Compiled by JOHNNY WATTERSON
Niland ready to Slam it with big boys
CONOR NILAND'S current ranking of 147 in the world might be the best of any Irish tennis player since Matt Doyle in the 1980s.
Yet in the shadow of Irish golfers hitting the world top ten and rugby teams claiming Europe, there has been little media clamour for Ireland’s number one player.
The Limerick right-hander is but one decent tournament victory away from automatic entry into the Grand Slam events.
Having won in Israel earlier this year at the Ramat Hasharon Open, where he collected 100 ranking points, another similar success would push him into the automatic entry point. There are 128 players in the main singles draw of the four tennis majors.
At his most recent outing in Rennes, France he made the quarter-finals and successfully protected his current position in the world rankings. His goal is to make the Slams as the injury-struck Louk Sorensen did this year in Australia to cause a welcome stir.
At 29-years-old 2011 could… no should… no will be Niland’s breakthrough.
Big stick approach by Gatland is a shame
GIVEN THE way the Irish provinces have been spare in their use of international players for the beginning of this season, you could forgive the English clubs for keeping strictly to the IRB guidelines with regard to protecting their own players in an extended World Cup season.
Pity though that former Irish and current Wales coach, Warren Gatland and the WRU, appear to be holding two players to ransom to push home a political agenda. This week Gatland named his Wales squad of 33 players for the autumn series of international matches and there were a few notable absentees.
Dwayne Peel, the Sale Sharks scrumhalf and Andy Powell, the Wasps number eight were unceremoniously dumped in the closest expression you will see of the generally unemotive New Zealander having a hissy fit. Once more, Gatland has threatened to leave the two players out of the World Cup because their clubs are adhering to previously made agreements.
Both Powell and Peel are unavailable for the opening match against Australia on November 6th, which falls outside the IRB international window. Sale and Wasps want the players for themselves. Wales can’t have them. Gatland doesn’t like it.
The umbrella group, Premier Rugby, which represents the teams in the Premiership has sent a letter to the WRU saying that players would also not be available next summer until August 4th in line with IRB regulations, which requires their release just 35 days before the World Cup in New Zealand. The reason is to protect the players, which the clubs pay. Gatland can’t have them. Wales don’t like it.
The problem as they see it is that the English clubs will end their season in May but won’t release non-English players until August, just two days before Wales play England in their first warm-up game. In Gatland’s mind there should be flexibility.
Sympathy for coach and WRU, though, is difficult. Their real concern is in what condition they get players from their clubs for the World Cup and not how they are returned. England players are released outside the IRB windows under a deal struck with the England Rugby Football Union, which pays about €17,000 per player for the privilege. Martin Johnson is okay on that front.
Ireland held a similar policy with Geordan Murphy at Leicester and Bob Casey at London Irish arguably early victims of a hardline IRFU stance that wanted Irish players here.
Murphy, who will also miss the first Irish Test against South Africa as he is with Leicester, is a case in point of how important it is for clubs to look after their best assets despite the pressure from international squads.
In Ireland’s last game before they flew to Australia for the 2003 World Cup, a tournament in which Murphy was expected to glitter as one of the coming stars, the fullback’s leg was shattered against Scotland at Murrayfield. He missed the World Cup and most of the following season.
When the large wheels turn it is the little guys that get crushed. Peel and Powell have become pawns in a tug-of-war and Gatland’s threat to keep the two out of the World Cup has considerably upped the ante. The effrontery of the Welsh lads in taking the Saxon shilling clearly hurts.
Most of November – a winter series designed to give some young players a chance but primarily to generate money for the unions – the entire Six Nations Championship and a 38-day spell before they kick-off against South Africa in the World Cup is simply not enough for Gatland and Wales. Shame.
Outside agency required to clean up Fifa scandal
THIS HAS been a week of bribe taking in football, although nothing compared to the ball -breaking trouble two students from Arizona State University (ASU) landed themselves in back in 1994.
The celebrity case, although 16-years-old, has even found its way on to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s website as an example of what can corrupt athletes and officials if they veer off the path.
In March of that year the legal gaming industry noticed unprecedented betting between a basketball match involving ASU and the University of Washington.
Typical betting usually totalled $50,000 (€36,000) but money on this game had reached $1 million (€720,000) and alarm bells began to go off. Some casinos in Nevada even took the game off their boards and the FBI in Phoenix were alerted enough to open a case.
The Bureau eventually revealed that two ASU players had been drawn into a scheme to shave points off ASU scores in four games entirely for the benefit of themselves and La Cosa Nostra figures – described by the FBI as the foremost organised criminal threat to American society.
Against Oregan the ASU team were spread to win by 14 points and won by six points. Again playing Oregan they were spread to win by 11.5 points and again won by six.
Against Southern California, they were picked to win by nine points and lost by 12 points and against Washington were picked to win by 11 points but won by 18 points after allegedly being told at half-time they were under scrutiny.
One of the ASU players had amassed $32,000 (€23,000) in gambling debts with a campus bookie and was recruited to fix games in exchange for the debt. In addition he was given $60,000 (€43,000). He also recruited a second player who was given $25,000 (€18,000) per game to help make sure they delivered the required points or lack of.
The FBI uncovered three different conspiracy groups. In Chicago and New York they connected the player’s fixing with La Cosa Nostra members and associates and also tied them into a separate group of campus bookies. Both players finally confessed.
The inquiry said one thing about investigating sports bribery.
That is to forget the tomfoolery of in-house committees and retain an outside, independent body. Fifa naturally disagrees. Their Ethics Committee will determine the innocence of their members in the current money for votes scandal.
Montenegro show size doesn't matter
OFTEN IN our haste to justify underachievement Irish soccer points to the small population and that the island houses not one but two grand football governing bodies. Aren’t we the ones!
In that light we might send a scout, not to the Faroe Islands, where Brian Kerr has sparked off a notion in the team of being able to punch above their weight but to Montenegro, where a population of under 700,000 has begotten a team that has uplifted the group with their willingness and positivity.
After drawing with England 0-0 at Wembley that generated much hand-wringing and home disapproval, three wins and a draw from their European Championship qualifiers now has the minnows top of the group.
The former Yugoslav state is but a dot on the European map and its first truly international representation as an independent state was only four years ago, when they entered a candidate for the 2006 Miss World competition.
Having now stormed the group with the sort of free spirited élan that a postage stamp state can muster by beating Wales, Bulgaria and Switzerland 1-0, their current Group G leading tally is surely proof to Ireland that size does not matter.
Paradise and a pretty pay cheque
SOME DIDN’T appreciate all the collegiate camaraderie and teams of twee-uniformed golfers parading around the drizzle of Celtic Manor for the Ryder Cup. Others were riled by the Dunhill Links, when they were cast aside for the rich, famous and powerful, who were teamed and televised with professional players.
This week golf again became a moving target when the PGA Grand Slam set up camp on the paradise island of Bermuda. The tone was quickly established in the Pro-am, where a spot of cricket broke out on the 16th tee box at the impossibly pretty Port Royal course, with three-time major champion Ernie Els at bat, cricket legend Brian Lara at wicketkeeper and Bermuda’s Premier Ewart Brown bowling.
It was picture perfect for publicity. and they needed it. The made-for-television event was designed to pitch the four major winners together but that became undone when the biggest draw, Masters winner Phil Mickelson, pulled out to chill with his family.
To replace him, the PGA of America at least managed to find someone who last won a grand slam event as recently as eight years ago: Els.
British Open winner Louis Oosthuizen subsequently became a casualty with a twisted ankle. So, naturally the PGA of America turned to. . . David Toms. An excellent choice despite a decade having passed since he collected his only major title at the 2001 PGA Championship.
At least Toms gave the four-horse tournament an international flavour. Joining South African Els and American Toms was US Open champion, Irishman Graeme McDowell and PGA Championship winner, German Martin Kaymer. In fairness McDowell did say that the PGA Grand Slam “is not a huge priority,” although that too should asphyxiate the critics.
In layman’s thinking not a huge priority could be seen as an obscenity. With a €970,000 purse, the winner (Els) getting €430,000 and McDowell and Kaymer taking home €180,000 each for sharing last spot, you would think even with current lottery money prize funds, turning up on the paradise island was urgent enough.
