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The London 2012 Olympics started with thousands of amateurs putting on a professional show. Since then our professional athletes have put on an amateur show. Our best dive didn’t come from Tom Daly in the pool but the Queen out of a helicopter.
Reporting Scotland tried to claim one of the Bronze winning Team GB gymnasts as a Scottish success. He may have a mother from Dundee but he was born in Liverpool, lives in Liverpool, supports Liverpool, speak with a Liverpudlian accent and his favorite song is Ferry Across the Mersey. Although BBC Scotland must have seen that he was ginger and decided that made him Scottish.
Why is beach volleyball considered sexist but men in speedos for the diving isn’t? Why are they all toned? Surely fat people could fall gracefully too?
Why do swimmers get changed at the poolside? Do they not have 20p for the lockers? They should be forced to swim with a bracelet containing their locker key. Why is 100m Freestyle in the swimming called freestyle? Everyone does the crawl. Why when a Chinese 16-year-old girl swims faster than a man do we ask for her to be drug tested. We should actually check that she isn’t a man.
Why if the pinnacle of your sport is not the Olympics are you in the Olympics? I would not allow football, tennis or wrestling to take place as I bet any participants in those sports would rather win the World Cup, Wimbledon or a WWE “Hell in a Cell” match.
I thought of this as I sat in the Theatre of Dreams (if your dream is a bad view of the pitch) Hampden Park whilst watching USA take on France at the Women’s Olympic football.
I’d gone to the game as a) it was Free and B) point A was more than enough reason. I was intrigued how it would compare with the men’s game. I can only say that the players I saw lacked skill, technique and pace. Some struggled with tactics whilst others ran around like headless chickens. All in all a very similar standard to the Scottish Men’s national team.
I was suspicious that one of the female players may have been a man. Judge for yourself in this zoomed in photo:
Joking aside the game was entertaining. France were 2 nil up before surrendering their lead. Nice to see a nation live up to its stereotype. The players were tactically sound and there was a fair amount of skill on display but it felt very different to the men’s game. It was a lack of pace. A few people in the crowd also commented on how slow it felt. The players were all so similarly matched that they cancelled each other out and the end result was the perceived slowness.
Outside the stadium the organisers had really made an effort to entertain the fans by putting on some entertainment. This lot were dancing away
…and it’s fair to say they had the biggest crowd of the day. If they were put on before Scotland Games then nobody would end up going into the stadium!
I think the women’s game is best summed up by this short clip from Futurama. Good fundamentals but they can’t dunk.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feE1G2sJty0&w=420&h=315]
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About the Author
Iain “Toddinho” Todd mistakenly believes he could have been a professional footballer if only the ‘The Claude Makelele role’ had been invented in the 1980’s. Unfortunately his ability to be neither a defender or a midfielder meant he could often be found on the bench. His greatest achievement was a match winning hat trick which the local paper reported as been scored by his twin brother and his brother wasn’t even playing that day. He recently celebrated 25 years of playing 5 aside footy and has nothing to show for it other than a dodgy hip.
Iain Todd graduated from Charlie Ross’s comedy class and has subsequently shown why Charlie should fail some students. He does open spots as one half of “The Brothers Todd” – the third best comedy twin act in the world! Only three comedy twin acts are in the world so they are also the world’s worst. They make Jedward look talented.
He stalks celebrities at @iainmacivertodd
