Balls! And Wheels!

England manager Fabio Capello reckons "(he doesn't) have to speak about a lot of different things. Maximum 100 words" when talking tactics with the England squad so in his view he need not improve his sometimes impenetrable English. That's 92 more words than Kevin "Run around a lot lads, I feel lucky" Keegan ever used then, so Fabio is probably right in his assumption!

Capello bashing has become a large participant sport in recent times, and amongst various misdemeanours our Fabio is being slated for is failing to remind Wayne Rooney that he was already on one yellow card before his needless booking on Saturday, which now means Wazza will be suspended for the Switzerland qualifier. What, is Rooney incapable of remembering simple things like that for himself?......Ah, stupid question!

Exactly what is the point of a friendly international being played three days after a competitive game? Answers on a postcard to Lancaster Gate. Speaking of which, insanely over-priced £35 million pound lummox Andy Carroll will start the game. Capello has told Carroll he should drink less beer and that he needs to improve. Improve? Just a touch, say by about 1000% then he might be worth about half what he was bought for.
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Predictably enough, the England cricket team lost (ahem...alright, they were utterly Murali'd) to Sri Lanka in their quarter final at the World Cup, thus ending a ludicrous five months on the road. What do the ECB expect when they, and let's be fair here, all other worldwide cricket authorities, insist on daft amounts of cricket being played? What in my opinion did for England, mounting injuries aside, was the seven game ODI series with the Aussies immediately after the Ashes where we played so well. Firstly the ODI series was at least two games too long and secondly it should have been played before the Ashes to maintain both spectator, and, more importantly, player motivation. When we arrived on the sub continent for the World Cup we were already jaded, and never really got going. The ECB should at the very least ensure that this length of overseas tour must never happen again.
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Those of you who follow the well heeled circus that is F1 may be worried, like me, that with the increasing dominance of Red Bull and Sebastian Vettel that we are in for a period of Ferrari & Schumacher style boredom, sorry, dominance for the next few seasons. Sunday's race was so dominated by Vettel he won it without really trying, and Vettel has all the charisma of an oil sump, so he's well up there in the Schumacher snooze inducing stakes. All the signs are there, then.

Warm Leatherette