It’s spoil Jim but not as we know it

Well you know yesterday was the 50th anniversary of the greatest day in international football when England only went and won the World Cup 4-2 against the mighty West Germany. Of course the bloody Germans have had their revenge many times over since then but nothing can take away the memory of that day. I was 14, about the same age as my eldest grandson is now, and he might have to wait until he’s my current age before he sees England win it again. Sigh. Anyway to celebrate the memory C and I went to quite a special place yesterday. It’s along the A40 just before the Target roundabout. Oooh sounds nice.

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Sport eh

Well it’s been a big week for sport hasn’t it? And another decent week for Brits; Hamilton won the Hungarian Grand Prix and overtook his team-mate Rosberg in the race for the F1 Drivers’ title. Johanna Konta won her first big WTA title and the biggest by any British woman in 30 years after defeating Venus Williams in a nerve-shredding three-set final in the Bank of the West Classic in Stanford, US. She has a ranking in the women’s top ten rankings in sight. After Murray’s successes it’s good to see a British tennis woman doing well at long last. The England cricket team trounced Pakistan in the 2nd test to square the series and Joe Root had a simply masterful match hitting 325 runs in all. Bloody brilliant. Finally Chris Froome won his 3rd Tour de France title after dominating the race with some scintiallating rides and tactics. Watching it was just great…

Froome’s effort was superhuman, he is a phenomenom. But the thing that was equally impressive about his victory was the team ethic. The support from his Sky team mates to ensure he won the title was just amazing. They were self-less, committed, dominating, super strong and tactically superb. I’ve got to think that the Team Sky general manager Sir Dave Brailsford is possibly the best team manager in British sport at the moment. In a few short years he has taken the British cycling team and the Sky team to unprecedented success through astute strategic thinking, smart selection policy, brilliant appointments, a desire to embrace cutting edge technology and inspired leadership creating an unbelievable team spirit.

It got me wondering whether Brailsford wasn’t the man to take on the England football job. Especially since I in recent times the FA have tried the passionate local but inadequate one (Keegan), the exotic foreign but still inadequate one (Eriksson), the eye-wateringly expensive foreign but ultimately boring and inadequate one (Capello), back to the dour pragmatic Yerkshire one who tantalisingly won a League cup Final with Middlesbrough but unsurprisingly proved hopelessly inadequate, then an old bloke with a speech impediment whose biggest claim to fame was that he didn’t get sacked by Fulham FC. But when it came major international tournament performance his record was played 3, all abjectly. But he was paid over £15m by the FA for his mangificent achievements.

So with so much selection success you’d expect the FA would go for a guy like Brailsford wouldn’t you? You know… incredibly smart, articulate, well-connected, forward-thinking, persuasive, believable, inspiring with great man-management skills. Instead they plumped for Big Sam Allardyce. Sigh. Now some would say he fits the bill in many respects with his early adoption of pro-zone data and technology support and his tactical acumen, super confidence in his own abilities and his self-declared motivational skills. Plus of course he was recommended to the FA by Sir Alex Ferguson. It got me thinking…Sir Alex was very happy to put him forward for the plum England job but didn’t feel he would be up for the job at Man United. Umm funny that. Instead Sralex recommended David Moyes for the Man U role and we all know how that ended. About as badly as Roy’s performance.

So England get a guy who’s never taken a team down but who’s been sacked by such major teams as Blackburn, NUFC and West Ham  for producing dull, defensive, don’t lose football. He was even sacked by the disgraced Chairman of dear old Blackpool FC whilst Owen Oyston was still in his prison cell serving time for rape. Such class.

But I’m sure the FA feel confident they’ve got the right man. After all any guy who has managed Bolton can surely feel confident about coming up against shoddy teams like Germany, Italy, France, Argentina, Holland, Spain, Brazil, Portugal, and footballing giants like Iceland, Greenland and Rockall.

But if the decision by the FA was lacking in boldness, what can you say about the IOC’s decision not to make a strong statement and ban the entire Russian team from the Olympics and Paralympics in the light of the damning evidence of state-sponsored doping transgressions. Instead they passed on the decision to individual sports federations like a bunch of timid girls. It’s a frigging outrageous. Why are they so scared of Putin? It’s a disgraceful way to end a great week of sport.

pp

Weight gain

I bet you’re probably thinking that’s an honest and effective title – just two words to describe all that’s happened to my body shape since those heady slim days in the 70’s. Well I have to admit it’s true. But I did’t think you’d be terribly interested in knowing more about my physique. But I caught sight of another gainer whilst browsing day time tv yesterday. And boy have the timbers been added on.

Sweet

Well you kinda had to experience the 70’s, the decade that fashion forgot so they say and the years of the creepy DJ’s and prawn cocktails,  to comment on it.  Well it was a notable decade for me – the one in which I had long hair, went to Uni, grew a moustache,  got married, started my 30 year career in BT, moved to London, had our 3 lovely daughters (well one born in 1980), moved onto the property ladder, and by the end of it lost the moustache and much of my hair and gave up competitive football. Ahh I loved those 10 years, even the loon trousers and the glam rock music.

Rio Trailers

It sounds like the name of a great salsa band or a new Man United defender. But Rio trailers is actually more prosaic; it’s a posting about two new film trailers for the upcoming Olympic and Paralympic Games produced by the BBC and C4 respectively. I’ve only seen one twice and the other once and I’m spell-bound. No doubt I’ll be sick of them before the events but from this perspective they look fantastic.

More TV presenters

Well I had a bit of fun talking about Mike bumbling Bushell and other rubbish tv presenters the other day and wouldn’t you know it, as soon as I’d finished I thought of several more who deserve some critical appraisal. So this is a bit of a post script posting and almost certainly not the last on the subject.

Franco Manca

We’ve found a fantastic Italian food place called Franco Manca. They have places across London and fortunately there’s one in Chiswick where our daughter S lives and one up on Ealing Broadway near where we live. And both are great.

Driving Me Crazy

Driving eh. I used to do well over 40,000 miles a year when I was in business (a lot of it the daily 4.5 hour commute from Buckingham to C London and back) and, believe it or not, pretty much enjoyed all of it. I’ve always been a guy who loves to drive. Until the last year or so….