quantumofsport.com

BEING BELGIAN: It’s sometimes difficult to keep things in perspective!

Well well well, what have we got here then. Ask many of Belgium’s imports what are the advantages of living in a country that put the crisis into banking and they will undoubtedly extol the proximity of Amsterdam and Paris. Well (well well), Paris might have something to sing about but Amsterdam, ha!, doesn’t even make it into the top ten of the world’s most important cities. Whereas Brussels is sixth, according to the completely reliable and beyond dispute Knight Frank World Cities Survey. Based on four parameters - economic activity, political power, knowledge, and quality of life - Brussels blows the opposition away with its political power. It is fair to say that the majority of the wealth and power associated with being THE WORLD’S SIXTH MOST IMPORTANT CITY is not concentrated in the western Brussels suburb of Anderlecht. It, on the other hand, has the honour of being a part of town in which there are riots between supporters of the football club and the people who actually live there. Salubrious it is not. In footballing terms, however, it is THE domestic powerhouse. 29 titles and counting, this week it took a giant step toward number 30 by defeating Zulte Waregem 6 – 0. A real power play.

Results and table of world’s greatest cities below. League table - remember that this week the play-offs started so unless you have a PhD please do not attempt to understand what the hell is going on - here.

Play-offs 1
Sint Truiden 0 – 0 Club Brugge
KV Kortrijk 1 – 2 AA Gent
Anderlecht 6 - 0 Zulte Waregem

Play-offs 2
Standard 2 – 0 Charleroi

The world’s top 10 cities in 2010:
1 New York
2 London
3 Paris
4 Tokyo
5 Los Angeles
6 BRUSSELS (Get in!)
7 Singapore
8 Berlin
9 Peking
10 Toronto

DEAR BERNIE: re Australian GP 2010 – Button brilliance signals end of ‘Team Hamilton’

Counterfeit correspondence from a (parallel) F1 universe...

Dear Bernie,

I’m sure you would agree with me when I say that the Australian Grand Prix produced a truly enthralling spectacle. I make no apology for hyperbole. Helped by the rain, this was Formula 1 at its very best: laying bare both the performance of machine and the soul of man. In a single stroke, Benson Jutton’s victory has done nothing less than turn the F1 landscape on its head. At least, in the much-vaunted match-up with Hewis Lamilton, it has turned the landscape at Team GB on its head.

When Jutton joined Team GB there were many who thought him crazy to want to take on Lamilton in his own backyard. Lamilton is simply quicker, they said. (And Lamilton is undoubtedly quick). But that was to assume that ‘quicker’ always wins the race. The Melbourne GP, and events surrounding it, showed that there may be more to it than that. Jutton now oozes confidence, while Lamilton, coming in an eventful but frustrating 6th, begins to look a troubled figure. Jutton leads Lamilton in the standings two GPs into the season – and my prediction that this would be the case come the end of the season begins to look more confident.

So what happened in Australia to produce this turnaround? And how should we assess Lamilton’s current state of mind...?

WE'RE STILL STANDING: The Football League's Brightest Managers Part 2

League 1

Andy Scott (Brentford)

In there on merit in spite of The Worm’s allegiance. Scott was a languid left-winger for the Bees and returned as Terry Butcher’s assistant at a time when the club seemed on a one-way road to the conference. With Butcher’s sacking he was given the managerial post on an interim basis and seized the opportunity to succeed, taking the club to the League 2 title in his first full season of management. A tactical and hard working boss, his scouting and knowledge of the players in the lower league is his biggest asset and has led to success in the transfer market. He also develops effective links with bigger clubs to afford the arrival of quality loanees but is no slave to sentiment and is quick to release those he views as surplus to requirements.

Paul Tisdale (Exeter)

Cravat-wearing Tisdale has styled himself as an intellectual and lover of the beautiful game. His teams have been accused of looking great but lacking the killer touch, but back-to-back promotions from the conference to league one in the past two years would seem to belie that judgement. Given the speed of their ascent, this season of consolidation can be seen a further achievement. No surprise he is seen as one of the more acerbic of football managers; before this appointment he gained four promotions in six years with Bath University’s Team Bath.

Kenny Jackett (Millwall)

Quietly going about his business at The New Den for 2½ years, Jackett hardly seems a perfect fit for the boorish Lions. He took over at Swansea in 2004 in League 2 and left 3 years later with the club firmly established in the top third of League 1. His Millwall team have hit form at the right time this year and are looking strong to overhaul Leeds in second, having won at Elland Road last week. There are no stars in his side but they are organised, physical and have Jackett’s own quiet self-belief. Having lost a thrilling play-off final to Scunthorpe last year, they are expected to go one better this time around.

Paul Lambert (Norwich)

A former Champions League winner, Lambert probably has the best credentials for a step up to the big league of anyone on this list. He started the season as Colchester manager in style with a 7-1 victory away at Norwich but within a month was Canaries boss. Now headed inexorably for the title, Lambert was able to exact some strange revenge with a 5-0 victory at Colchester in January. What would Simon Kuper make of that, I wonder? Lambert’s achievement at Norwich has been to convert a dishevelled and dispirited collection of players into the most combative and outgoing side in the league within the blink of an eye.

The wheels on the bike go round and round

Why are the achievements of Sir Chris Hoy so underwhelming is a question that, I imagine, many will be guiltily asking themselves this morning. The worthy but dull 34 year-old Scot picked up his 10th world title in the keirin event at the Track Cycling World Championships at the Ballerup Super Arena in Copenhagen last night but all I could do was yawn I’m afraid. The repetitive nature of a lot of sports makes for poor entertainment at the best of times but this is particularly the case with cycling and swimming, which are crushingly boring to watch. Let’s be honest about it, the only excitement to be had here is of the schadenfreude variety - a horrific crash, a drowning, etc. All you can do is nod respectfully at the dedication and leave it there. Forgive the trite colonial formulation but there is unlikely to be an instance of Homo sapiens in the Congo faster over 100 yards than Usain Bolt but there may well be a man in your home town with the latent peculiar talent the equal of Hoy.

The race for fourth.

A sad indictment of the times that we should be focussing on this given the theoretically exciting three-way battle for the title but oh well.

Nothing sophisticated, just going on good old football pools style “that lot should beat that lot” intuition, I looked at the remaining fixtures of the fourth place contenders (ignoring the dark horse of Everton) and reckoned Liverpool and Villa would accrue 17 points, Spurs and City 13 points, which would leave Spurs, Liverpool and Villa tied on points in the fourth to sixth positions.

The foreseen non-maximums from the remaining fixtures:

Spurs: Draws at home to Arsenal, Chelsea and away to Sunderland, City; defeat at Utd.

City: Draws at home to Utd, Villa, Spurs and away at West Ham; defeat away to Arsenal.

Liverpool: Draws away at Brum and at home to Chelsea.

Villa: Draws at home to Everton and away at City; defeat away to Chelsea.

City have the hardest run in but that might be offset somewhat by their not being involved in any cup competitions, unlike the other three teams.

That 9-0 drubbing of Wigan earlier in the season might just be decisive for Redknapp’s men if it all comes down to goal difference...