Favourite photos of the year

I've no idea how many photos I have taken this year but it must run into the many thousands,well the other day i decided to sort out my favourites and I came yup with around 70 that can be found here on my Flickr page

http://www.flickr.com/photos/captainpenguin/sets/72157632325488417/

Decided though to narrow those down to my top 3 for the year and they are

Drum Roll and excruciatingly long pause

In 3rd place

I have been lucky enough to travel to Shetland on business a few times this year and i got this on July 12th at Sumborough Head

In 2nd place

14th October saw me at the North York Moors Railway war weekend in Pickering and these 2 ladies so perfectly in character

And the winner and my favourite of the year and don't moan because it's football but this one of Nathan Rose-Laing's goal for AFC Wulfrunians against Bustlehome on August 4th was one of those sports shots you just dream about

In 2nd place

Must get blogging again

For whatever reason I have not blogged a great deal this year so as my photo a day project is just one day from completion the plan for 2013 is to blog a bit more,well maybe a lot more,wish me luck

Goodbye Paralympics And Thanks For Everything

To say that the last 10 days have been inspiring is putting it mildly,my views towards disabled athletes  has changed and I think I can say without fear of contradiction that the same can be said of huge numbers of fellow Britons.
So what has changed what has been different well I have gone from thinking aren't they doing well for disabled people to appreciating that these are amazing sportsmen and women, the appreciation that Johnny Peacock and Jason Smyth are words class sprinters in their own right,that I will never forget the way Hannah Cockcroft annihilated the rest of the world in a sprint double and no matter how many times I watch David Whitehead I still don't believe he can turn 20 metre deficit into a 20 metre win within the home straight and as I may have said in a Facebook post just drooled at the site of Oscar in full flow down the final straight of the 400 metres
My highlight of a wonderful inspiring life changing few days was not a gold for GB but a silver,the quite amazing women's 34 point medley relay as 4 nations came into the final few yards neck and neck.with Australia just pipping GB for the gold but the result didn't matter it was a quite pulsating swimming race.

Secondly the attitude of the competitors has if possible been even more inspirational than the performances,congratulations and hugs from losers to winners words of praise straight after the races from defeated athletes (and I will forgive Oscar) to the victors and a total resurrection of sportsmanship that will have Baron De Coubertin grinning from ear to ear wherever he is,and yes i will say to footballers cricketers F1 drivers etc they have set a standard that you have got to follow or be forever dammed.

And finally Channel 4,well I was not looking forward to their coverage believing that the BBC would be so much better and after the first morning I thought I was going to be proved correct,but then came the evening and Claire and Ade anchoring the show superbly a standard they kept up the whole games as the daytime presenters started to get their act together.But the jewel in the crown has to be The Last Leg with amputee's Adam Hills and Alex Brooker and Josh Widdecombe as the token able bodied person bringing a humour that epitomised how in these games disabled athletes are finally  looked on as athletes per se ,for those who have not seen it ask your mates about some of the "Is it OK's"

So to the athletes,broadcasters and everybody involved with these fabulous games thank you from the bottom of my heart,it has certainly changed me hopefully for the better

The Magic Of The FA Cup Lives On

After watching a truly superb FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round tie last night I have a great deal of sympathy for fans who follow those clubs for who this great competition gets in the way of them trying to finish 4^th in the EPL or avoid relegation,because of the weakened sides they put out they are never likely to know the sheer joy that this wonderful competition still engenders.

I wonder if we will ever again have a Wimbledon,Sunderland or Southampton go all the way to a win at Wembley or will the likes of Sutton,Woking and Hereford ever get the great elation of being real giant killers against a full strength top level side.

Well last nights match between AFC Wulfrunians and Coleshill Town (levels 5 & 6 in the non League Pyramid) may not have attracted any publicity but it was a credit to the old competition as full blooded cup tie and a win for the underdog as well.

So to those fans of the “Elite” if you are not going to your clubs match on the weekend of August 24^th may I suggest you find out which of your local non league sides are playing in the FA Cup Preliminary round get down their and watch matches that still engender the true spirit of the FA Cup,your few pounds will also help in ensuring that this level of football that keeps old traditions alive will have a future as well.

And if you are in Wolverhampton the AFC Wulfrunians v Kidsgrove at the Castlecroft Stadium is where you should be heading,you wont be disappointed

Hope I Die Before I Get Old

When Roger Daltry first sang those words from My Generation the last thing on his mind would have been the fact that he would still be playing to word wide audiences 40 years later and the same would apply to Paul McCartney and Elton John,this summer we have seen them in all their geriatric glory at the jubilee and the Olympics,sadly it has left many of us wondering if it would have been better if they had a t least retired before they got old.

Now dont get me wrong I have and always will be a major Who and Beatles fan and a lover of Elton's music  until the 80's came along but surely only the most blinkered die hard fan could have failed to cringe at some of the performances to world wide audiences this summer,sorry Paul , Roger and Elton but the voices have gone and Pete at your age windmill guitar really does not look cool any more.
Strangely enough the one oldie who can still hack it whose guitar style is mature and has a vocal range to cover his material .I refer you to Mr Eric Clapton,does not appear to have been considered for a major role in the Summers festivities.

So guys and Mick and the boys you might want to consider this as well there comes a time when you can no longer hack it those who have gloried in your magnificent music over the years reach for the ear plugs and to use an Olympic term before your legacy is shot to pieces.
So leave us with the records CD's tracks on the MP3 players etc and ride off with dignity into the sunset proud to be able to say I  could once hold an audience in the palm of my hand

Reflections On Super Saturday

There are days of Great Sport and there are Great Sportsdays but very rarely do the 2 come together,Saturday August 4th 2012 was one such day and one that those of us privileged to witness it will ever forget.I have been watching Olympic games World cups etc etc since 1964 but never have I known a day of sport that made me so proud to be British,but it's not just the winning it was the manner of the winning the people who won that made it extra special.

The manner of winning in a way was greater than the winning itself,it was pure sport with all the hype and commercialism stripped away be it the rowers surpassing even the exploits of Bejing the cyclists continuing to astonish us with their brilliance or the athletes living up to or in the case of Greg Rutherford exceeding expectations.
And the people themselves,well a few days ago Colin Moyhihan complained about the majority of medals coming from public school kids,look at yesterday though Colin  and to quote Billy Brag  on Twitter

"Tonight, our society was wonderfully represented by a ginger bloke, an immigrant named Mohammed and a mixed race woman"

In addition we had  rowers from a Comprehensive school a posh public school and a Grammar School and cyclists from mixed backgrounds,but all of them however many silver spoons or lack of them they had in their mouths had one thing in common  a burning desire to be the best at what they did and to win Olympic gold for their country.

A complete representation of our country from all classes and backgrounds gave us that wonderful day yesterday and for that we should be eternally grateful.

But of course where there are winners there have to be losers and there we had possibly the most inspirational moment of the day with Mark Hunter and Zac Purchase in tears in the post match interview apologising for letting everybody down by ONLY winning Olympic Silver,compare and contrast with the attitude of some footballers in South Africa after abject failure in the last World Cup

So to all those who gave us Super Saturday thank you for the joy of all those medals and thatnk you for all the hours of training away from the limelight that you did so that the rest of us could have that truly SUPER DAY.

Bradley & The Olympics

I have had over the past few days had a fair bit of stick for disagreeing with the sudden claims for Sir Bradley Wiggins and a few grumps about the Olympics so I thought it was time I put the record straight on where I stand

Bradley and The Tour De France

Firstly I must make the point that unlike many I have not suddenly been attracted to Le Tour because of the success of Bradley,Cav and Chris Froome but have been an avid follower ever since Channel 4 first took the step of showing regular highlights back in the mid 80's a time when the only British interest was likely to be in the hard work of a lowly Domestique,my heroes back in those days were the likes of Lauren Fignon, Greg Lemond and Stephen Roche and especially in the sprints the Tashkent Terror Djamolidine Abdoujaparov.

I know therefore the enormity of both Cav's winning of the points race and the fact that today Bradley will enter the Champs Elysees wearing the  Maillot Jaune and I hold the guy in total admiration as one of the great British sportsman of this and any other generation.I do however have a problem with the clamour for him to be knighted and that's not a problem with Bradley but with any professional be they a sportsman ,Politician,School dinner lady or whatever in that Knighthoods, MBE's etc etc should be an award  not for Doing Your Job but for going the extra mile (Ian Bothan for Charity work, Jummy Saville for the nights on the ward at Stoke Mandevilleetc or the thousands of unknowns who give up their own time to benefit others and not themselves).
So hopefully i wont be accused of being anti Bradley in the future 

The Olympics 

Anti Olympics per se  I am definitely not having watched them avidly since Tokyo in 1964 but from an early stage I have not been blinded by the fact that although they are the greatest sporting show on earth they are an nd never have been without major problems be that the major drugs problems that existed when the likes of Sharon Davies , Cathy Cook and many others were denied Gold medals because they were competing against the chemically enhanced Eastern Europeans through the politics that meant 3 successive games in Montreal,Moscow and LA were not a true test of who was the best because of assorted politically inspired boycotts through to China that was the last throw of a regime trying to prove that Communism was better than Capitalism .

So we come to London and although I profoundly hope it ends up as a great success and a credit to our country I am not going to jump on the bandwagon that all is perfect for the following reasons.

1) The Torch Relay a great idea of getting the whole country involved and had it been local people,maybe those who deserve  MBE's etc being involved I would have had no problem,but right from the start it became celebrity obsessed with the likes of Beckham,Drogba,Will I Am carrying the torch,people with no connection with the area they ran through and if any connection with the Olympics a very tenuous one.

2) Corporate Sponsorship,now I ma not naive enough to believe that in this day and age we can mange without the big boys  shoving their wares down our throat for the privilege of paying big bucks towards the cost of the games but the Sponsors Roadshow around the torch,the only recently clarified issue of wearing Non Sponsors logo's on your clothing when attending the games and the chosing of a company like Mcdonalds to be the "Official Restaurant " of the games when sport is supposed to sponsor a healthy lifestyle.

3) Locog and the "Olympic Brand" protection,what sort of world are we living in where the owner of the Olympic cafe that's not even in London was forced to change it's name for the duration of the games.

4) G4S well enough said about that complete balls up suffice it to say that millions have been paid to G4S that could have been used to stop the cuts in the army personnel who are now being asked to clean up the mess.

5) Team GB what the hell is that all about we are Great Britain not some American inspired branding of a country 


6) And worst of all the fact we are forced to allow convicted drug cheats to take part (Messrs Chambers & Miller) when we tried to take a stand for decency and were overruled not just by the courts but the IOC themselves in their backing of WADA.


So clarification grump over and I really hope Bradley goes on to add Olympic gold to today's success in Paris and that we come away with a clutch of medals from our home games

Olympic Rejection

In today''s Independent was an article that initially was not surprising in today's nanny state but on further reflection given the people involved became rather confusing.

The article was referring to athletes who have either already missed out on 2012 selection or are likely to do so in the next few weeks and their tirades against their sports governing bodies who are failing to give them support or counselling to help them through these tragic times,those recounting their stories from the last Olympics talked of turning to anti depressants to help them through such terrible rejection.

Now the initial reaction was that these are people in the 18-25 age group who are the first brought up in the “Non Competitive” era whereby everybody wins there are no losers and kiddies get a prize for finishing last so they don’t get looked down upon by the winners. Yes I am starting to sound cynical because these are not 7 year old 's at school sports day we are talking about these are International sportsmen and women who are competing in and around the highest level so should be used to the highs of winning and the lows of losing,they will have known for some time that unless their name was Philips Odowu,Jessica Ennis or Dai Green that there was a possibility that they might not make it so why the bleating now.

Is it a case that the early indoctrination of “No losers” has stayed with them over the years and they feel they have a right to compete in their home Olympics,well that’s life there are winners and losers so instead of moaning about counselling maybe they should think more about Kipling

“If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:

you’ll be a Man, my son! “

A New Musical Revolution Needed

Been watching Punk Britannia over the last few weeks and enjoying an interesting look back at one of the most defining periods in British musical cultural history even though the slagging off of my love of Prog and Rock,”Dinosaurs”, did not go down well but it did make me think that maybe we need a Punk revolution again.

Many of those of a certain age who saw the Jubilee concert will I guess have been saddened by the fayre that was put before us,putting aside the excellent Tom Jones the other oldies,Cliff,Elton & Macca proved little more than the fact that they are well past their sell by date and really need to admit defeat and hand over the mantle to a new generation.

But who are the new generation where are the international mega stars in waiting the Who,Stones,Queen etc who will influence the world of music in the next 20 years,Punk gave us the Pistols,Clash,The Jam and The Dammed all of whom were hugely influential in the years that followed Punk but sadly that type of band no longer appears to be around in the music world.

Now I appreciate that with the Internet and Digital TV mean that we do not see much of the interesting music entertaining many of today's younger music lovers but something needs to be done to get something half decent and potentially influential onto the mainstream in place of the dross that abounds on The Voice,X factor etc etc.

Is it possible or are we doomed to inhabit Simon Cowell world for the rest of our lives,I can only hope that out there somewhere is a new Johnny Rotten,Joe Strummer or Paul Weller that can put a bomb under the music world so that as I sit in the old folks home in years to come I dont have to watch Lord Cowell present X factor series 35 without the ability to hold a knife and slash my wrists

A Letter To Joey Barton

Well Joey you really have excelled yourself this time I mean we already knew you were a complete Neanderthal with a history like this

May 2005 you break someone's leg whilst driving.

March 2007 you are arrested for suspicion of assault on a taxi driver and criminal damage

.May 2008 you get prison for an assault outside McDonald’s

July 2008 you get a suspended sentence for assault and ABH on a team mate, ending your Man City career. You also got charged by the FA for violent conduct.


But Sunday well that was just about the best your team are fighting relegation you are the captain and for once surely you could put your brain dead tendencies to one side and give a performance for the team, but hell why do that only normal human beings behave in such a way.

So let’s give it everything, elbow one player, knee another and try to punch a third just to confirm that you really don't come from the human gene pool.

Well with a bit of luck Joey the FA will ban you for a very long time QPR will rip up your contract and for once football will show it has morals and nobody will employ you so that your worthless hide is never seen on a football pitch again

A Rant Over Childhood Obesity

Now lets get one thing straight first,as all who have known me for many years I am not and never have been Mr Skinny so I am not preaching from the angle of one who has always carried a finely honed physique.

My rant has been triggered by the latest pronouncement from St Jamie bloody Oliver who now want cookery taught in schools as the panacea for that greatest of today's ills obesity,well Jamie (sorry Sir Jamie doffs cap in the presence of the all knowing) cookery may be a great idea so that in later life yo9u dont get people living on take aways but the answer to obesity and it should be bloody obvious in this Olympic year is SPORT & EXCERSISE.

Let me go back to my school days when PE and games were compulsory,when we were forced on X Country runs through muddy woods next to estates whose local Neanderthals would happily beat up a Grammar School kid,when on school sports day even those of us who could not even spell running had to take part in the athletics and look pretty crap at it.Appalling you might say that must scar a child for life,well no because it made you look for a sport you were good at in my case swimming and Table tennis that got me out of X Country etc so that PE and Games periods were actually enjoyable.

Now onto out of school and this is where parents have to take all the blame,kids sat in front of computers or the TV eating take aways and TV dinners,sorry you idle gits but get of your arses and get your kids down to the park or a walk along the canal etc etc get them exercising and when you get back don't go via McDonald's or the chippy get the cook book out and do a Bolognaise or a Chilli or anything that actually contains something nourishing rather than just fat,and you don't need cookery lessons to teach you to do that

And finally the good old government,well governments actually all of you who have sold off school playing fields brought in H&S and Human Rights legislation that means the little darlings can cry of sports because it might upset them well pull your finger out and make sport of some sort compulsory,and if that means getting ain aerobics or Zumba teachers or whatever give the kids options but make them do sport so that just maybe in this Olympic yeart we can start doing something to help fat kids be a bit less fat

What Are The Press doing About Football's Cheats

So today’s question is are her majesty's sporting gutter press and the audio and visual media doing their jobs in attacking the wrongdoings in the nations favourite game,well of course the answer is a big resounding NO.

Over the weekend the cancer that is diving has reached new levels of absurdity with the pathetic actions of to name just 2 Adam Lalana of Southampton and Ashley Young of Manchester Utd so this morning we can expect all areas of the press to be attacking these and other cheats with an enormous avenging zeal.

Well we could but no we get pages and minutes droning on about the pathetic but basically harmless child that is Mario Ballotelli and of course the usual easy option of slagging off the referees comes out in sound and print.

What makes it worse is the fact that vested interests have the media to have their biased say, for example former cricketer Ronnie Irani on Talk Sport radio who is a rabid Utd fan and would defend them even if Fergie were videoed rogering the Queen and yet his bias is allowed to dominate the airways in the morning.

So where are the journalists and broadcasters of courage who will stand up against cheating who will stop droning on about There was contact” when a tap softer than a butterflies wing beat causes a player to fall as if shot where are our attack dogs of the press and media who are going to force clubs,the FA and the leagues to do something about cheats.

Well sadly they appear not to exist with one notable exception,Stan Collymore former bad boy footballer has realised what is wrong with the game and on Twitter and Talk Sport is vehement in his condemnation of cheats,he is however a voice crying in the wilderness until the cowards that inhabit our press boxes decide to put their heads above the parapets and join him.

And if and when they do we may stand a chance of getting back the game we used to love

Is Messi The Greatest Ever

The Stellar performance against Leverkuesen the other night has lead to more discussion over who is the greatest footballer ever and has  Lionel Messi attained that title or is he close to getting there,I have listened to many discussions about this over the years and have always dismissed any pretenders to that title because of my love for the great Pele especially as part of the great Brazilian side of 1970.
However I am beginning to reconsider based on the stunning performances of the little man who lights up football grounds wherever he plays and does so in such an unassuming manner and with a smile on his face,maybe he needs to turn it on in a World Cup but even if Argentina fail to win a World Cup with him if he continues to perform at club level as he has over the past few years then shere consistant brilliance will I think elevate him to greatness,lets face it Pele never played n a cauldron of European League football so we dont know how he would have faired.

Re other contenders
Maradonna,well  will never consider him amongst the greats not because of the Hand Of God but because of regular cheating and the drugs

Best European Johan Cruyff by a mile not only for the 1974 World Cup but also the seasons of dominance at Ajax

Best briton well George Best never forget how he used to tear my beloved Wolves to shreds every year in the 60's

Best Englishman Bobby Moore probably the greatest defender I have ever seen and maybe of all time although my dad always said that had he lived Duncan Edwards would have eclipsed them all

What Shall We Teach In School Today

Two articles in today's Observer caught my eye and rather made me weep for the British education system and the future of our youngsters

Firstly on the front page we have the Amy Winehouse Foundation and parents of other kids who died in a haze of illegal substances calling for Drug and Alcohol awareness classes to be made compulsory i8n schools

Secondly the fact that Maths is now so radically different to what it was little more than 20 years ago that even well educated parents are having to get hold of Maths Dictionaries to be able to help there kids even with Primary School maths.

With regard to the first point I have great sympathy for those who have lost loved ones to the evils of drugs but sorry the school is not the place to educate kids about the dangers of such substances that’s still the responsibility of the parents like mine did with me and I have done with mine,whatever you do some kids will always go off the rails.

And may I also ask where the time will be found to teach such things,its only a few weeks ago that we were talking about Driving Lessons in school,add to that the fact that the school day is a good 20-% shorter than “When I Were a Lad” and where will the time be found to teach kids important subjects like Maths.

Ah yes maths now may I say that I was rubbish at maths at school but was still able by knuckling down to be able to help my kids with maths at least when they were at Primary School,so what is this latest version of maths that is so complex,are we teaching Euclidean Geometry to 6 year olds or Integral calculus in nursery?

My heart bleeds for kids today so called experts change the curriculum on a whim so that the kids from one generation to the next see no continuity in their education and parents arrive at a situation like this where helping their children prosper at school is a virtual impossibility.

I know I'm a dinosaur but how about a return to the basics otherwise the generations of dysfunctional jobless kids turning to illegal substances because they have nothing else to do will blight this country for a very long time.

Footballs Finances Ignored

A few days ago in my ramblings about the Wolves manager saga I alludeed to the finances within football and how I hoped Wolves would not be stupid enough to follow the same road as Portsmouth and end up in serious mire,well at the time I was just alluding to Portsmouth and Rangers but the past 24 hours have seen the spectre of administration plus transfer embargo's and possible points deductions hanging over Birmingham,Coventry and Port Vale,and those are the ones we know about.

What stupefies me as more and more clubs head down the slippery soap proving that unless you have a mega rich owner speculating to accumulate in today's climate is a seriously dangerous game and yet club after club are heading down that route seemingly hell bent on destruction.
Both Huddersfield and Sheffield Wednesday sitting in top 6 positions in League 1 have sacked their managers in the hope of attaining the immediate Grail of the Championship by a knee jerk reaction to a few defeats, but at what cost,paying off the contracts of Messrs Clarke and Megson would not have been cheap and no doubt the new contracts of Simon Grayson (What was his payoff from Leeds) and Dave Jones will be substantial.

So what if it goes wrong ,I mean there are only 2 spots available unless Charlton have the mother of all collapses and there are other clubs in and around these 2 and no guarantee of promotion and the increased riches that await,I dont see both going up and would not be at all surprised to see the failure in financial difficulty by this time next year along with a good many others.


Of course all this carries on to a backdrop of the top players earning in a year what would be the full budget of many clubs in the lower reaches,hey ho funny game football

Hey Lets Slag Off Parker & Pearce

So the new era of England has started and for once I was really looking forward to watching an England match, none of the serial failures of the Golden Generation with the exception of Gerard

and my apologies for being a Little Englander but a manager who can actually speak English.

At the end we lost but I liked what I saw an number of players who looked comfortable at international level and in Scott Parker a captain who lead by example ,i know the Dutch were way ahead in technical ability but this is a side with real world class players who have played together for many years so you would expect that.

So what do we get today,a hatchet job not by the papers as we might expect but by Talk Sport radio (Stan Collymore a notable exception, ,yes the same station that come major tournaments are demanding we get behind the national team doing a complete hatchet job on Stuart Pearce and the Scott Parker. Shat did they do wrong well they are not Steven Gerard or Harry Redknapp,yes that's the same Steven Gerard who has not done it for England for years despite doing it on a regular basis for his club and the Redknapp that is the media darling who will help us take over the world.

Now I am in favour of Harry Redknapp getting the job but for a supposed patriotic Englishman I am nor happy with the comments coming from him and from around him that he has to think about the Spurs fans and club,well sorry I am a patriotic Englishman and would walk over hot coals even if I were on the verge of taking Wolves to a European Cup final,at least Stuart Pearce whatever his limitations as a manger has made himself available for his country if needed.

The Wolves Manager Saga

Anybody with even a passing interest in football has no doubt looked at the events going on around Molineux over the past couple of weeks and wondered quite what sort of a mess Wolves have got themselves into,in essence I would agree with that sentiment especially as days went by and more managers seemed to be queuing up to turn Wolves down.

My initial reaction to the appointment of Terry Connor was one of ,If they were going to do that why not do it at the start rather than the end of the 2 weeks? however comments made in the Media,on Twitter and from friends with an ear to the ground around Molineux have made me re-evaluate my initial thoughts.

If the rumours are to be believed a number of the managers linked with the Wolves job have been asking silly money to take on the task or making unreasonable demands about terms,transfer policy and kitty's etc and to be honest I am rather proud of Morgan and Moxey for not caving in to demands such as these just to have an easy life.

But what has really annoyed me since the Connor appointment has been the reaction of many fans on Twitter and radio phone ins,comments such as

We should pay the going rate

No ambition they refused to promise millions to be spend on players

What chance do we have with players ONLY on 20-30K per week at the club.

I think these comments and others like them show that many fans do not really understand football at the start of the second decade of the 21st century,Rangers fans wanted players on big money and managers paid the going rate,Portsmouth did the same and look where they are now and how many others are fast heading that way at all levels of football (Dartlington & Kettering for those who like me follow Non League football.

At the end of the day Terry Connor may be a bad appointment ,although yesterday was a good start,but at least Wolves will be solvent, and don’t come back with the "But they will lose4 £30Mill from Sky",that’s not guaranteed and Portsmouth were hocked up to the eyeballs relying on Sky money until it all went pear shaped.

I wish Terry Connor good luck and say thanks to Steve Morgan and Jez Moxey for at least putting the long term financial future of the club ,whatever division that be in,ahead of short term appeasement of the fans and the media.

Suarez And Dalgleish Drag Liverpool Down

I don't think any of us expected the events of yesterday at Old Trafford prior to the Utd v Liverpool game,i mean even in Suarez still hated Evra for his 8 match ban and all that went on around it surely the Liverpool management would have drummed it into him to shake hands and move on ,well it appears not.

The first reaction is not really one of surprise because Louis Suarez has form from his time at Ajax and we all saw the unsporting reaction during the Ghana match after his sending off during the last world cup but then you wonder is he just a nasty piece of work who ignored all that was said to him or have Liverpool as a club under the leadership of Kenny Dalgleish really started to lose the plot?

Well looking at the interview on Sky Sports after the match and his reaction to the questions (I did not see it) I think says it all and for whatever reason Dalgleish and Liverpool have adopted a siege mentality,pulled up the drawbridge and somehow management to put the most hated club in the country,man Utd, in the right,for god sake I found myself agreeing with Fergie last night.

What makes it worse is that the Liverpool fans who,back in the 70's & 80's were the most admired and respected in the land appear to have adopted this "Our players and managers can do no wrong" attitude and adding themselves to the unpopularity bandwagon.
What was really sad about this blinkered attitude was encapsulated listening to ex player Talk Sport pundit and professional Scouser Micky Quinn on the radio just defending Suarez,saying he was not obligated to shake Evra's hand and to move on and talk about the match.

So once again on a Sunday morning those of us who love the game and it's history are sitting here and weeping for the way it has once again been dragged into the gutter

Do Journalists Really Want England To Fail

There has been a train of thought for a few years now that the football journalists would rather the England football team fail rather than succeed as it creates better headlines and helps sell more papers,well I have never really subscribed to that view until this week.

It's not the sacking of Capello ,he was a dead man walking after 2010's pathetic display  at the World Cup and should have gone then ,rather its the appalling story in the Sun accusing the caretaker England manager Stuart Pearce of racism.

Now the story has been around for a while and dates pack to words said to Paul   in 1994,18 years ago,Pearce apologised Ince accepted that apology and the world moved on,so what the hell are the Sun doing  plastering across the front pages as if it had happened yesterday with no mention that it was an event from history and insinuating that in addition to John Terry England had another  major rascism problem within their football team.

Ok you may say it's the Sun yet another News International rag that should have been closed down at the same time as the News Of The World and that was my initial reaction,what has really worried me though is the reaction of other well respected journalists who have either said nothing or in a couple of cases supported the right of the Sun to publish the story in the way they did.I have challenged a number of journalists via Twitter to condem the story and the way it was presented but to no avail.

So it appears that anything England related is fair game and if the peoples choice and the darling of the majority of the press Harry Redknapp takes the job you can guarantee that at the first chance Her majesty's Gutter Press will look to bring him down and take great relish in doing so with whatever dirty trick they feel like using

Whatever Happened To Dukla Prague

Well not just Dukla Prague but also many other teams from Europe in my youth,I remember my team Wolves and others playing such sides as the aforementioned Dukla Prague buit also the likes of Carl Zeiss Jena,Academica Coimbra,ADO Den Hague etc etc.

So what is the point of the reminiice well it's just that every year in the current Champions league even in the group stages it's pretty much the same teams year after year,I mean back in the 80's we had Forest v Malmo in a European Cup Final we had Red Star Belgrade winning the dammeed thing but now its the same old crew time after time.

Now i know that the money feeds the same clubs year after year and the Champions League is dominant but I do feel sorry for fans today who because of ther lack of the interest in the Europa League and the demise of the Cup Winners Cup see only the "Big" names of Europe and see them year in and out rather than the variety of foreign opposition that was around in my youth

Photographic Names From The Past

There was an article on BBC Breakfast yesterday about the demise of many high street stores that those of us of a certain age remember ,names such as Rumbleows,C&A and of course Woolworths are long gone,then today comes the news that Kodak are staring at the abyss and may be gone from our conciousness in the not to distant future.

So the combination of those 2 got me thinking about the names from the photographic industry around when I first dipped my toe in the water some 36 years ago,its just a list but those of you with an interest in this hobby may find it brings back a few memories

Chinon-My first ever SLR was a Chinon CE-4 and was a Dixons (remember them) own brand strangely enouugh Kodak bought them out in 1997 so they are on the way out as well

Minolta-Yes we all know that Minolta or Konica Minolta asa they were at the time were taken over by the mighty Sony corporation but Sony on a camera jusr doesn''t cut it like Minolta used to

Soligor- One of those numerous manufacturers or maybe just labellers of lenses that abounded in the 1960's & 70's and the reason I remember them is that I still have one of their lenses that with a cheap adapter I fit on my modern DSLR and still use

Kiev,Zorki,Fed & Zenith- The wonderful machines of the former soviet union that many of us cut our teeth on in the world of SLR's and rangefinders,god they were industrial and primitive and quality control was often in short supply in the soviet camera industry but if you got a good one well they were cheap and cheerfull and gave pretty good results.

So 30 years from now what will we be reminiscing about in the photographic world,Nikon,Pentax well you never know.

A Live Premiership match

Yesterday I was invited to go to the Hawthorns to go and watch the WBA v Norwich City match from the pleasant surroundings of corporate hospitality and a very pleasamnt experience it was with good food and company

The match however was a totally different kettle of fish,this was the first time in probably 6 years that I had experienced a live Premiership match and I was obviously going to compare it with the West Midlands League fare that I watch every week.Well what a dissapointmernt,if this is the top level of English football I am glad that I dont waste my hard earned cash on it every week,the standard of passing was atrocious from both sides there aws a total lack of passion and committment and unlike the WML the EPL appears to be a non physical contact league.

Now you may accuse me of bias as a Wolves fan at the home of our greatest rivals but my critisisms apply to Norwich just as much as to Albion,this was not something I would want to watch every week and i am so glad that I became associated with AFC Wulfrunians so that I am able to watch proper football each Saturday.

Two other points when Albion went 2-1 down with 15 minutes still left I was amased at the mass exodus of home fans,surely they should stay to encourage their team to get an equaliser and maybe go on to win the game,and secondly can somebody buy Alan Shearer a watch because on Match  Of The day he said the Norwich winner was 3-4 minutes from the end,well as i stated earlier it was 15 minutes,11 minutes normal time and 4 miinutes injury time,now that's just sloppy broadcasting

English Football Back To The 70's

No I'm not talking about the tackling I'm on about the sexism and racism  that appear to have raised their ugly heads over the past few months.

Firstly we had the Andy Grey scenario and the number of pro's who couldn't see what was wrong with that and now Paul Jewell and his Neanderthal comments after last night's defeat at Blues.

Then of course there is the Suarez,Terry and god knows how many more on Twitter comments that appears to show that the racism that was prevalent throughout the game in the past has never gone away despite the Kick It Out campaign but has just been laying dormant for a while.

So  is it that football is a working class game and whilst the intellectual elite have bitten the bullet and abandoned the old attitudes (Although Diane Abbott needs to hold her hands up) whilst it has simmered in the background of the average football fan and the attitudes of Grey and Suarez have given them the chance to resurrect their long dormant prejudices.

Scholes & Henry

Much has been made of the return of these 2 icons to their respective teams and no doubt the waves of nostalgia burn brightly in the hearts of Manchester Utd and Arsenal fans,now I am not going down the route of its all hype and they are past it more along the lines of what does it say about the state of the Premier League.

We are given to understand that this is the best league in the world with all the best players (I will just say La Liga) but at least there should be squads awash with quality and yet out of 25 squad members Utd cannot find a decent midfield without resorting to the recall of a retired player and Arsenal's forwards in the absense of RVP need a player who has been playing in a pub league.

Now I may be proven wrong and both players may roll back the years for a final glorious swansong but maybe the managers,and I dont just include Ferguson and Wenger in this,need to be honest about the dross they are buying that forces these drastic actions.
Lets face it Chamaq,ArshavinCarrick and many others either never did or no longer set the world on fire,Premier League teams at full strength may be superb but take a few starters out and even Moneybags City look to be a bit threadbare.

Hate Amongst Football Fans

Listening to Talk Sport on the way home last night I was saddened by some of the comments that were flying around in the wake of the Suarez/Evra affair,Liverpool and Utd fans phoning in and texting confirming that basic rivalry between the 2 clubs is a thing of the past and that its now gone way beyond that to a vile hatred that I have never witnessed in football before.

As a Wolves fan of nearly 50 years I grew up in Dudley equidistent between Molineux and the Hawthorns so that everywhere there were Wolves and Albion fans and although there was major rivalry the hatred that now abounds between Liverpool and Utd never reard it's ugly head,I mean Liverpool and Manchester are miles apart.

So what has caused this situation that to my mind has only existed in the UK before in the sectarian divisions of Glasgow,well to be honest my initial reaction was that it's Utd and their arrogance during the Premier League ear especially with the baiting of Liverpool  over the 19th league title,a situation that never occurred during the 80's when Liverpool were not only dominant but admired and respected by the majority of neutrals but is that to simplistic? Well at the risk of upsetting many friends who are Utd fans I dont think it is but the Suarez affair and the attitude of Liverpool FC and many of their fans in the wake of that  has exasserbated it to the extent that  we now have a situation where the next match between the 2 is a powder keg waiting to explode and the authorities have a real problem on their hands in about 5 weeks time.

All I can hope is that these attitudes stay at either end of the East Lancs Road and do not infiltrate the rest of football.

What Is The Obsession With Rotation

The current obsession with rotating players really reached it's peak (Or Nadir) over the New Year weekend with the performances of the 2 Manchester clubs in playing well below strength sides and suffering the consequences but why oh why do they and so many others do it.

Now the initial reaction will be "Well it's all these foreigners over here init" but is that the case,from what I understand the continental teams don't have  thev same obsession,in fact last week Barcelona played 90% of their fist team in the 8 goal win over a 3rd division side in the cup,a fixture that would have had Fergie or Wenger playing the tea lady in central midfield.

So it must be the huge number of games we play over here well tell that to Lionel Messi who has played more than 50 games in each of the last 3 seasons and he didn't look tired at Wembley as he took Man Utd apart in the Champions League final,in comparison Wayne Rooney has played on average 8 games less per season over the same period.

To be honest I think we have to blame 3 men, Arsene Wenger Claudio Ranieri (The Tinkerman) and Rafael Benitez who really popularised the rotation system and seemed to sell it to the rest of the Premier League who used the excuses of fixture congestion tired players etc to embrace it.But has it been of benefit well England's players don't seem any fresher at the end of each season and the weekends results show that it has driven the common sense approach of getting the match won before you give your top players a rest into the bushes.

Back in the "Good old day's" of the 60's, 70's & 80's players turned out week after week on pretty awful pitches and never complained about being tired and yet we won more European trophies and the England team did no worse internationally than today's well rested internationals.
So will a manger be brave enough to start his best side each week because if they did I have a sneaking suspicion that the rotation policy would soon be shown up for the myth that it really is