THIS SPORTING LAND.....????.....SPORT IS A WAY FOR PSYCHOTIC NUTTERS TO ENJOY THEMSELVES!!!!

 THE SLIDE TACKLE !

When you think of sport you mainly think of the three sporting staples for your average
Englishman....Football!....Or "SARKER!" as our beloved cousins across the pond like to call it. They have their own FOOTBALL where the dress up like the cast of IRON MAN 3 and play ,being Americans too the micro second as measured on an atomic clock in the super stadium, so when they tackle each other and it looks looks and sounds like them massive police car pile ups from the car chases beloved by Hollywood in billions of  action films , every second is accounted for so it's possible that a score can be 'scored'(Converted/ touched down ??) in the last 0.0000235 of a second of  time. The good ol' British version of FOOTBALL, properly spelt and pronounced "SOCCER!", or as civilised fans of 'The beautiful game in the fair city of Liverpool, where we have a number of decent teams would refer to it as,"DE FOOTY!" if your watching it ,say 'On the telly'...."Going to watch de footy, down the boozer!".....Or if your a bit more serious going "DE MATCH!" and occassionally a "DE GAME!"...As in "didj'ya see de game?"

          Our FOOTY is different to the Yanks Football as the nearest we have to their very odd idea of a game which is only played by them even though they think it's a globally loved game ,even though nobody on the planet has a clue what the fascination is with it and it is globally resented that the Americans call their big championship games things like 'THE WORLD SERIES????'.....We have a wonderful game called RUGBY where rough tough battered looking fellahs basically fill the pitch and amongst the mass of broken bodies is an oval ball which has to be retrieved by the opposing sides so the can run away to the far end of the pitch to score a try by putting the ball on the floor ,sounds simple ,but as is always the case theres about  between 14-16 big mean hefty looking monsters who dont agree with your intentions and want to stop you in the most painful bone shuddering ways they can. For a game that when you look at it is remarkably stupid in so far its a way of scoring points while keeping your skeletal system in roughly one piece, often unsuccessfully, the players are generally highly intelligent fellahs, admittedly the faces :scars, beaten eye brows ,broken noses and cauliflower ears may give them a slightly Prehistoric caveman look, but most have careers and basically are smart!....They say "Rugby is a game for hooligans played by gentlemen?"

               The 'Footy!' was once a 'mans game', the stuff of comic book heroes in 'TheVICTOR,the HOTSPUR, characters like 'ROY OF THE ROVERS!' decent proud and could hoof an old style leather caseball the length of the pitch and still burst the net at the other end!......In real life we had our 1966 world cup squad with BOBBY MOORES; GEOFF HURSTS; BOBBY CHARLTONS, ROGER HUNTS(One of Liverpools all time greats!)....They played in old leather boots ,in thick mud and went "They dun their foot in!" in a vicious tackle, which were allowed in them days all the had to get them up was an old trainer in a wooly bob-hat and a rusty bucket of freezing cold water with a freezing sponge to slap on the injury....Even broken legs didn't stop our heroes leaping to their feet rather than face the dreaded cold sponge. Nowadays the ball is plastic ,almost ballon like so when given a good whack with the new trendy pink or silver boots worn and promoted by all our new foreign players pushing 'Their ranges ' of clothing, scents and sporting goods, occassionally!...The ball goes sailing up into the stratoshere, so they have to side foot the ball, none of your 30 yard Bobby Charlton blasts with the instep , back in the days when games used to have scores of 6,7 or8 goals in a game when it was slower, but enabled superb talents to dribble in the box, No GEORGE BESTS, KEVIN KEEGANS, ROGER HUNTS, ETC, ETC now as the game is too fast, and its against the rules to tackle!!???....Players do their own stunts and dives and fall and fall flat if they get a dirty look , Nobody "oes their foot in!",anymore ,they all amage tarsals n' meta tarsels,  Groins get a lot of grief, but thats probably nothing to do with the 'Footy' or training ,its out spending their £5000000000/week wages in the best places , you wont see 'the advertising hoardings who are our childrens heroes down the local 'boozer!'.....I hate it now ,i really do!, the say about the 'Footy'...."It's a game for gentlemen played by hooligans!"

                 I was never a fan of cricket and was terriffied on the few occassions i played ,once i got the ball in the face and once on my knee ,i've never felt pain like it i was sure i'd busted my leg. The game was the most vicious of the three as the idea was for the bowler to 'get the batsman out!' any way he could only armed with a rock hard cricket ball that he's trained for years to throw at amazing speeds with a variety of sneaky ,tricky spins and turns to make it impossible for the batsman to defend himself....The bowler gets the batsman in his sights and has a run up to add to his power and it is nothing more or less than to kill the target!......Than if he doesn't manage to do that , they go through it all again and so it goes on for days and weeks. When i lived in India i got interested in the Cricket as it's an obsession over there, the kids don't play 'Footy!' ,they play cricket on patches of wasteland ,or wherever they can.  I always wonder how some of the crowd dont get killed or seriously hurt ,when the batsman whacks the killer projectile out of the ground ,for a six!...A bit of cricketing parlance for you there....But the ball sails high into the crowd and it must ,on occassions smash into somebodies gob as they watch the game in fascination and go "OOOOOhhhhhh!" at the cracker of a shot thats "Jus' gotts be a 6!"....Leaving their teeth behind in the stadium, if it's not severe concussion.

ANY DAY NOW THEY'LL LIGHT THE RED TOUCH PAPER! AND GIVE RAFA THE ROCKET!

Every cloud has a silver lining ,for a cartoonist anyhow. Liverpool have had one ,if not the worst season in their history. Only last night being beaten by Reading of all people, at Anfield !(sob).....In fact Reading looked the better side and Liverpool looked the first division side instead of the great premiership side they should be. But on the plus side i can reuse my Rafa getting the' rocket' cartoon again. With his American chairmens launching him, as thats what yanks're good at launching things. In this case from Cape Anfield, has the countdown started.

THE BIKE MIGHT BE GOOD FOR YOUR HEALTH, BUT THE TOE CLIPS WILL KILL YOU !

Being fat n' lazy is by far the most and natural human condition, but with politicians ,celebrities, supermodels,Trinny and Suzanna, etc, etc, all pushing healthy diets and slim figures and god forbid fitness at us being a lazy get is, saddly frowned upon, its not trendy and 'in', but one day it'll come back 'in', what goes aroun, comes around, oh happy days. Fitness is a horrible condition as it takes a lot of work and effort which nobody really likes having to do. You go into the leisure centres, i dont know why they call them leisure centres. I mean to me leisure is taking it easy, passing time relaxing, having a good drink, whatever, not pushing my cardiovascular and respiratory levels through the roof. Names like Fitness world, much more Hernia land or bust a gut world or gasp centre. It is a totally surreal experiance going into these places and seeing brightly, trendily attired men and women , running ,walking, stepping, pushing ,pulling, bending, thrusting, grunting, gasping, shouting and occassionally breaking down in tears. Very leisurely.

But the outdoor training, the more natural, running from A-B, or cycling. I've never enjoyed running. I played footy and rugby and was a fair old sprinter, but with an ankle injury and a loathing of jogging i dont run, but i do have a bike and was getting back into good long rides before the weather 'set in.' The roads are dangerous enough, a lot worse than i seem to remember from when 'i were a lad.' The main problem i have is with the bloody toe clips on the pedals. Without them you could mount your bike like a cowboy mounting his horse, but with the clips you have to position yourself astride the seat, put one foot in and then push off. When your moving ,you have to flip the other clip over to insert your other foot in. Sometimes,'Dead easy!', no sweat, whatsoever. But other times, your flipping the pedal time and time again, looking down at the damn pedal. Then your alerted by such give away signs like car horns ,or even truck air horns blaring at you as you've wobbled into the middle of the dual carriageway. Looking up to the the cars , not only behind you, but coming at you.

There is a road nearby where they filmed,'DEATH RACE 2000'... The drivers get points for all the pedestrians and bikeriders they can run over. I was on the pavement trying to get my clips on when i suddenly found myself crashing arse over tit throuh thorns and bushes. I crawled battered and scratched out onto the pavement trying to unravel the bike from the undergrowth, and desperatly trying to retain some dignity by looking from side to side to see if anyone had noticed, my cycling hiccup. When i finally got branches out of the spokes,and staunced my bleeding from copious cuts and scratches, etc and set off, for about 50 yards and thebike started bumping and rattling along. I'd gone and burst my 'f***'in' tyre. Just as well the bike was a lightweight frame as i had to carry it the rest of the way home. I was buggered if, i was going to take the tyre off and sit by a bowl of water trying to mend my puncture, thats for schoolboys, i took it to the shop and it was fixed in minutes, had to pay, but we've got to help the small buisnessman and keep the economy afloat and stay fit.But i'm still tempted to get rid of them toe clips.

LIVERPOOL FC 'KD UP...AND THE YANKS MAY LAUNCH A ROCKET FROM CAPE ANFIELD.

'NUFF SAID!'

REMEMBER WHEN SPORTSMEN BROKE PROPER BONES?

I'm not a great sport fan, i used to watch Liverpool many years ago and had a season ticket for a few years once upon a lifetime ago. I do enjoy watching old games and old boxing on the 'box' from time to time. There's a channel called ESPN on the SKY network and they show old sporting events. I've just been watching a heap of old Liverpool games from the 70's and early 80's. And a series of documentaries on various old time boxers. Things just seemed more real and exciting, as well as 'harder.' There was a documentary about 'Football..The wonderful game'..All about the 70's . It was great all these teams with shocking haircuts;Droopy mustaches; Shorts that were so tight they seperated the blood in the legs from the blood in the rest of the body. Thats probably why the players were always boozing n' shagging all those models, etc...As soon as they took those shorts off and the blood from above and below re-connected in the 'middle-nether reigons'..Well, i'd rather not think about it, it makes you wonder about the team bath. The pitches started the season green and pristine. A few showers of rain and a few games and the bowling green became a bog. This was also the days when tackling was allowed. Players, who wouldn't be allowed in the ground, these days, even if they were allowed out of the solitary padded cell in the psychiatric hospital they were sentanced to spend their life in. In those days they were encouraged, cheered and praised for attempted murder every Saturday afternoon. God bless Tommy Smith! The players used to suffer from proper medical conditions....None of your damaged meta-tarsels, ligament or tendon damage...... It was stuff like "He's done his leg in.... Busted his foot .....Done his knee....Or had his nose busted!!!" All this was cured by the cold wet sponge that had spent the game festering in stagnant water in an old club rusty bucket before being slapped, not placed, but slapped onto the 'sore bit'. 9 times out of 10, the player saw the bucket and sponge coming , muttered 'Sod that!', suddenly found the inner strength to ignore the pain and get back into the battle, it wasn't a game. As the immortal BILL SHANKLEY once said about football being a matter of life or death.."No, son , it's far more important than that".

THE SAMURAI SPIRIT OR JUST BAD LOSERS ?

THE BAD LOSER

I was watching a programme on the telly the other night all about a very odd bunch of chaps indeed. The Samurai warriors of Japan. They would train all their life with the most fantastic weapons ever made, (before atom bombs ,polaris, trident, of course ),but the samurai sword. perfectly balanced and razor sharp. Which, unfortunatly couldnt be said for the weilder of this perfect blade /sword. These noble brave warriors devoted their life to learning to fight and devoted their lives to their emperor , overlord ,or whatever they called the 'bosses in those bygone feudal days. They would march into battle cutting and slashing their opponents ,then if they won, all was well and good and celebrations abound . But, if they lost their fight they would commit a very silly thing indeed. Ritual suicide, or Hari-Kiri..... A very strange way to get over a defeat. Clutching a smaller samurai sword, specially designed for the purpose they would kneel down; Ram the dagger into the lower belly; Pull the blade across to the other side then pull up???..Then as their guts spill out over the deck, their 'second' would take a swipe at their neck with a full sword and decapitate the disembowelled warrior, or ex-warrior. This was the only honorable way to go. One Samurai commited Hari-Kiri and his assistant had to take 3 or 4 swipes at his neck to decapitate him..Just not his day, some days it's not worth a Samurai getting out of bed.

Thankfully the Samurai spirit doesn't abound around here. All sports fixtures would be a blood bath.At the football, after full time as the beaten 11 at the 'match' disembowel themselves in the shower.(bloodbath in the shower, eh?) But on the bright side, the season would be a lot shorter and they'd have to be a lot more flexible with the transfer window, ; The snooker player ruining the green baize with his innards; The defeated darts champion trying to hack his way through his hugh beer belly with his tiny Samurai dart; In golf the 18th hole would be a mess ,all that blood, the green wouldnt be green for long . In my case dissappointment and defeat is something i'm quite used to. But pain, funnily enough is something i never got the hang of. So, i've decided i'm going to be honourbound to stay dishonourable. The only Samurai spirit in the Leatherbarrow's is a bottle of after shave in a cupboard in the bathroom.......Gawd it stinks, too!

IT'S A GREAT TIME FOR BALLS OF BOTH SHAPES!!!!

Well, well ,what a day for sport . ;The 'footy 'n' The Rugger;'N' me sprawled across the couch ,perfecting the arts of picking ,scratching 'n' squeezing bits of my anatomy...Ah, it's the sporting life for me.

It was a great day for balls of both shapes.