Sports Blog 11th May

This week I’m going to talk about football and snooker. It was a week of mixed fortunes for Man Utd and a miserable one for Chelsea. The former lost in the Champions League (former European Cup) to AC Milan. It was a truly disappointing performance from United after all the heroics against Milan in the first leg and the previous round against Roma. It’s fair to say that Milan’s game plan simply didn’t allow United to play in the way they like to and also key players (especially Rooney, Ronaldo & Scholes) did not perform on the night. However, the week ended on a high note as United were confirmed as Premiership Champions allowing their victory over Manchester City and Chelsea’s failure to beat Arsenal. So now Chelsea have only the FA Cup to play for having been in a position to play for three titles at the beginning of the week.
A final comment on football – there were two televised incidents of violence on the football field at the weekend which I want to comment on. These are Manchester City’s Michael Ball’s vicious stamp on Cristiano Ronaldo and Fulham’s Michael Brown’s headbutt on Liverpool’s Xabi Alonso. Both incidents took place when the referees were looking elsewhere. If these incidents were intentional then what were these guys thinking? They know that the games are televised and that even if the officials fail to spot the incident the Football Association (FA) can still take action. Indeed it has been announced earlier today that the FA will investigate these incidents.
Yesterday saw the conclusion of the world snooker championship with victory going to John Higgins after an enthralling final against Mark Selby. It was the longest final on record finishing at 1 o’clock in the morning! Here’s my thought on this one – is snooker a sport? It’s definitely a game of skill but where does one draw the line at deciding whether something’s a game or a sport? What do you think?
See you next week!