Yes, I know I’m a serial F1 abuser, I’m not ashamed of that and nor am I at the bleeding edge of motorsport critique. But whilst a critic I am not a hater of the formula other than in as much as it is far less than it ought to be. So Ron Dennis not only engineers great cars but results as well? So hands up everyone who’s surprised by this? Let me just have a quick count here, that will be, er, no one. This is what successful businessmen do, it’s what defines them. Clearly Dennis didn’t expect anyone to be surprised otherwise he would have kept his gob shut and no one would have been any the wiser, Hamilton knows how many beans make five and that he is tied very securely to Dennis as he has been closely involved with Hamilton’s career progression for years, so he was never going to squeal. Alonso won the race so where is the margin on him upsetting the apple cart? It’s Dennis who has made an error in judgement by assuming, with adequate justification, that the FIA had accepted it’s role as overseers of a business and not a sport. Let’s be clear here, what Dennis did was take a pragmatic and rational business management decision. Is this not the same modus operandi as that of the FIA in going to Monaco every year? As a race it’s an exercise in low gear, high RPM impotence but generates huge revenue for the FIA.

With Champ Car, and it’s single supplier regime of Honda engines and Panoz chassis’, treading on F1’s European toes with the announcement of races at Zolder and Assen, F1 and the FIA needs to look once again at it’s principles; are they to be sporting or business?

but a good and efficient victory today in the cricket. The worst defeat suffered in WI cricket history is noteworthy but does need to be qualified, Chanderpaul and Sarwen absent and with the ball not swinging to any significant degree in the first test, the lack of preparation for the conditions they found themselves dealing with at Headingly has bitten them big style. ‘Harmison; not at his best’ still in evidence but looking more relaxed about his work and contributing and must surely be the greatest beneficiary if Alan Donald is going to have an impact as bowling coach. We did not allow any meaningful partnerships to be established, even the Moreton/Bravo partnership was not significant in the context of the position at the time. Got to give props to Moores/Vaughan/Graveney for the selection of Sidebottom and have to admit that I’m not sure he would have appeared under the Fletcher regime. At the moment the WI team looks less than the sum of it’s parts and even if it does put it all together is still not going to go down in history as a great team but whilst the batting lineup appears fairly strong, when the two above, are playing the bowling attack looks much of a muchness on English wickets, no spinner in evidence and no one to swing the ball to a significant degree.

If we can just get the temperature down by another couple of degrees for Old Trafford then we’ll be in the box seat.

Congratulations to Derby County on their victory this afternoon. The Premiership beckons and they will grace the division. This elevation does no more than reflect the quality of the game seen this afternoon, so once again, congratulations and welcome to the Scottish Premiership. What, don’t tell me nobody informed you that unless you vaguely resemble a Premiership side then it’s up and away to the likes of Kilmarnock and Inverness Caledonian Thistle and other stalwarts or the SPL and if you think that’s bad then consider how you’ll feel if you get relegated!!

Yes, I know it’s uncharitable and I should probably stop watching English football because I have a very jaundiced view of it but the thud and blunder on view this afternoon was dire and served only to emphasise the chasm between the top two divisions. This is not news but it is sad, in particular for those, and there will be many, who put out a huge effort this afternoon and will play little or no part in next season’s campaign in the Premiership. If they do play then Derby County’s directorship has taken the view that they will take the money and descend like a lead balloon back into the championship for the following season. It could be that they believe they have a plan to take the money for going up and the parachute payments for going back down again and be better prepared for their next tilt and the Premiership, but as they say, ‘the road to hell is paved with good intentions’. And if they do spend the money then they will acquire a bunch of mercenaries, they know who they are, who will have no affinity for the shirt and, in failing to keep them up, in all likelihood, will then bugger off to their next short term contract.

What was seen today was the most valuable club game in world football, so they say, and it was played by players with limited or still to be developed gifts for the game, so it’s probably unreasonable to expect an entertaining game overall. But that being said there really ought to have been at least a couple of individual performances suggesting the capability to play at a higher level, but I saw no evidence of such.

Was just watching the Indy 500 (Go Dario!!) on Sky and, inevitably every 6 minutes and 13 seconds or so, an advert break comes around so I start to wander from the room, having noted the start of an advert for some optician, didn’t note who which probably means I watch too much TV as I seem to be well on the way to advanced advert filtration capability. But just as I’m leaving I hear some talking head seemingly suggesting that the essential service offered by this optician was the making available of many designer frames?! Now I’m a curmudgeonly, middle aged fart, I don’t deny it, I rejoice in it, at least at times, but I don’t visit the optician in order to obtain a pair of Tommy Hilfiger frames and then try to persuade the ophthalmologist to lob some glass in them, call me a Neanderthal but there it is. No, what I want is an accurate prescription for the differing capabilities of each eye and after that a lens that ensures that the vast majority of my field of vision is viewed through that lens, anything after that is trivia. As a road user I do not want a bunch of bozos on the roads looking cool in their Red or Dead frames unable to see their hand in front of their face let alone find their over stylised arse with both hands. Long gone are the days of NHS specs from the 60’s which utilised the minimum amount of plastic coated wire to hold a circular lens but we have surely gone way too far on the form vs. function curve in favour of the former.

Congratulations on your century today. Must admit I have only seen the highlights on Sky but it looks like a very well crafted piece of work and reminiscent of 2000/2001, I think, when you were ranked No.1 batsman, scored a mountain of runs and were as dominant as Ponting is today. This was one of the few times in England cricket of the recent past when I believed opposition bowlers expected to concede long runs if they couldn’t get you early. We have had good batsmen in the past, and currently, but some could be at the crease all day and still only have 70-80 runs, the likes of Boycott, Tavare et al. Then we had aggressive batsmen like Botham and today Flintoff & Pietersen who could be ferocious but always the bowlers have a chance. I hope you can return to this form, or something approaching it, but I feel that you are a little irked that anyone could suggest that you may not. Maybe not even show enough form to hold down a place. But now the runs are in the book, everything else is just conversation and another couple of decent scores will have people eating their words faster than shit through a goose. But it is only runs that will do this, no amount of dazzling captaincy will still wagging tongues, the days of carrying a passenger, no matter how good a captain, are gone.

Just in case you think we’ve forgotten and you haven’t been checking over your shoulder so much recently, we’re still here and the number is still 180 minutes of competitive football. Tonight’s B international doesn’t count, just in case panic was starting to set in, I think the B team can take care of Albania, although I wouldn’t be so confident if it were the ‘A’ team taking them on.

How about a football definition of irony; David Beckham rocks up and becomes the one who, at least temporarily, extracts McLaren’s metaphorical gonads from the wringer? I saw no great need to drop Beckham after the World Cup, a new manager had come in and could dictate what was expected from him, he was playing for a top club in a competitive league. But no I see equally little value in recalling him except to attempt to extent the above number beyond 180. In the season leading up to the finals, assuming we qualify, Beckham will have been playing a full season in a mediocre league and with the best work ethnic in the world I find it hard to believe that he will have been able to retain the condition he has now. If McLaren believes that he is in for the long haul he needs to go with what he’s got and make it work, that’s what an international manager does, ask Sven, he’ll tell you. Er, hang on, maybe Laurie Sanchez’s phone number would be more useful.

So we have now had the first showpiece event at the new Wembley and it seems to have been quite fitting; a cookie cutter game for a cookie cutter stadium. I have seen the stadium from a distance and it appears reasonably impressive but solely due to the form over function mechanism for closing the roof. To the casual observer, that’ll be me, the TV pictures today could have come from any modern stadium, Emirates, Old Trafford, The Millennium Stadium, etc, etc. I appreciate that it is not practical, nor desirable, for a stadium to be designed with a TV audience in mind, however the new version of Wembley signally fails to convey the grandeur of the late, lamented original. And so to the appropriate nature of the match, as two of the finest teams in Europe (as I’m sure they would wish to be billed, although I haven’t checked, Fergie hasn’t been answering his cellphone for the last couple of hours) thrashed around in the middle of what seemed a congested midfield to very little effect. How big is the playing surface compared to the old version, I certainly don’t recall space ever being so limited in previous Wembley finals? If the fans found it an improvement over the previous incarnation then fair enough but as a home to a national team, seemingly in need of inspiration over and above that of just pulling on the shirt, it appears somewhat lacking.

So to the cricket; when is it that we are going to play a test match without the doppelganger ‘Harmison; not at his best’ putting in an appearance? Yes he had to bowl more than expected following Hoggard’s injury but still only 22 overs and they were spread far and wide, often before encountering a bat. So what are we to make of the many pundits avowed claim that he needs overs under his belt? Still in a good position but that will only remain the case if we get the WI innings wrapped up in short order tomorrow.

Brown is going to face a challenger it would seem but I don’t see John McDonnell playing David Cameron to Golden Brown’s David Davies, which may cause a little consternation amongst the bookmaking fraternity. However the likely coronation of Golden as the next president does remind me of the comment of a basketball coach in the U.S. On hearing that he had been fired and replaced by his assistant coach, he remarked along the lines, ‘our team has been in the tank all season and I’ve been sitting on the bench next to the man with the answers all along?!?’

I enjoy watching motorsport in general so I was quite happy to have a reason to give F1 another look, and Lewis Hamilton provided that excuse. And whilst it’s good, from a nationalistic perspective, to see him getting results, the overall perspective is the same as ever; a two hour yawn, briefly interrupted by a pitstop or a mechanical casualty. The time was that Schumacher was blamed for making races into a precession but in the first four races, how many overtaking moves have been made between the MacLarens and the Ferraris? The only interesting action occurs between the stiffs below the top six to eight places. Hamilton seems capable of taking advantages of such opportunities as arise but they are few and far between and he seems to have the ability, even with his limited experience at this level, to make very few himself. Clearly the construction, capabilities and systems of the cars dictate that there is no beneficial margin for trying to operate the car outside of clearly defined parameters and a driver is put in a car to operate it strictly within these clearly defined limits. If you are not prepared to do this then you don’t get the seat, certainly not in a competitive car. So, sadly, I suspect that Hamilton will just prove to be just another F1 clone, albeit an extremely capable and British one, but a clone nevertheless. And if I continue to watch it will be, as I am watching it now, on fast forward.

And I will make no apology for suggesting a comparison be made between today’s F1 race and the World Superbike race from Monza. Yes, it was the same faces at the front of the race, but these were Bayliss on a Ducati, Biaggi on a Suzuki, Toseland and Rolfo on Hondas, Corser and Haga on Yamahas, the fastest time in practice, but not Superpole, was set by Laconi on a Kawasaki and Xaus has already won this season on a year old Ducati. Many would have made a case for any of these to win at least one of the races, how many would have suggested the winner of the F1 race would not be driving a Ferrari or a MacLaren?

How has it come to the position whereby you see the wheels out of line more often on a 200 bhp, two wheeled machine than on a 800 bhp four wheeled machine? I understand that they are different and can be enjoyed for what they are, but where does the greater enjoyment lie, in seeing a rider putting forth all his skills on a bike or seeing a car circulating, without a wheel getting out of line, with only a helmet on show from the outside to suggest that there is any human intervention in the process? I don’t know what the answer is for F1 but it remains in need of them now just as much as it did anytime during the Schumacher reign.

I think I maybe carrying something, and it seems to be infectious. It’s not biological, nor is it a computer virus, could be some new strain of nasty and I seem to transmit it to everything containing anything vaguely technological. In the past few months we have had to buy new a freezer, washing machine, TV will need attention soon, computer (and still got another two in need of repair or replacement and another seemingly on it’s last legs), mouse and my sat nav went tits up in the middle of London yesterday, that made for a fun day. I use the sat nav almost every day for work and need to replace it by Monday so going to have to pay through the nose for it and get one from the High Street. Don’t think the usual anti-virals are going to be too effective, guess I just keep taking the nicotine.

Not seeing as much Ice Hockey as I would like, not helped by the crappy signal I get for Five and the piss poor DVD recorder referred to previously (that’ll be the one manufactured by Philips Piss Poor Products) doesn’t help a great deal either, but that’s by the by. I do get a podcast by a guy who rejoices in the sobriquet of Millian who has some interesting views on the game, for anyone so inclined you can find his site here;

http://www.bluelinetalkradio.com/alt/

In his latest he retells a rumour which I would find very disappointing if implemented. The present situation in the NHL post season is that if a game is tied at the end of regulation, well the players just have to suck it up and keep going until someone scores, however long it takes. I think the longest so far this season is four periods of sudden death overtime, that’s 120+ minutes whereas the regulation game is 60 minutes and this is by no means a record. Now, not being a hockey player myself, I regard this as the way to settle a game, no shoot outs, no replays, you keep dragging your ass over the ice until it’s done. But according to the aforementioned Millian there might be moves afoot to bring this to an end. This cannot be allowed to happen, it is one of the most engaging features of post season hockey. I understand that is screws the TV schedule, but what else are you going to watch??

I was up last night, primarily to watch some of the Moto GP but I also was aware that the most lucrative fight in history was going to be on as well, so, from time to time, I had a look. It was crap. Ian Darke, who’s usually a decent commentator, maybe his contract is due for renegotiation, thought it was exciting and Jim Watt toned it down a bit, he thought it was ‘interesting’. I thought it was rank mediocrity. If this offering had been broadcast from some small provincial hall and been put on by a couple of journeymen it would have been acknowledged as no more than an ordinary bout. But as Sky had been pimping for weeks it had to be spun as a great fight, in contradiction of everything on view. de la Hoya wasn’t powerful enough to slow down Mayweather or quick enough to cut him off and make it into a brawl. Mayweather wasn’t good enough to penetrate de la Hoya’s defence when he was pot shotting on the move. The meaningful punches landed by both fighters could be counted on the fingers of both hands. Stopped watching after about the 10th, don’t know who won, don’t care. I have the greatest of respect for anyone who gets in a boxing ring and I don’t begrudge either of them their pay day, just don’t come calling again.

There’s been a bereavement. My rodent has died, it was a cute little thing, not even two years old, not much of a life I guess. One moment scampering around just the same as usual, next time I come back to it, no movement at all. Frankly I blame the kids, they never really looked after it, it was out all the time, got covered in food, often when I got home from work I would have to clean it, I hoped that this demonstration of dedication would result in them taking better care of it, but what’s done is done and there’s no going back now. But the consumer society being what it is I’ll just go and get another I suppose. Really can’t be dealing with the one I have on my desktop now, it has a wire attached! How nineteen eighties is that? Looking at a Logitech MX Revolution I think this time, should hook up with the existing receiver for the cordless keyboard and in no time at all my previous rodent will not even be a fleeting memory. Sic transit gloria mundi.

…. at the risk of appearing to be somewhat misinformed and reactionary, I believe I heard on the news that a paedophile who had been abusing boys below the age of 16 has been jailed for 5½ years. Not a minimum term, so that means that he’ll be out in 3, and whilst I really do hesitate to assume knowledge of the thought processes of someone with this inclination, it strikes me that had Lucifer popped up on the shoulder of this individual 30 years ago and said ‘here’s the deal Jack, you get your way with these boys for the next thirty years and then have to spend 3 years in jail, what’s it going to be, deal or no deal?’, I beg to suggest that someone already harbouring such inclinations would sign up in a New York minute. I don’t know if the Attorney General is looking to appeal this or what the reaction of the victims is but this does not appear, at least on the face of it, to be appropriate punishment nor serve as anything resembling a deterrent to such behaviour.