Monday, June 27, 2005
A pair of shorts

It's strange how some things can be placed in perspective by random items. Today was another baking hot day, at least here in the temperate climate of south wales :), so naturally I reached for the shorts. But not any shorts, these were shorts I'd bought nine years ago in California in XL so I'd have, at the time, room to grow into them. Today they didn't fit, yet they'd always fitted me. So I did an objective assessment of me and surprise, surprise my waist was somewhat bigger :)) A fair degree bigger if I'm honest. So too were my arms, legs and chest - oh and two inches on my neck (I have an 18" neck which came as a surprise) Now mostly these measurements are good because it means my training is paying off everywhere except where it counts. Thus a pair of shorts has laid me low and means it's back to the drawing board :)

Posted by Owen Jones 2005-06-27 18:20:03

Sunday, June 26, 2005
It's all clear err

So I happilystayed up to watch Mayweather jr vs Gatti and Vivian Harris fight and since it's about the only thing my mates and I have been talking about all day I thought I'd share it on here too.

Firstly there couldn't have been two more contrasting fights. Harris was absymal and lucky he didn't step in the ring with Hatton in the end because Hatton would have seriously ended him. As it was somesouth-american whose name I can't even remember ( Colombian Carlos Maussa but you get the point)with a terribly amateurish style ended his reign in the most embarassing of cicumstances - a clean knockout from the most uncoordinated fighter I've ever seen in boxing at this level, means the WBA title isessentially a gimme. In the alphabet soup that is today's boxing world the WBA is actually a fairly big title, rated just outside theboxing trinity of IBF, WBC and WBO and along with those titles the only ones serious boxing fans think are important. So although Harris has a rematch with a guy not ranked in the top 15 in the world in any of the four organisations rankings, it can be strenuously argued it's there for a good boxer to pick up a hand in the big game. And a big game it is.

The permutations for a division that right now is hotter than hell and twice as interesting; throw in names like Hatton, Cotto, Mayweather, Tsyzu, Mitchell, Witter, Branco, N'dou and even still Harris and possibly Gatti, have become slightly more distinct. Why? Because the 'Prettyboy' Floyd Mayweather jnr just put hishand up as the best of the best. A drawn Gatti who looked like he went through hell to make the weight, was given a boxing lesson. Gatti, an immense warrior of huge respect in the game who has been through more wars than any current boxer I can think to name, was made to look positively club class. He isn't and never has been, so thatshould go someway to explaining just how deadly Mayweather was. His accuracy was nothing short of stunning, his power for a man who is already in this third different weightdivision was impressive and he never once got tagged. Gatti couldn't hit him, he couldn't pressure or bully him, he didn't try to cut the ring off and blocked with his face. In that fight all the years and all the wars caught up with Arturo 'Thunder' Gatti who immediately announced his step up to the welterweight division for one last hurrah. I hope he gets it and a superfight with Zab Judah or De La Hoya or even Shane Moseley because no one whohas given as much to boxing as Gatti should have to leave, eventhough onlytwo days ago he was world champion, like that. He deserves more.

That being said you don't always get what you deserve. This can be to an extentsaid of Ricky Hatton, having taken out the best pound-for-pound fighter in the division his next fight may well be against thenew p-f-p best, Mayweather. Certainly he was relishing the fight already at ringside watching, ditto Cotto, who was there too, and Hatton's trainer Billy 'Preacher' Graham who was in the Sky Sports studio. Yet after adisplay of such class by a young, unbeaten gold medallist, three-weight world champion and hauntingly brilliant boxer you have to question with massive seriousness whether Hatton's 'educated pressure' style would work. Tsyzu made Ricky pay on the way in, but nowhere like the accuracy and combinations that Mayweather can put together. Styles make fights and Hatton vs Mayweather is a definite candidate for fight of the year.

This all presupposes that Hatton's next fight isn't the Tszyu rematch. I don't think it will be given the type of fight the first one was. Tszyu doesn't need any more ageing fights, he has money, he has respect and he was a great champion for a decade.If he wasto come back and that's a big 'if', Maussa or Harris would make the most sense. TheWBA title puts him right back in the mix and guarantees a superfight or two against fighters who wouldn't hound him every second of twelve rounds as Hatton did. However the WBA beltis now a big deal,it can feasibly be won fairly easily whoever ofthe twoholds it, and tworecognised world titles means more money and halfway to being the unified Light-Welterweight champion of the world. Cotto has alreadybeaten Maussa comfortably so that probably won't happen but with Bob Arum's money behind his Puerto Ricon prodigy who knows, it's more likely if Harris regains the title. If Harris regains the title a unification fight with Hatton or Mayweather may be inevitable, having lost he now knows his position is tenuous -he turned down almost a million pound offer from Hatton's camp to fight him six months ago - and will be intent on makingtheBenjamin's while the sun shines. Hatton, Cottoor Mayweather would then hold half the game boardand the enticement for the others would be too large. At upwards of$4 million a fight and the possibility of three superfights for all the marbles thiswill undoubtedly be the year of the lighwelter/super-lightweight.I cannot wait :)

Posted by Owen Jones 2005-06-26 17:32:26

Saturday, June 25, 2005
Cold light of day

So? Well it was what we half expected, I put my Lions shirt on and crossed my fingers -to no avail. In post-mortem, after the tour is finished,'experts' (I use the term loosely) and fans will come to the same conclusions. That the players were under done, that the selections were the wrong ones, that the players that played with a few exceptions didn't front up, too many players on tour,our tactics were poor and the coaching staff did nothing to change it. Best prepared? Not in this lifetime. All these factors are true but I think there are two key issues thatare more significant than all the above;

1.) That CW didn't learn any lessons from 2001 or 1997

2.) That the tour hasn't been about the players and the rugby but about CW.

Taking the first one, I point to the divisive nature of splitting the squad into two teams from the offset. While the mid-week team are busting a gut down in the arse end of nowhere (Southland) the rest of the squad is up in Christchurch. How does this foster team unity?The big mouths of Dawson and Healey complained that in 2001 they were trained too hard. So we enter the 2005 first test with guys who only have 80mins under their belt in a tour accepted as the hardest in rugby, after major injuries.By the first test in 2001 Graham Henry hadtried and tested combinations, players who knew each other's game well and who had gelled as a unit. What came across so vividly in the CW interview at 10am this morning was that he didn't have a clue. I don't mean in the obvious disparaging way (although that is no less true) but he clearly didn't know what his best team was nor what combinations to fall back on thus he picked a team that was comfortable rather than on form. Say what you want about 2001, they won the first test with a superb brandof rugby and should have won the series comfortably. After BOD went off we looked absolutely toothless, no-one knew who was playing 10 JW or SJand what the hell was that nonsense with the haka - FRONT UP FFS. There is a maximum that CW should have followed - basics, time and freedom.In a squad or teamthat doesn't know each other, which they should have done but hey, then you drill and drill in the basics, give your players time to learn each others game's and don't weigh them down with patterns,varying messages from coaches andextra pressure. Give them freedom.

To see a clear example of what I mean, take a look at how Shane Williams and Jason Robinson have gone in the last year - Shane Williams was nowhere, couldn't get in his club side whenMike Ruddocktold him to just play his game. He scared the shit out of NZ in November, set the Six Nations alight, won the Celtic League with his cluband made it on to a Lions tour where he has been hamstrung by the coaches and style of play. JRob was the most exciting player in the world a year ago, he could beatanyone one-on-one and looked like a threat from anywhere. Then Johnson left followed by Dallaglio and he became captain - he was forced to adapt to an English team that was only gaining parity up front by ... learning to kick. From there he has become utterly conservative, drifting out of games entirely and culminating in the Lions debacle this morning. What has becomepainfully apparent is that there can be too much planning, too much 'professionalism' and not enough reliance on theplayers. It sounds a touch lame to say at such a level but there was noenjoyment there.In his interviewCW didn't appear to be overly bothered and it is that lack of emotion, of this detached approach that rankles so badly. The whole tour has been stifled. From Henson being told what to say at press conferences to the dull monotony ofmost of the rugby. Therehas been more focus on all the extra stuff and no substance - gameplan, style of play andcombinations. If we are going to play a forward orientated game then let's do it, not go half-arsed. Forwards do forwards jobs, backs do backs jobs and for crying out loud get the forwards out of the 9-10-12 channels. All the procrastination must stop.

SecondlyCW. Obviously he has an ego, nothing could be moreclear but on this tour it has not been checkedbecause there isn't anyone above him to say NO! With agroup of yes men as coaches, far too many staff - two defensive coaches? Isn't thatone of the dumbest things you've ever heard of? One thing has taken priority, CW sees it as him versus Graham Henry. Graham Henry sees it as the AB's vs the Lions and beating CW is a big bonus. The whole 'out-thinking' the other coach is sostupid as to defy belief were it not for the fact that CW seems to have bought into it. He is facing three coaches who know a lot of the Lions players better than he does, Henry himself lead a more successful Lions tour than CW has to date. What is he going to bluff him with? How is he going to out think a man who said the morning the Lionsteam was announced that he thought they would play it close, kick for the corners and try to out-muscle the AB's upfront. It was the worst kept secreton tour. CW still played that way, the way the AB's had been preparing for two weeks to combat.Graham Thorpe was slated recently for announcing six months in advance that he was going to play in Australia in Oct/Nov. On tour it comes out that CW is quitting rugby after this tour, having already been out of the game on a day-to-day basis for almost a year. A repeat performance on Saturday willbring a curtain down on his rugby career in a manner that few will be able to defend.

Posted by Owen Jones 2005-06-25 16:31:07

Friday, June 24, 2005
Countdown

It's 1am and I cannot sleep, the Lions take the field in seven hours and I am absolutely buzzing. I can't believe the first test is here and all the hype - don't the New Zealanders take that to a whole new level rugby wise - has just made it all the more exciting. I think Graham Henry holds most of the cards, he's a shrewd barsteward and may just have CW's number. Truthfully I'm torn - if the Lions get walloped then he has to change things and play some more rugby using form players - whatever nationality they are - and yet it's the frickin Lions, all the shit they've put up with from the refereeing triumphrate of see-no-evil, speak-no-evil and hear-no-evil plus five Welsh boys in there. I'm going to sleep on it :)

Posted by Owen Jones 2005-06-24 19:53:04

Thursday, June 23, 2005
Normalcy resumed

Henman crashes diappointingly at Wimbledon.

Australia beat England in the cricket.

All the pundits slate robotic Lions selection :)

Ricky Hatton misses out on another superfight.

For everything that changes, everything remains the same.

Posted by Owen Jones 2005-06-23 18:00:06