap... indoors and another with a tattoo (where the hell do they think they are?) , their ability really shone through. Though the talent evident within the team has been conspicuously absent against several opponents (Canada included) it did return against the US. A lone woman roared "Davey Murdoch's Barmy Army!" and no-one else even seemed tempted to join in. I was singing along at home, as David 'the Iceman' Murdoch played a marvellous draw to seal the 9th end. I think I actually understand some of the technicalities of curling now (shame the nearest rink is Tunbridge Wells...).

There were some hectic thrills and spills in the other events too. Ski Cross was essentially carnage with home favourite Delbosco just falling out of the sky on the penultimate jump, while Ed Leigh and Graham Bell basically just had a laugh on commentary. Bobsleigh provided numerous painful looking prangs- one including the British pair (you just knew it was going to happen). My suggestion to improve Bobsleigh: instead of calling them things like Germany 2 and Liechtenstein 1 (who also took a tumble), give them proper names. Cool Runnings had the 'Rasta Rockett', why not have the 'Berlin Bomber' (actually that one might not be so good in the current climate) or the Spirit of Vaduz? Monaco could be the 'Monte Carlo Flyer', wouldn't that be so much better? Speaking of Monaco, (an inclusion every bit as bizarre as the Jamaicans, where's 'Monte Carlo or Bob'?) a famous Bob-pilot of theirs in the golden age was none other than Prince Albert II, who now enjoys a behind-the-scenes role. This got me thinking about the days when royalty had a proper go at things- when the King would ride in the Derby or play cricket for the Gentlemen, there was a wonderful 'What we miss about...' in the Guardian today about the 1928 St. Moritz games, in which plucky Brit, David Ludovic George Hopetoun Carnegie, 11th Earl of Northesk snatched a hard-earned bronze in the skeleton bob. So Williams is but the most recent in a long line of British people deranged enough to hurl themselves down a twisty track on a teatray and well done to her. It does strike me that the events that Britain are capable of winning medals in play to our natural strengths: idiocy, marbles, housework etc.


Plan for the Week
40% (of time) Writing Blogs
30% Tweeting about and watching the Winter Olympics
30% Learning 'Mae Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau' before Friday