Link below to my round-up from SportsNewsIreland.com
http://www.sportsnewsireland.com/2010/03/28/magners-league-round-up-26th-27th-march/
Archive for March, 2010
MAGNERS LEAGUE – WEEK 14 PREVIEW
Friday March 26th
Cardiff Blues v Ulster 19.05
Munster v Glasgow Warriors 20.00
Saturday March 27th
Leinster v Connaught 16.30
After the disappointment of last week’s Six Nations defeat by Scotland, all eyes revert back to the Magners League this week as the race for the coveted top four spots really hots up.
We begin with a look at a crunch tie between two of the play-off hopefuls when third-placed Glasgow Warriors travel to Limerick to take on fourth-placed Munster on Friday night. It is the Warriors second consecutive game on these shores, and they will be keen to fare a little better than they did against Leinster last week, where a late Colin Gregor try added a bit of respectability to the scoreline, eventually losing by 20-14.
Munster have some slight injury concerns with Billy Holland and Duncan Williams both sitting out training earlier in the week, but they have made the squad, which also includes Ronan O’Gara, Donncha O’Callaghan and Tony Buckley. O’Gara and Buckley both took part in training with O’Callaghan looking on from the sidelines, but all three returning internationals are expected to feature for Munster who will be desperate to make up for the defeat suffered at the hands of the Warriors in Glasgow earlier in the season.
Friday’s clash with The Warriors signals the start of a crucial few weeks in Munster’s season where they will also meet Leinster in the Magners League and that is followed by the Heineken Cup quarter-final against Northampton on April 10.
Also on Friday night, Ulster travel to the Cardiff City Stadium to take on the Blues who currently trail Brian McLaughlin’s charges by two points in the table. It is the first leg of a double-header between the two sides as they will meet again next week in the return fixture, but Ulster will be hoping to maintain their play-off hopes with an away win here. Boosted by the return of key players including Stephen Ferris and Rory Best, they are well-equipped to do so, but after a miserable start to the campaign, David Young’s side have recovered well and are a tough proposition, particularly in front of a fervent home crowd.
The focus of our attention then switches to Saturday’s all-Irish clash between league leaders Leinster and bottom-of-the-pile Connacht at the RDS, and despite injuries to Brian O’Driscoll and Gordon D’Arcy that leaves both men in a race for fitness for the Heineken Cup clash with Clermont Auvergne next month, the home side will be confident of dispatching of the Connacht challenge.
Connacht haven’t defeated Leinster in Dublin since 2002, and although buoyed on by a convincing 16-3 St.Patrick’s Day victory over the Newport Gwent Dragons, coach Michael Bradley will be all to aware of the difficulty of the task ahead.
Leinster coach Michael Cheika has suggested that Jonathan Sexton and Rob Kearney will both play against Connacht, and with Leo Cullen, Eoin Reddan and Shane Jenings also back in the fold, Connacht could find themselves up against it on Saturday afternoon.
Link below to my review on SportsNewsIreland.com
http://www.sportsnewsireland.com/2010/03/20/ireland-eager-for-one-last-croke-victory/
Hi all, link below to my preview of today’s RBS 6 Nations game between Ireland and Wales on
sportsnewsireland.com
On the rare occasion when I hit a decent golf shot as I hack my way around some par-3 course of little or no distinction, my playing partner will usually ask something along the lines of ” what ya hit that one with?”. It’s an indictment on my enthusiasm for the game when I have to turn the club around and have a look myself before I can answer him.
Those with a greater appreciation for the game will automatically know what club to select prior to hitting each shot. They will have calculated the distance to the pin and from years of practice will know exactly what club is required to reach it. They become comfortable with a particular make of club, and will only consider deviating from that make when they inevitably hit a slump in form or an newer, superior club becomes available. It’s an exact science.
For Phil Mickelson, the world number 2, that slump never really materialised, and he has used the same Ping clubs for over twenty years. However, the Ping wedges he uses have a unique U-shaped groove on the club face, which allows for greater ball-control and provides the opportuntiy to create more back-spin when required. Since their initial production, the legality of these U-shaped clubs have continually been challenged, and in 1990, the PGA Tour declared that all wedges must have the traditional V-shaped grooves.
Ping, facing a huge loss in revenue, challenged this decision in a legal case that eventually reached a compromise. All Ping wedges manufactured before 1990 were deemed legitimate PGA Tour clubs, but ones made after that year were banned. It was through this loop-hole that Mickelson was allowed to continue his long term love-affair with the Ping wedge.
Mickelson, one of the Tour’s most respected players, subsequently rose through the ranks with 45 tour wins, three of those coming in one of golf’s four Majors. However, the niggling question of Mickelson’s use of the Ping wedge never really went away, and it all came to a head recently in an incident that almost ended up in the courts.
On Jan 28th, during the San Diego Open, Scott McCarron was asked what he thought of Mickelson’s continued use of the controversial clubs. McCarron, a Tour professional since 1992, and a member of the Tour Player’s Advisory Council, responded by saying “It’s cheating, and I’m appalled Phil has put it in play”
Mickelson was understandably less than impressed, but while he spoke of possible legal action, other pro’s, including Lee Westwood, weighed in with their take on the issue.
So who was the winner? Well, no-one really. McCarron had to make a swift retraction of his statements, probably aware of the potential cost of a legal case of this magnitude. Mickelson, although claiming the moral victory and with his dignity no doubt intact, conceded that maybe it was time to open the purse-strings and invest in a new set of wedges.
And as luck would have it, Mickelson’s decision coincided with The PGA’s implentation of a total ban on all U-shaped wedges with immediate effect, following an announcement from Ping CEO John Solheim. Great timing Phil!
Having missed out on last years World Championships for the first time in sixteen years, Ken Doherty announced his return to The Crucible in emphatic style with a 10-1 drubbing of two-time semi-finalist Joe Swail in Sheffield this evening. The Rathgar man raced into an 8-1 lead after this morning’s first session, and finished off the job a short while ago by clinching the first two frames to round of a superb win over the Northern Irishman.
It rounds off a remarkable return to form for the 1997 World Champion, who seems to have put a torrid 2008-09 campaign well and truly behind him. Despite slipping to 44th in the official World Snooker rankings, Doherty made light of a potentially tricky path to this years showcase event, knocking out snooker’s legendary Jimmy White 10-3 before this mornings clash with Swail.
Having followed the likes of former greats such as John Parrot and John Virgo onto the BBC’s commentary team last year, few could have expected Doherty to return to snooker’s premier competition in such emphatic fashion, and now all eyes will be on the draw for the first round of this year’s championship which takes place on Thursday morning. The Dubliner would probably like to avoid the likes of O’Sullivan or Higgins, but on today’s performance, he will be more than a match for anyone in the pot.
Fellow Irishman David Morris, the Kilkenny cueman hoping to seal his first ever Crucible appearance, currently has it all to do as he trails Michael Holt by 9-6 in this evenings action.
The door is closed. The decision was not to use technology at all
Less than an hour after FIFA’s general secretary Jerome Valcke firmly dismissed the idea of utilising any form of technology in football, Birmingham City’s Liam Ridgwell nodded a header past David James at a crucial stage in one of fotball’s biggest and best-loved tournaments. the FA Cup. Referee Steve Bennett, aided by assistant referee Adam Watts, disallowed the effort as neither were certain that the ball had crossed the line.
And how could they be certain? Moments like these pass in fractions of seconds. The referee has to look through a mass of bodies and decide in a milisecond whether a fast-moving football has crossed a line less than five inches in depth. It’s an impossible task, and clearly points to a flawed system that puts too much pressure on one or two individuals.
Personally, I couldn’t think of a tougher job. You have the glaring eyes of thousands of spectators in the crowd firmly fixed on you at any decisive moment. TV cameras record every moment, with a host of commentators, pundits and ex-players only too happy to castigate your every call, using replay after replay to highlight any error you might make.
So why then, in this age of instant technology, can FIFA allow the men and women who they send out to adjudicate their game’s rules, to accept this intense level of pressure. Every day, they preach about respect and fair-play from their luxurious offices all over the world, and yet they leave referee’s completely open to the criticism and abuse from players, managers and fans every day of the week in every country in the world.
Sepp Blatter, FIFA’s controversial president has come up with some pearls of wisdom during his tenure, the idea that women soccer players should play in tighter shorts to attract more male viewers stands out as a particularly zany one. But it seems when it comes to the idea of technology, he is refusing to budge. Whilst hotpants in the women’s game are the way of the future, in Blatter’s opinion, technology isn’t.
Dr. Paul Hawkins, the inventor of Hawk-Eye that has been used to great success in tennis, was in Switzerland on Saturday morning presenting the possibilities of his technology to the FIFA delegates. On the back of extremely positive feedback from ex-referees and players, Hawkins was confident that he had a strong chance of winning FIFA over to his side. But then again, Hawkins is a well-informed, rational and practical innovator, talents that are criminally lacking amingst the elite of FIFA’s decision-making delegates.
One of the main concerns that FIFA have is that if goal-line technology is embraced, then every decision all over the field could be eventually subjected to similar processes. Every penalty shout, every robust tackle, every off-the-ball clash would be challenged, resulting in a stop-start game similar to American Football. However, the nature of the American game is intrinsically different from soccer. The overwhelming success of the system in rugby can provide a more accurate comparison. It takes less than a minute for a Television Match Official (TMO) to make a call that the referee couldn’t possibly make. No intimidations, no foul-mouthed rantings, no argy-bargy. The matter is dealt with there and then. And it even adds a bit of extra enjoyment for the eager spectators who nervously await the decision, often displayed on a huge screen for all to see. Try or No Try.
I think the vast majority of players, coaches and fans would be eternally satisfied with the introduction of a goal-line technology system. Let the referee make the all the usual in-game decisions that occur all over the field. But when it comes to the make-or-break, the do-or-die, the life-or-death calls in front of the goal, let someone who can actually see it from a range of angles and varying speeds make that call.
The real fans know it makes sense.
‘Maybe this year will be OUR year’
Ah, the foolhardy aspirations of the soccer-deprived fanatic. The build-up to any new season, for any sports fans anywhere in the world brings about a short but glorious period of possibilities. The new recruits COULD gel in perfect unison. The new gaffer COULD be the answer. Everywhere, hope is high, expectations rise despite the failures or otherwise of the previous season. The new season is here and it could just be ‘our year’.
And then the reality hits home. It becomes apparent that the new signings have as much competence as the slack-jawed, trench-coated buffoon that bought them. The dreams are dashed and the new season that once carried promises of glory now threatens to be a long, gloomy battle. Maybe next year.
Today however, all hopes remain intact as the Airtricity League gets underway. Last seasons champions Bohemians kick-off at home against newly-promoted Sporting Fingal in what should be an intriguing tie. Teams making the step up to a higher division often fare quite well in the opening stages of the season, although it will be a big ask of Liam Buckley’s men, and I can see Bohs notching up a home win with a bit to spare.
Elsewhere, Bray Wanderers can begin to put last season well and truly behind them when they welcome Dundalk to the Carlisle Grounds. Hampered as they are with injuries to a few key players, The Gulls will beup against it and Dundalk should start the new season on the right note. Also tonight, St.Pats should be too strong for travelling Galway United, and a draw looks to be on the cards when Drogheda entertain newboys UCD at United Park.
Shamrock Rovers, who most bookies see as the only real obstacle in the way of a Bohs hat-trick of titles start their campaign tomorrow night against Sligo Rovers. Last September, Rovers had to come from a goal down to earn a hard fought victory over the Bit ‘o Red in the corresponding fixture, and they can expect a similarly tough task.
With just over two hours to go before the big kick-off, I only hope that the fans of all ten top-flight sides are basking in the ‘glory’ that awaits.
