The Secret Diary of Lewis Hamilton, aged 22 & three-quarters

When I was little, I used to drive go-karts but then a man called Ron came up to me and asked me if I could drive his car for him.








At first, he would only let me drive little cars, but then one day, he let me drive a really fast Mercedes car. I really enjoyed racing the big car, even if I had to work with a really nasty Spaniard who didn't like me very much and I even won a few races.

In the end, I finished second because the car broke down and then I went to live in Switzerland so that the nasty tax man can't take any of my money.

Now of course, all of that probably isn't an extract from the Lewis Hamilton: My Story - available from all good book stores and some rubbish ones as well.

Neither is it a slant at a young, British driver who has got people talking once again about a sport that had a dwindling following before he arrived on the scene.

But the point, as you might have gathered, is more a question as to how someone of 22 years of age, with just one full-season of top-class sport behind him, can possibly write a full, worthwhile autobiography?

Unfortunately, he's not alone when it comes to pointless autobiographies and with 2006 being a World Cup year, last Christmas was full of them.

Frank Lampard, Wayne Rooney, Ashley Cole, Rio Ferdinand, Steven Gerrard and Joe Cole - all players who achieved the net sum of "zero" during the 2006 tournament in Germany despite a hefty match fee were all lured by another big cheque to cram pad out their entire life story into a few hundred pages. Then Manchester City loud-mouth Joey Barton summed up my feelings perfectly:

“England did nothing in the World Cup so why were they bringing books out?” Barton asked. “ ‘We got beat in the quarter-finals. I played like s***. Here’s my book’.”

Sports autobiographies can be excellent. Lance Armstrong's series of books but, most notably, 'It's not about the Bike' is superb. Tawera Nikau, a former Castleford, Warrington and New Zealand international rugby league player who had to content with the tragic death of his wife and the loss of his right leg, wrote the eye-opening 'Standing Tall' and the likes of Tony Adams, Paul McGrath and Paul Gascoigne have all put together good books which, unfortunately, get lost in a sea of shite on the shelves of Waterstones.

Another quick search on Amazon brings up such delights as 'Russell Brand: My Booky Wooky', 'Jodie Marsh: Keeping it Real', 'Being Jordan' and 'My Autobiography' by Big Brother ignorant Jade Goody.

Honestly? Who buys this garbage?

The Haka

It's one of the iconic sights in international sport, calling on a nations aboriginal heritage and declaring war on the opposition, albeit in a sporting context.



It's most notably performed by the New Zealand rugby sides and on Saturday, New Zealand's rugby league side kick-off a three-match test series against Great Britain in Hudderfield.

I'll confess that I haven't actually seen the "Kiwi's" peform the Haka in person. I've seen the Fijian's perform their versionm 'The Cibi', at the 2000 World Cup and I've seen a spectacular rendition of both the Samoan and Tongan Hakas, performed simultaneously, towards each other, only last year in a World Cup qualifier in Leeds.

But's I've not yet seen the New Zealand version, instead, having to make do with the television:



A lot of opponents have foolishly tried to challenge the Haka, in both codes, non more so than Australian forward Willie Mason, who's probably still suffering the after affects from the 2006 Tri-Nations. It's not big, it's not clever, and more often that not, you end up paying for it.

Tomorrow, I'll be attending the first Gillette Fusion test at the Galpharm Stadium, hoping for a British win of course.

What can Sheffield Wednesday teach us?

[obligatory joke answer] How not to play football! [/obligatory joke answer]








Sheffield Wednesday, a Championship football club in South Yorkshire are probably making a lot of bloggers and forum users think at the minute.

Sheffield Wednesday currently lie 22nd in the Coca-Cola Championship and, as I type this, are trailing 2-1 at home to newly promoted Scunthorpe United. They are reportedly in financial trouble and their supporters, understandably, are frustrated with goings on at the club.

It's the sort of scenario that most sports supporters will probably be familiar with.

In the past, these sorts of issues would be discussed over a pint in the local pub, around the water cooler in the office or in the factory canteen. You could shout, swear and put the world to rights as much as you wanted with no fear of the consequences.

Today, we've got a new medium - the world wide web.

If you can think of a special interest, no matter how mainstream, how commercial or how bizarre, there's probably a website, blog and forum on it and in this case, you don't have to look hard to find a football forum.

That's where Sheffield Wednesday come into it.

After being unimpressed with the running of the club this summer, a number of supporters, like fans of any club would, vented their frustration on the fans forum Owlstalk.

The board at Hillsborough however, didn't take too kindly to the comments and filed a defamation lawsuit against 34 of its own supporters. That number has since reduced to the point where the High Court has ordered the owner of the site to hand over details of three users of the site.

It made me question my own position, both as a blogger and as an internet forum user.
I've looked at some of the posts that have been mentioned in the court documents and, to be honest, you soon realise how careful you could have to be.

I won't post examples in here, but you can read them for yourself here.

Upon reading those comments, it's nothing that I haven't already read on plenty of internet message boards in the past. I've also posted my fair share of uncomplimentary things on here about certain firms / people in the past with minimal thought and I'm sure most other blog posters have as well.

Whilst it's no excuse for a publication (and a web forum or blog is a publication) to defame individuals, I'd like to think that most football clubs would be "PR savvy" enough to realise that taking legal action against users of a fan site is something of an "own goal". It also opens up the whole "freedom of speech" argument. We aren't going to see a "Google.cn" style of censorship, but are we going to be in a position where people are wary of sharing opinions and ideas?

Whatever happens in this case over the coming months, the stance taken by a lot of football forums in the future could be extremely interesting.

Try or no Try?

I'm a rugby league fan. I'm used to seeing video referee decisions that, to say the least, raise more questions than they answer.





I could go on and on about how I've seen video referee decisions that have caused outcry in the game. I remember seeing a decision go against Bradford Bulls which effectively cost them the Grand Final in 1999, I've seen my own team Leeds have plenty of decisions go against us and for us since the idea of video replays was first introduced to the sport in 1995.

Obviously, such instances are not unique to rugby league, as was proved less than a hour ago in the Rugby Union World Cup final.

England, trailing 9-3 early in the second half, make a rare clean break for the South African line, which ends in this very scene just seconds later:


A video referee is called in to adjudicate on the decision. Did Mark Cueto leave the field of play before he grounded the ball? The people watching my TV set as the action was replayed from various angles couldn't agree and, from that second picture at least, the fourth official was being asked to decide whether a certain blade of grass was painted white or not, such was the margin.

After plenty of deliberation, the try was ruled out. In the end, it would have made little difference as the Springboks came out 15-6 winners in Paris to clinch their second World Cup.

In the end, you'd have to say that it was a fair result and concede that the "right" team won the tournament. England have been poor in the years leading up to the tournament, they were poor when they first arrived in France and, long story short, they aren't the best team in the world. South Africa on the other hand, are unbeaten in the tournament, thrashed England 36-0 in the group stages and knew how to play England's game tonight.

Lewis Hamilton could cheer the nation up tomorrow, as at the age of 22, he looks to become the first ever F1 driver to be crowned World Champion in his debut season.

Crap TV adverts

One advert is irritating me lately and really hope that I'm not the only one that cringes every time I see it.







It's the Bridgestone tyres advert, and I just don't get what it's trying to tell me.

Problem number one: The music bed is completely to cock. It starts with an operatic attempt at "World in Union" which, whilst not my first choice for a tyre commercial, isn't completely unacceptable, but the "sting" at the end is. It's completely out of sync and is the sort of thing that would fail a GCSE media studies project, let alone a multi-million pound marketing campaign.

Then, the images. Why would I deliberately drive over a wooden plank with 12 inch nails protruding upwards? Why would I be interested in F1 slicks that aren't road legal? Why would the fact that Bridgestone tyres are used on a Boeing 747 encourage me to put them on my Citroen Saxo? You really haven't identified your demographic have you?

I'd love to meet the marketing exec who signed it off.

Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find the offending article online, but I have managed to find another Bridgestone commercial from years gone by, but one that probably didn't make our airwaves.

The ad still seems to be more one for a certain car manufacturers brake discs, but it's better than what they are currently inflicting upon us.

A great sporting weekend

What a fantastic sporting weekend we have just witnessed.....







Now upon seeing that sentence, you'll probably be expecting this blog post to claim how fantastic it was that England's footballers beat a team of Estonian bricklayers and minicab drivers whilst the nation's over aged public-schoolboy squad somehow squirmed their way into the Rugby Union World Cup final against a side that, for much of their history, were merely a Nazi-sponsored band of looters and thieves. (Mike Rylance's book 'The Forbidden Game' will tell you more).

But no. For me, the event of the weekend was the engage Super League Grand Final in which my team Leeds battered the defending champions St Helens by 33-6 to win the domestic rugby league championship.

Before the game it was impossible to split the sides. In the past three meetings, Leeds had won two, St Helens the other. In the league, one competition point split first-placed St Helens from the Rhinos and in the play-off game at Knowsley Road, a dubiously awarded penalty goal was all that split the pair. What we saw was a second-half blitz from Leeds which blew away the current World Club Champions.

It was a fantastic day out in Manchester and, unusually for a Leeds side, a stunning final performance in front of 71,000 people at Old Trafford.

It wasn't just the victory, or the manner of the victory against a side that has really set the benchmark in recent seasons, but there were plenty of other subplots behind yesterday's game.

In the early hours of Saturday, just a matter of hours before the sides were due to take the field, former Leeds scrum-half Jeff Stevenson passed away at the age of 75. During the presentation, Leeds captain Kevin Sinfield paid tribute to the Leeds legend in his post-match acceptance speech.

If their was any other motivation needed for the side, another Leeds legend and perennial gobshite Garry Schofield was busy making himself look an idiot one again and proclaiming how Leeds would get stuffed. As great a player Schofield was for both Leeds and Great Britain, he's a nothing pundit. Anyone inside the game knows that, the fans know that and the press know that - it's just that he can always be relied upon to make a stupid headline grabbing comment at the expense of his own dignity - as was the case this weekend and many weekend's before it.

It was also the final game in charge of Leeds for coach Tony Smith - and what a final game. After joining the club in 2004, Smith has guided Leeds to three Grand Finals in four years, winning two of them and in his debut season, brought Leeds their first title for 32 years. Smith will now take the job of national team coach.

So all in all, a fantastic sporting weekend only dampened by Farsley Celtic's unlucky 1-0 loss to Oxford United.

Getting the message across?

The BBC are in a bit of bother again this week, except this time they aren't pulling a premium-rate phone scam or getting 9-year-olds to fake a competition win.






As part of a HIV awareness drive, the Beeb have introduced an educational video which has been attacked by "parent groups" (no me neither). It's probably worth mentioning that the Metro happens to have some link with worst rag in the UK, the Daily Mail, a publication that is hardly supportive of the BBC it has to be said.

Judge for yourself:



Now I don't care what anybody says - that's funny. OK, so the overall message might get lost in translation, but it's definitely got people talking and no doubt the hits for that online video will be skyrocketing.

Mission accomplished surely?

Football Fortunes

After a summer of turmoil, Leeds United are appearing in a live televised game for the first time this season.






OK, so it's the Johnstone's Paint Trophy, the butt of all professional football jokes since it's inception in 1983, but they face Darlington tonight on the road to Wembley. It was almost inevitable that the match presenter opened the programme with "Seven years ago, Leeds were in the Champions League", but playing in the football league trophy is hardly the worst thing that could have happened to the club lately.

After being all-but relegated last season, the club exploited a Football League loophole and entered administration due to the long-term debts the club accrued in an ill-fated drive for the Champions League, with unsecured debts totaling £100m at one point before a succession of chairman chipped away at the debt.

Football League rules meant that Leeds incurred a 10-point penalty for their financial situation but, as they were effectively relegated anyway, the club faced the wrath of fellow Football League members.

As it emerged, it was all one big debt avoidance scheme by chairman Ken Bates, a man who himself resides in the tax-haven that is Monte Carlo.

Creditors of the club were vast, ranging from a local mobile DJ, a balloon supplier, St Gemma's Hospice and the St John's Ambulance but it was four main parties that were of major interest in this remarkable saga.

Whilst their was a number of creditors, the bulk of the debt was owed to four parties. Astor Holdings, Krato Trust, Forward Sports Fund and HMRC - the tax man to you and me. But here's the twist: Nobody had ever heard of the former three firms, they were based at various parts of the globe, including the British Virgin Islands, where businesses can set themselves up almost anonymously. The link was that Bates was attached or associated with the three firms all along. He was in a win-win situation. 75% of a creditors vote was needed for a new ownership of the club, yet Bates himself was attached to 45% of the creditors.

Bates promptly made an offer to creditors - you would get 1p back for every £1 you were owed. That meant that a local hospice, who were owed more than £800, would get little more that £8. However, in line with Football League regulations, all 'football creditors' had to be paid. That meant that former players, owed hundreds of thousands of pounds, would receive every penny.

The offer didn't go down too well with the tax-man, who challenged the resulting CVA.

I could go on here but I'll bore you. Long story short, the CVA was scrapped, against Football League rules, and after much uncertainty over whether the club would be allowed to compete, they were eventually, at the eleventh hour, granted entry to League One - with a 15-point deduction and no FA membership.

There was one other Yorkshire side though who weren't so lucky.

Scarborough FC are another football club who had been teetering on the brink of collapse for a number of years.

As the debts mounted, the solution seemed to be to leave their home at Seamer Road and move to a new, purpose built ground on the outskirts of the city. There nothing wrong with the McCain Stadium, I went their myself whilst following Farsley Celtic last season and as a Conference North ground, there few, if any that were better. But the site was prime land for property developers. Flats and apartments were starting to surround the ground and the "Seadogs" wanted to cash-in on the housing boom.

But local politics got in the way. A covenant existed on the site that restricted its use only to sporting activities. There was no way that the site could be sold to a property developer without the covenant being lifted. Despite the club's best efforts to convince the authorities that this plan would save the club, Scarborough Borough Council refused to budge.

Inevitably, the club was wound up. A new club has formed, Scarborough Athletic, in the Northern Counties East League and the club, an offshoot from a side that was facing Chelsea in the FA Cup in 2004, will face Kirkbymoorside this coming Saturday as part of a league campaign that will take in Rainworth Miners Welfare and the Leeds Metropolitan University team.

There are probably intricacies and details that I'm probably not aware of in the case of Scarborough FC, but from the outset, it seems a shame that a local authority was so short-sighted when it came to the state of the club. After insisting that the site at Seamer Road could only be used for sport, they now have a site with no sports team which will, in all likelihood, be sold off to a property developer.

I also type this just hours after Widnes Vikings RLFC themselves entered administration.

In the chase for promotion, they banked heavily on a result which, on Sunday, never came. Today the club are counting the cost of that ambition and, although it would seem unlikely, the sport could lose one of it's great names.

The rugby league authorities are introducing a franchising system from 2009, which would eliminate automatic promotion and relegation and force clubs to build a long-term plan and prove that they are capable of competing in the elite division - both on and off the field. It can't come soon enough.

A Plea

On Friday night, Leeds Rhinos ended their home campaign by booking their place at the Rugby Super League Grand Final at Old Trafford.

A 36-6 victory over Wigan in the Final Eliminator of the play-offs means that Leeds will now face St Helens at the home of Manchester United for the right to be crowned Super League champions and after queuing for around 2 and a half hours from 7:50am on Saturday, I had my match ticket in hand.

The Grand Final itself is a fantastic concept and a great day out. The game is played in the sports traditional heartlands, Manchester City Centre opens up it's bars to supporters of all clubs without the need for the heavy police presence that accompanies certain other sports and the game itself is as tense as anything ever seen in a sporting arena. A full season of work comes down to 80 minutes.

That photo was taken in 2004 - when Leeds won the championship for the first time in 32 years and it was an unforgettable day. It also showed that even Leeds' rugby team can do something that Leeds United can't do - win at Old Trafford. ;)

But there is one downside. One blight on the evening that spoils the day for all involved - air horns.

Despite the various signs displayed at every turnstile informing you that such items are banned from all British sporting stadia, street traders the length of Sir Matt Busby Way will be peddling these infernal horns to people stupid enough to buy them. As soon as the gates open and you reach your seat, you are guaranteed to be sat in front of some brat who insists pointing his new-found toy directly at your ear lobe.

Some of us see sense. There is a bloke selling the same offending articles at Headingley, standing on St Michael's Lane before every home game. Despite this, I have never heard an air horn sound in the ground for as long as I can remember - and I don't think that's down to the eagle-eyed stewards telling purchasers where to shove the offending object before they enter the ground. Quite how that seller earns a living is quite intriguing.

So anyway - it's time to take a stand. If you're going to the Grand Final on Saturday - don't buy air horns. Don't even think about it - just don't.

I even made a crappy photoshop banner to start my campaign. Feel free to steal it if you wish.

Ice Hockey is funny

The NHL came to London this week in the first of many attempts by the Americans to spark some interest from Europe in sports that, generally speaking, only Americans play.




We've got Basketball and American Football yet to come, but the National Hockey League took centre stage this weekend as the Anaheim Ducks played the LA Kings in two NHL regular season fixtures.

The aim of the game is to build a team of big, angry, violent, toothless Canadians, give them a stick and some ice skates and get them to score more goals than the opposition whilst also trying to start as many fights as possible in the three periods of play - simple really.

As it turned out, LA won the first game 4-1 whilst the Ducks won the second game 4-1.

Personally, the main reason I subscribed to NASN (aside from the fact that it comes bundled with Setanta) was for the almost wall-to-wall NHL coverage and there is a hell of a lot of skill involved besides just trying to knock as many teeth out of an opponents gum as possible, even if that is the biggest crowd puller. A bit like this one between the Philadelphia Flyers and Owatta Senators:



But in the world of sporting hard-men, there's always one who's on standby ready to make a pillock of himself and in this blog, we pay homage to Calgary Flames hard-nut Dion Phaneuf.

Enjoy!