Am I alright?

Is it wrong that I'm starting to find Scott Mills' show funny?

England = crap, but job done I guess. Hopefully United have found their new goalkeeper. Keeping one of Madrid's strikeforce and their midfield dynamo to one goal is a lot better than Carroll or Howard would have managed. Two if Gerrard chooses Real instead of Chelsea.

Having said that, if they face Wisla Krakow they're fucked :-)

VC Student Poker - cashed!

A bit disappointing to have only come 21st - outdrew A-10 with J-8 but the other guy rivered a straight... anyways got a nice start, had A-K first hand and won a pot to move me up to about 2300, which was nice. It enabled me to limp a few times with small pairs, mostly missed but eventually hit middle set with 6-6. I lead out and get called. I manage to get all my money in with a checkraise on the turn and the other guy has bottom set. Double up to about 4K5. This does me well for a while, the table's aggressive and I stay out of the way until Il_Padrino comes to my table. I find A-Qs in second position and he minraised UTG. I decide to call and see what the flop brings. Q-Q-2 two suits get in. He shoves before I can bet and I call, he has A-K for the flush draw, turn is an A making that irrelevant, up to 8K. Don't have too many cards, fluctuate for a while. Get moved to Wlleiotl's table and he's got a huge stack (but busts near the bubble). Bust someone from Warwick with K-K against A-9, and get up to about 10K. This is good enough to approach the bubble, then have Alex Scott move to the table. Immediately loses a couple of key pots, gets short, then uses a strange strategy of all-in's and controversial calls to move up and down a lot. Have to fold the arlo near the bubble when there's fierce action before it comes to me. Have to fold it again after making the money as I get the suited variety UTG. Key hand comes when Alex minraises then a shortstack moves in for about the same again. For some reason I find a reason to muck A-K (still a couple of people to act behind me who have me covered)... sees A-J against J-8 oops. 8 comes and the 20-20 hindsight says good pass... that's the last of the good cards I get, down to 8K with 600/1200 blinds and I'm the short stack of the tournament, folded round to me in the SB and get called with the hand first described. Arse, but it's another $5 for nothing and it's doubled the free money VC gave me :-)

How the tiers of the Premiership work and other sporting crap

Off the bat, congrats to Wales for winning the grand slam. With that out of the way, lets move on to the farce that was Liverpool - Everton.

I'm not going to discuss the referee any further, apart from to say he was a homer (booking Everton players for the slightest touch, ignoring a clear elbow to the face of Carsley, making a token gesture after Baros tried to break Alan "God" Stubbs' leg in an ex-fantasy league player trying to come back to haunt me gesture). Everton were clearly the better team - Liverpool got two lucky goals, due to that retarded "tap the ball two yards to the side so that the wall can be half the distance away when they shoot" free kick routine actually working due to Gerrard's shot sneaking under three separate defenders, and Martyn being caught in two minds for Morientes' speculative effort leaving Luis Garcia to score the easiest goal he'll ever score (although he did try to put it over, only Ljungberg could miss from there).

The whole point of this is that Liverpool are now in with an outside chance of overtaking their city rivals for the last Champions League spot, and coupled with their Reserve Team Cup final appearance and CL quarter final (achieved by a last minute winner against Olymipakos, who Newcastle coincidentally put seven past, and meeting a pisspoor Leverkusen), and ergo their fans will still think they're a "big club". Clue - you ceased to be a big club some time in the early 90's when you stopped being a genuine contender for the title. There's only three big clubs - United, Arsenal and Chelsea. Chelsea only being there as a result of being the latest team to be bankrolled to success (cf. Blackburn, Newcastle for a while, Leeds being the biggest case of self-implosion, at least Blackburn bounced back from relegation). Nobody else is coming within a sniff of a title. The best a non-big club is to hope to get 4th and qualify for the gravy train of the Champions League (we'll leave the aberration of a fourth place finisher making the "Champions" League for another post) a few times and join the big boys.

Liverpool are not a big club. Neither are Newcastle, Aston Villa (to me, they were last any good in the early 80's when they won the European Cup. As did Nottingham Forest, who look destined to either go into the old Third Division, or just escape), Man City, Spurs (who are surely the worst offenders for believing they're a big club - White Hart Lane's a shithole, live with it) or anyone else outside the top 3. They're on precisely the same level as Bolton, Charlton, Middlesbrough etc. who've fought their way up to become regular Premiership contenders, i.e. fighting for UEFA Cup places.

There are precisely three tiers - United, Arsenal, Chelsea, then those who aren't likely to get relegated, then those who can fuck it up (the borderline for the bottom two tiers is miniscule - cf. Southampton). Every team in that bottom tier can join every other team in the pyramid as far as I'm concerned - Birmingham are just as likely to qualify for Europe as Norwich, Wigan or Accrington Stanley. The likes of Liverpool need to stop living on past glories and get a fucking team together.

By the way, isn't it nice to see two grands prix without the name Schumacher featuring on the top of the rostrum? I wouldn't know, as they've buggered off to the third world for the first two and I'm not watching the thrill of pit stops at three in the morning. Even if I had a telly I wouldn't.

UK universities pool - not great

Played the UK universities pool singles competition yesterday down at Derby, as Sheffield's sole representative (not due to being in a different class to everyone else at uni, mainly because nobody else could be arsed). After a torts cancellation (need not have got up for 9 then... arse) I can make it down to Derby nice and early. Yes, got as far as Derby nice and early, took a while to find McLusky's (which is a nice enough venue, despite extortionate drinks prices as is the par for these places - luckily they had 2 for 1 on bottles), after walking through Derby city centre from the rail to bus station... I say city centre, there's a few shops and that's it. If they need a new nuclear weapon calibration site, I suggest there. Grab a bus in the direction of Spondon - driver doesn't know where the place is, although the bus should go straight past it. Eventually I see Spondon Snooker Club, figure that's a good place to try. Is the right place, thankfully, and I'm there for my match a good 5 hours early or so (taking into account they're naturally running late). Register, grab a coke (1 pound/half...) and find the Warwick boys for a chinwag. Dibben's doing some of his project, Charles is busy losing in the first round, and the rest of the B team are about, as is Richie Vegas. A few quid shoved in the quiz machines later, and I eventually kick off my prelim match for the right to get into the last 128. Playing Abdur from Cambridge, lose 3-1. Take the first with a little good fortune, lose the second after jawing a difficult black after a bad positional shot on the last colour, outplayed in the third and then lose the fourth after being caught in two minds whether to play a pot or safety and get neither, leaving him enough room to cut in a black which I thought I'd cover anyway. The guy then beats last year's England B captain (I think, Matt O'Keeffe from Durham anyway) 3-0 before losing to UK number 6 (outright, not students) Neil Raybone. I wasn't going far even if I won then... Raybone eventually gets through to Mark Jones (who dumped out seed Ricky Taylor earlier) and wins 3-2 in a good match.

Incidentally, during my match some guy from Middlesex starts effing and jeffing good and proper, clearly because he doesn't know world rules. If we're talking poker, it's a Hellmuth 20 minute job. Had to take a tactical time out to let the guy calm down.

Shove some more money in the quizzie, down some cheap beers and watch the Warwick kids. Only one who has any luck is "shit the bed" Dibben, who reaches the quarters in the junior section despite good efforts from all. Unfortunately, I nearly fucked over his chances good and proper. After Vegas is the last to complete, Craig gives me a lift back to Derby station (at which I had to wait 90 mins for the last Sheffield train, then get a surprisingly cheap cab back). I grab my cue and bag, check I've not missed the last train and signal them off (I could have gone back to Leam with them). At least I think that's my cue... shit that's Dibben's cue. Give them a bell, don't know what to do. Can they turn back? No, they're at Leicester by now. Luckily some guys from Birmingham were about as they missed their last train, and leave it with them. While John's cue is (hopefully) safely in his possession, mine's in Craig's car and will likely be on Ebay within days.

All in all, a bit of a pisser of a day, but it was a laugh. Didn't help my bank balance though :-)

Administrative errors kick ass

Heh, because some people cocked things up, a lot of the ILLS marks were incorrect. So instead of the previously reported 58, I actually got 68. Get in.

Have seen the UK uni pool draw. Got a prelim against some guy who's doing OK in Cambridge's league, followed by some guy from Durham who beat Rich from Warwick at 9-ball in the team final of that event. First Warwick player I could conceivably play is Jonesy in the last 16. I wish :-)

England rugby - an objective analysis

I was amused to read the back page of the Times yesterday where Sir Clive Woodward (for it is he) says that England need to stop whining about injuries and bad refereeing decisions to start winning again. There's just one small problem with that - we don't need to have both of those fixed in order to win again, just one will do. A non-bent ref would have seen us home against Ireland (who choked against a poor French team who weren't playing well but still repeatedly crossed the Irish line, something they couldn't do against us), someone who can kick (a certain Newcastle fly half springs to mind) and we beat France, and probably Wales as well. Then the grand slam is as good as ours.

We're not as bad as things look (although it's difficult to come up with good comments when we've got a fourth place playoff with Scotland next week), but we're definitely a team in transition. Look at the team against Italy yesterday and who the survivors from the World Cup are - Steve "Liability" Thompson, Ben "Teflon" Kay and Josh "Fairy" Lewsey. We're missing both of our props through injury, Johnno's gone but we've got Danny the Thug to play 4, the dream team back row has seen Richard Hill (by far the most important player we have) out long term and two retirements. Dawson's past it, Wilko's always injured. Cohen's been usurped by Cuets, Mike "God" Tindall's been off the pitch more than on it and Greenwood's nowhere. Even Robinson was injured.

A full strength England team is easily the best in the northern hemisphere at present, and if we use comparisons via Wales, still competitive against anyone. We've just not seen that team once since Sydney.

By the way, it's a shame Ireland lost yesterday. They normally leave their choking until the last game. Now Wales will have the sole opportunity to fluff their lines on the biggest stage.

Results - good!

58 on ILLS, 55 on public (?) and 52 on contract. All 2:2's, not great but I'll take them seeing how they don't count for anything in the long run.

Long time no post...

Have just about got over this cold I've had for the past week or so... apart from that what's been happening? Not much, just plodding along until the Easter break. Won my table on Monday to go top of the league, a proper demolition job in about 45 minutes, raising like a madman (and drawing out on people three times to knock them out... only time I was ahead, the guy called off his stack because "he knew I was bluffing"... with a full house) but not winning quickly enough to play the VC freeroll. Did the Earnshaw quiz on Sunday - shit music selection (Eamon and Frankee back to back... Matinee five times... shuffle button broken) and 18/50 due to an impossible 20 mark music round. Winners got 40+ apparently. Cheats. Did the Cobden quiz yesterday while watching the Chelsea game (get in!), made 16/31 before the cavalry arrived from the curry house with one question to go to pull up to 21. Win was 27 though.

And I've installed Pine on my computer now - no more using the really shit webmail portal to check my emails. Also discovered that Sheffield do, in fact, have a NNTP server, with a surprising number of alt.binaries.erotica groups... filthy IT techie types :-)

Up, up, up, down, up

No posts for a while - have been pouting for a bit over England's continued pisspoor performances and Kaplan's blatant disregard for the rules, tempered only by a Rooney brace and Solano goal to consolidate my fantasy league lead. Still, yesterday was a bit of a rollercoaster - quickly up a fiver on the quiz machines, then my day was kind of thrown out a bit by a very (read - 40 minutes) early end to the afternoon property double header (cheers Pete!). This left me with far too much time on my hands, meaning that I got down to the Cat rather early for the UKSPC qualifier shootout. Some quick chips and laughing at Rich's Su Doku inadequacies later (the bastards have put up the prices of the burgers again... 5.75 is a bit too pricey) and we kick off. I'm on the same table as Kev, Dan, Charlotte and some other woman who I don't recognise (apparently only played twice in her life - no disrespect but it showed). Got a little shortstacked but we were down to three due to Dan's dubious stack management. Win a checked down pot off Kev with kings (ace on the flop, another on the turn - I think we both thought we had a third) and he folds to a couple of all-ins as well to put me on a precisely average stack. Kev then knocks Charlie out and has a precise 2:1 chip advantage heads up. This doesn't last long - we get all-in preflop, his A-6 suited against my Q-10 suited (both the same suit, funnily enough). A rivered queen reverses the stacks and I get J-9 in the SB. Limp, check, flop is J-J-9. Check, check, turn is a queen, Kev stacks, I beat him to the pot, his Q-6 doesn't improve. Final table!

This wasn't as good. Leda busts out early and another player drops out, leaving four left - effectively three for two tickets as John was ineligible. After playing one pot with Q-Q in the first level and folding on the turn to a scary board (after a 2x the pot bet which would set me all-in), I nick the blinds with A-3 (all-in uncalled), and with about 1000 and 100-200 blinds, I pick up A-10 UTG and move in, called quickly by A-K and I get no help. Bubbled, fuck.

Still, I picked up a cookbook for it, and my mood is slightly improved by the fact that Real Groovy's replacement Back Of The Y DVD has arrived! The first one went AWOL, but I'll give them credit for sending out a replacement and it coming quickly. Excellent.

Played one turbo heads-up today and get A-A first hand in the BB. SB goes all-in before I can act! His 9-8 stood no chance, quickest win ever :-)