boss_kitty

Are you with Le Tour?

As any of you who've been regularly bored by my cycling bits (excuse the phrase) over the last x number of years will know, I prefer the Italian cycling scene to other geographical areas of the sport.  Unfortunately the flip side of the freedom of spirit, and lightness of character I prefer in cyclists such as Simoni and Bettini seems to be a less than rigorous approach to enforcing the rules on doping.  It seems this year Le Tour has targeted Italian based cyclists partly due to their "unusual" blood readings prior to the Tour (and fair enough to that), but also partly because they seem to want to one-up the Giro (the comments after Ricco's recent expulsion from the Tour that "our country is trying to root out these cheats" with the unsaid but pointed "maybe others aren't" lurking between the lines) which is maybe a dangerous "glass houses" approach undermining any moral crusade.

Cheats need to be caught, and in past posts I've been pleased this is going on despite the damage it causes in the eyes of non-cycling fans.  That said I was genuinely choked by the positive of Ricco.  He is just the kind of rider I love watching, aggressive, dogged, bit of a mouth on him, in short more than your average faceless follower.  Why Ricardo, why???  It feels hard to invest any trust in pro cyclists now, and for the first time I kind of see non-cycling fans' point "how can you trust any of them enough to waste time supporting these events"?  the answer is "I don't know" and I can't recommend it to anyone any more.  Happy days in pro cycling are a long way off.

Which is such a shame as the racing at this year's Tour has been breathtaking.  Sunday's stage to Prato Nevoso was extraordinary.  A steady ratcheting up of tension as Evans got "worked over" by his rivals, then the mad dash to the finish line and the agonising wait to see how the timings worked out whether Schleck or Kohl would take the yellow jersey.  Add in Menchov's fall and the "what might've beens" associated with that, and you had a truly compelling sporting spectacle.

Evans lost the yellow in the classic stage to Prato Nevoso on Sunday,  however, with a long flat time trial to come, he still figures as my favourite (even though I don't like him) for the yellow jersey in Paris.  His bizarre behaviour while in yellow was actually quite scary, I don't think he endears himself to many.

How different that might've been if Denis Menchov's attack on the climb of Prato Nevoso had succeeded.  A patch of oil and a bounce on the tarmac led to a short hiatus in attacks on Evans (protocol states you shouldn't attack while an enemy has had an accident), and a short recuperation and roll closer to the finish before the punishment started again.  As it is he looks the biggest threat to the Aussie, he can time trial, and he looks in much better shape on the slopes.  Maybe losing the couple of minutes in a crash during week 1 will be the decisive factor after all.  He has impressed me though.

Frank Schleck continues to astound, he's taking his opportunity, but I can't see him gaining enough time to keep ahead in the time trial on Saturday, the same going for his team mate Carlos Sastre.  Team CSC has been awesome in this race, they have the ability en masse to punish Evans particularly, but not the individual with the skills to hold the jersey to Paris, a shame.

Finally, the surprise package Bernhard Kohl of Gerolsteiner.  He has simply been several levels above what we would have expected prior to the race, and its a testament either to my optimism or my credulousness that I feel this is great and not suspicious.  I think he could (form permitting) do some real damage in the next 2 days in the Alps, and maybe enough damage to keep the jersey to the end.  He is looking a real dark horse.

Let's hope the surprises keep coming, but not in the doping sense, it'll be hard to trust the winner, whoever he is, but that's gonna be the case for some years yet.  I just love the spectacle of it all.  Enjoy (and particularly Wednesday's stage to Alpe d'Huez, see picture of me struggling my big arse up there in 2005) but maybe with a pinch of salt.

I'll round up what's left after the end of the Tour, may be some delay as I'm at Aberdare Park Road Races this weekend (tickets still available folks!).

Hiatus Status

It's the first Tour rest day, see??

Pretty enthralling stuff so far (OK watching hours of pro cycling doesn't float everyone's boat, but I don't mind being "niche").  Already Valverde and Cunego's challenges have vanished into (very) thin Pyreneean air, and some surprising potential challengers to favourite Cadel Evans have emerged.  Frank Schleck (who I didn't even have down as best rider in his house, brother Andy looked a better rider to me), pictured with Piepoli and Cobo today on the Hautecam, is only 1 second off the lead, but with some transitional stages to come it may be some time before he can make a real attempt to seize race control.  Christian Vandevelde is also having a tippety top time, only 40-odd seconds back, and looking solid-as in the conky stuff today.

Would have to say as three principles Evans, Menchov and Sastre are about the three dullest principal boys I can imagine (and I'm known for my lack of imagination), Ricardo Ricco's decision to ride the tour has thus livened things up immeasurably, with him and team mate Cobo both in the top ten, they could still ruffle some feathers before the adding up's done.

Finally props to Mark Cavendish, some true power sprinting bringing two deserved stage wins in only his second pro season, the manner of those wins augers well for his career prospects.  Hey and he seems a nice guy too (you can ignore today's surliness, hard mountain stage and a fall off does that to a man).  Next update at the second rest day next Monday!  Au revoir!

Tour-iste

Loving the Tour so far.  Seems the most open race in years.  Winner???  Heart says Cunego, head says Evans (with a sneaking suspicion on Valverde, who is at least not as boring as Cadel).

Not much I really want to say as yet beyond the kit changes for both High Road (now Team Colombia) and Slipstream (now Garmin [bike computer company not cosmetics]) are both steps back.  I was very keen on the High Road kit.

Hope Cav gets a win, if only so the commentators (particularly ITVs who don't seem to think anyone'll watch if there's no chance of a Brit win [for any sport cf the Euro footy in posts passim]) get off his back.  Carrying quite a load to the line.

Loved the abolishing of the prologue, despite my doubts, it did improve early stage's competitiveness, and mountains late this week make for early climber oppos too.  Preud'homme should be applauded for his innovation (not something that could be said about Tour Directeurs past).

Finally, most disturbing Tour comment so far came for this news item on Eurosport's website.  It says "Placed next to his polar opposite, Silence Lotto's gentle giant Johan Van Summeren, who stretches a whole 1m 97cm, Dumoulin would just about be able, depending on the length of his tongue, lick the Belgian's nipples".  Now OK Dumoulin is only 5'2" tall, but that's an image I didn't need.  I thought I was the only panerotic cycling web presence.  Bah!

Cup Ooozeth Over

Aye, so better say something before the semis start tonight.

First, man its odd that the "top" half of the draw featured 7 teams who wore red as their first colours (Austria, Switzerland, Croatia, Czech Republic, Poland, Portugal and Turkey) with only Germany playing in another colour shirt.

Also, it's the first tournament I can remember that has seen all the group winners decided after 2 games, allowing them to rest players for the final game.  Maybe that wasn't such a good thing with 3 of the 4 group winners going out in the quarters (and Spain having to survive a shoot-out after a game which saw a big drop in performance from them).

The football has been high quality, although there has been a marked drop in attacking attitude since the knock out stages started (similar to USA '94 in that respect, everyone raving about exciting football only for the latter stages to be so stagnant as to wash most memories of the promising start away), Germany v Portugal apart.

Of the teams left, who knows who will win?  Russia have put 2 high quality performances back to back, but Spain are a quality line up, maybe newly confident having finally won a shoot out.  Germany look hot faves to beat Turkey, but maybe overconfidence allied to the fact that Turkey will be entrenched and corseted by limitations due to injuries and suspensions, and already have outfoxed better teams.

Still enjoying!!!

Quiz answer from last time (zero replies) was Rene van de Kerkhof.  Poor showing guys.

This post's question???  Turkey's great rivals (and reigning Euro champs) are the Greeks.  In the pr0nography industry what does the term "Greek" refer to????

Melt Banana, Rolo Tomassi - Rock City 23-06-08

Third time to see Melt Banana at the end of a bittersweet day as I said goodbye (probably temporarily) to my student status earlier in the afternoon.  This meant a poor Illusionator mood and lack of attentiveness to tales of holidays from George and enthusiasm from Mr Eldritch (I know, fucking hell), sorry for being such a wet wank.

Rolo Tomassi were the support.  I saw some young people making music.  (Thanks Chris for the idea for this part of the shite)

Main act were Melt Banana, whom I've loved for a long while.  Tonight though my disappointment (mild) wasn't just because I was feeling low.  They were very good, polished, put it over in a professionally aggressive way, quality control is never an issue.  But, as alluded to in my last trip to see them (when much admiration-semen was spilt), their set has changed little over the 5 years since I first saw them.  Ironic this becomes a problem when they HAVE made some changes.  Anyway, my disappointment focused most keenly during the "short songs" bit.  It's fun 'n' all, and people react to it with mirth and enthusiasm, but they do it EVERY TIME, and for me it's got a bit old.

So to sum up, a very good gig, worth the admission, but there's a sense of MxBx standing still.  It's a nice place to stand, but what I loved about them was the manic rush to the new, and maybe that's gone, psychodynamically speaking there's some linking to be done there I'm sure.

And finally, they did do "Love Song" not "Neat Neat Neat" 5 years ago guys, trust me for once.

Shut Up You Fecking Mouth-Breathers

After yesterday's Euro '08 post, and last night's games, I have to vent spleen about the behaviour of various "analysts" during this tournament.

OK most of this stems from the van Nistelrooy goal that stood, but seemingly was controversial initially.  UEFA has given chapter and verse on this, and while it is a little seen interpretation, you have to go with the fact that actually what they said DOES make sense, i.e. where a player is still active (no head injury to the Italian [?Panucci?], so no need to stop play, ref doesn't stop play unless injury is serious, Italian gets up soon after, fact he falls off field is of no importance as he is a defender so whether he is interfering with play is irrelevant), he is still included in the decision process.

Now there was consensus that this was an obscure incident, and that most people didn't think about this scenario, but in my head it makes sense or at least is a plausible interpretation of the rule.  The difficulty I have comes with pundits' reaction to this, every time there is a borderline decision now comments of the ilk  of "whatever the rule is about offside this week" are spewed out.  Which puts pundits in a bad light.  One there is no respect for authority (and they're quick enough to criticise players for not "getting on with it" when they disagree with decisions), two there is a tacit "I'm [usually] an ex-player, so I know best, how can some bean-counter know better?" (well, pundits seem to reveal more about their lack of knowledge of the games laws and also use the bloke-in-the-pub style to bully/bluster their way to being approved by weak co-presenters), and finally there is just something soooooo defensive about not being able to let go of something when you're wrong, and you have to admit it, in fact more than that, it's insulting, and the lack of standing up to it is appalling from the matey, bonhomie loving jellyfish who present these things (that's right Steve Rider I'm looking at you, but Mr Lineker also, among others).  I don't care if I'm wrong, and will admit it if it's proved, but these bullying braggarts need taking down a peg or two.  And Andy Townsend wants sending back to Portobello Market ("sports socks 3 pair a paaaahnd") where he would be more comfortable.  Hehehehe.

Glad I've got that off my chest, and here's another, minor, gripe.  When, Jim Beglin again among others, a player goes down and appeals for a free kick, it's not given and the ref motions for the player to get up, the ref doesn't "have to book him for simulation".  That would only be the case where the ref is saying "you dived".  Here the ref may be saying "no free kick, any contact was incidental and the payer won the ball.  Play on lads and get up y'girl".  No booking required.  If only they read the rules rather than lazily passing opinion as fact (fun though that is and I should know).

Finally, on to Mr Pleat and his continued bafflement of this viewer.  How is he still in a job??  His role is to offer an insight not available to us mortals unfamiliar with the world of professional football.  So his description of the marvellous (just to wind up Keith) Zlatan Ibrahimovic????  "Tall", nothing more "they need to bring in the... tall... Ibrahimovic more".  Fucking hell.  Also his pre-match build up piece was hilarious.  One he is so shifty looking lurking on the kerb touchline, eyes darting about for under cover vice squad officers.  And two yesterday the Dutch were described as, I swear I didn't dream this, "sexsational".  It's lucky they aren't playing in Germany, if they were keep him away from the Millerntor is all I can say.

Talking of which, I don't think I've said anything about Croatia, which is a shame as a) they saved the finals from the blight of Ingerland, b) they've got a cool kit (™ Rhi and Beth), c) they played really well against Germany and deserved a great win and finally, and most importantly for me, they have, in reserve striker Ivan Klasnic (pictured above in the brown 'n' white of St Pauli), one of the few players from my fave overseas team FC Sankt Pauli to have made a go of their footballing career (see very poor piece kinda about FC S P in this month's WSC - not very good guys :-().  Klasnic now plays for Werder Bremen (I think).  Bilic-mongous.

Up the Duff

Father's Day today, and also the last day of the Criterium de Dauphine Libere, on Eurosport.  The channel has given Harman and Kelly a rest and so Duffers hobbles up to the mike.  I've defended DDfield in the past, but he really is sounding past his best now, as a case in point Chris Sorenson won yesterday's hill-top finish with a nicely judged break over the in-fighting GC contenders.  Duffers calls him "Rasmussen" as he crosses the line (also misjudges obviously fishing themed celebration for "rewinding a video" but let that slide for now).  Now making that sort of mistake at the end of a live broadcast is understandable, I'm sure the production team would point out "wrong name" to him to allow him to make a correction.  But not here, whether he wasn't told or whether he is finally losing his grip Dave continues to call Sorenson Rasmussen for the remainder of the programme (about 6 or 7 times as a rough guesstimate).  OK the prod team should've let him know, but it's embarrassing and frustrating when such an obvious mistake goes unchecked (his co-commentator was getting the name right, showing Duff wasn't listening to him even).

Rant over, the race has been exciting as pretty much always with this week long TdF form indicator, going in to the last stage b_k favourite Alejandro Valverde leads from Cadel Evans by 39 seconds, and Levi Leipheimer by 1'24".

Talking of Leipheimer, why are Astana here???  This race as far as I know is run by TdF organisers ASO, who are not inviting Astana to the Tour.  So why here?  Is there to be another Giro-style volte-face and last minute invite???  Must say on this week's showing, despite the closeness, the riders in the Giro look better class (OK no Cunego here but pretty much everyone else is).  Right in the TdF mood now :-)

A Europe-wide Search for Love

OK so we're nearly half ways through the Euro '08 tournament now, and after the last update things have actually kicked off.  Earlier games seemed like friendlies with little atmos or excitement, but Italy v Holland changed all that.

There have been some genuinely awesome games, and yesterday's clashes between Romania/Italy and Holland/France were one of the best back-to-back football experiences I've had in a long while (sorry if that sounds a bit pr0n).

In terms of prognosis for who's going to win, I have a feeling Portugal could do it, while the team I'm following (Holland) have had 2 great results, I do think the scorelines flattered them (although they deserved to win both really), and that there's a long time remaining to sustain their form, and maybe its unlikely they'll win at the final reckoning.

TV coverage has been woeful on both channels, constant referencing to English/Prem League clubs is just annoying (like the too loud child playing up to remind you she/he's still there as if you could forget).  Face it the tournament is better because of the lack of UK teams not in spite of, the whole (assumed) pre-eminence of EPL is based on a flood of incoming overseas talent that a) raises the league's playing standards, but also b) shows up the dearth of genuine talent in the UK right now.

In the crowd, there has been an irritating preponderance of whistles (as in little metal things the ref blows) being blown by someone in the crowd.  This happened at a Notts match this season, and they had to announce over the tannoy "if you don't stop we may have to forfeit the game".  It is really distracting, though maybe is a terrace norm in mittel-europe.  Stop it please.

I actually like the smaller stadia being used (only 30k capacity in a lot of them, the exceptions being Basel and Vienna), and there's a great intimacy of atmosphere (well it seems there through the tube anyway) at most games.

A transitional life point too, Rhi is filling in the toilet wallchart this tourney, the first time I've not/she's done it, [sniff] she's growing up (heh, that'll embarrass her).  She has also noted that in the majority of games, the ref adds 3 minutes to the second half as "injury time", only last nite's Holland/France and the Switzerland/Turkey swimming gala game had different time (2 and 4 minutes respectively if you're still reading).  How weird is that????  She's definitely her father's daughter though with anal factoids like that, I'm so proud.

Quiz time now (the first one is still open, see the last post below).  Holland won last night 4-1 v France, and Wesley Snijder had his arm in a bandage/light cast.  Which Dutch player wore a light cast on his arm in the 1978 World Cup Final (see pic above)????  Extra points if you don't use the interweb for this, like what I didn't have to.

For an extra special bonus point:  How many mls of synovial fluid did the physio drain from my knee on Wednesday with a massive needle (clue you normally have 5 mls total in the joint)?

Euro(s) Child

It's been a long time since no home nation has qualified for a big championships, and I was quite looking forward to the current Euro '08 tourney because of that - 3 weeks of top quality football without the tension of a home team to really get stressed about.

Obviously this issue has been vexing the terrestrial broadcasters as they've been pushing the tournament by encouraging surrogacy of support (BBC) or, well, not being encouraging at all (ITV who aren't showing the final live I believe).  Either way something is missing so far.

The 4 games to now have been OK without being excellent and I've yet to really get in the swing (I've even missed a couple of halves of games, one for the excellent Dr Who episode on Saturday, signs of quality returning there).  For the record I'm supporting Holland based on sepia tinted childhood memories of them being losing World Cup finalists in '74 and '78.

The opening ceremony was rubbish, the cubes idea didn't work (ask Braque and Picasso) and the opening game (Switzerland v Czech Republic) saw Motson continue to potter off into his dotage being mainly concerned with living up to his stereotype and less in actually adding anything to the game, time to go Mr M.  But then who to replace him?

ITVs first knock was the potentially interesting Portugal v Turkey.  On the whole though it was a stroll for Portugal (although Turkey did look a bit menacing). Highlights were few, and with Tyldesley and Pleat in the commentary box insight was always going to be sparse.  This tournament the terms "shop window" and "agent" will be first to the ITV lips, capitalist scumbags, and were starting to wear thin long before half way through the second half.  Only Pleat's semi-delusional convictions regarding rightness or otherwise of refereeing decisions lightened the mood, he will not change his opinion even when replays indisputably prove him wrong.  Oh and he called Portugal "Portsmouth" once (why do they not have the confidence that people might be interested in the game outside this country, slip though this was?) and said a Turkish player was "loathsome" up front on his own (I assume he meant "lonesome", though that's an odd phrase too).

The games on Sunday were oddly duplications of the Saturday matches (in results as well as style), Lineker's casual racism to the fore re Germany (his dad'd be so proud) and again an assumption we're only watching because of premier league connections (or UK club ties) rather than this being a decent football tourney.  Germany looked very good for the record but a bit shaky at the back (like WC '06 then).  I think it's going to be a long 3 weeks.

Finally, a quiz:  Whose wife is pictured above? (Ooo it's just like The Sun)

Harmon-ic

Watched the Giro (my fave bike race as mentioned in years past), and it was a belter.  All the way up to the final stage there were only handfuls of seconds between the top guys (well, 4 between Ricco and Contador going into the last TT, Marzio Bruseghin did really well to come 3rd on GC).

The last day was a damp squib really as Contador is way better TT-ing than Ricco, but hey he deserved the victory overall.  Oddly I felt it was inevitable he'd win and wasn't as engrossed as, say, when Savoldelli last won in 2005 by 23 seconds even though this race was closer.  Maybe it's the Armstrong/Trek bikes/Bruneel connection but I can't get fired up over Contador despite his exceptional talent and him being an obviously nice guy.  I still feel Ricco lost the race when Leonardo Piepoli (pronounced Pee-pole-ee rather than Pee-eh-pole-ee by the king Kelly) retired after a nasty disagreement with an armco barrier.

My rider of the event was 6th place Emanuele Sella of CFS Navigare.  He won the KoM competition and attacked constantly in the mountains winning three stages.  Mark Cavendish of the Isle of Man won 2 stages and handed one to a team mate (name escapes), he is developing into one of the top sprinters in road racing, it'll be interesting to see if he'll go to the Tour seriously or go for the Madison in the Olympics (with Brad Wiggins?) or both.  Bettini was struggling with a cold, Di Luca looked short of sharpness and got shoe-ed in the last 3 days, he looked like death.  Also disappointed at Damiano Cunego's decision to miss the Giro and concentrate on the Tour.  Hope the little prince wins that.

Only real controversy was the Giro organisers asking Astana to compete at the last minute (Contador was on the beach with family when he heard), at the expense of a very small swiuss team who may go under as a result, which has created a rift between ASO (Tour), Unipublic (Vuelta) and RCS (Giro) triumvirate so the political shenanigans continue (the three had agreed not to invite Astana this year after repeated doping links [Vinokourov, Kaschechkin and Mazzoleni]).  They need their heads knocking together.  Racing was great though so well done RCS overall (I wouldn't have asked Astana, incidentally).

Finally was delighted at finally getting the stage to Plan de Corones/Kronplatz (clip below) done as a TT this year (when they failed in 06 I was very disappointed), awesome win for a really solid Franco Pelizotti from Sella and Contador that day.  Shame, as a last bit, to see my tippety top rider Gilberto Simoni finally starting to look his 36/37 years.  Thankfully missed him blowing on the penultimate road race stage thanks to Eurosport's haphazard approach to scheduling.  Harman and Kelly were very good in the box (I do tend to want to doze off when Sean is speaking though, especially if I've just eaten), great work, just a shame they can't put the shows on when they say they are, it made taping in advance from our Paris holiday a very hit-and-miss affair.

Ciao!