Evonne Goolagong US Open 1972

Evonne Goolagong, US Open 1972

A weekly image from my archive. Click on the image to make it larger.
Since it is US Open Week: Evonne Goolagong Cawley at the 1972 US Open Championships at Forest Hills Goolagong later lost to Teeguarden in the 3rd Round. There are some additional photos on my flickr page of her and many other great players. (Here)

All about the T Shirt

I had some fun with my latest blurb book. It is quite silly but I got to the point where I had to throw out some of my collection and thus decided to commit them to print posterity.

It's all about...

By Michael Cairns

Book Preview

Munich: February 6th 1958 - Repost

Originally posted on 2/6/08.

Today is the 50th anniversary of the air crash that killed eight members of the Manchester United football team among 23 who died when a plane they were on crashed on take-off. It was the aircraft’s third attempt to gain altitude but the snow and ice that had accumulated on the plane and slush at the end of the runway ensured it never achieved the lift necessary for take-off. The plane clipped a fence at the end of the runway and split open on impact. The team members who died were Roger Byrne, Billy Whelan, Tommy Taylor, Duncan Edwards, Mark Jones, Eddie Colman, Geoff Bent and David Pegg. It is hard to underestimate the impact the tragedy had on Manchester and England at the time. All were members of a youthful team dubbed the Busby Babes so named after the team's manager. Many of the dead not only played team football but had already been named to the full England team despite their youth. There was a wider context in that the crash occurred only 13 years after the end of WW2 and this team somehow represented a new generation free from the expectation of deprivation and war. In contrast to the US, the nation was only just starting to come out of the war years and rationing had only just ended.

Duncan Edwards, ‘the young colossus’ was the soul of the team. At 21, he survived the actual crash but died from his injuries 15 days later. Perhaps the intervening years have added to his mystique but even in his day he was considered a special footballer. Bobby Charlton who survived the crash and went on to a phenomenal club and international career has said he was "his hero and a beautiful, beautiful footballer and he has never seen one better." Bobby played with George Best and against Pele, Eusebio, Beckenbauer among other great players of the 1960s and 1970s. Family legend has it that some of the team were billeted in a rooming house my grandfather owned near the ground and that my father had a kick-around with Duncan and the other team members from time to time.

Manchester United is a world club just like the Yankees but bigger. The Munich disaster punctuates any discussion about the team - even today, whether the fan is in Japan, China or England. It is one of those club facts that a new fan - or in my case a young fan becoming more aware - is confronted with. At the ground, despite all its changes in the years since, still has a clock set to the time and date of the crash. No one visiting the ground can fail to see it.

No one knows what the Busby Babes team could have accomplished. This team, with an average age about 22, had already won the league title twice and the night of the crash they went into the semi-final of the European Cup for the second straight year. Sir Matt Busby, who almost died in the crash, went on to rebuild the team around the nucleus of the remaining players. It took another ten years until the team led by Bobby Charlton and another Busby wunderkind named George Best conquered Europe. Today, and this weekend there will be commemorations about this event for ‘the young players with the world at their feet – suddenly no more,” lest we not forget them.

Manchester United
BBC
Football Focus

Technology and Sport 2000-2009

On the Sports Blog at the Guardian they intertwine who did what over the past ten years with a look at how technology has redefined how we interact with live and broadcast sport events (Guardian).

It would be a mistake to think of Wetzel's new buddy from Arizona as the geek at the gate: a pauper disenfranchised by exorbitant ticket costs. This was a lesson in fan empowerment. The non-live spectator is now a kind of Willy Wonka in a paradise of instant-thrill-availability. "In 1999 the vast majority of Americans didn't know how to send or receive a text message on their cell phones," Wetzel wrote. "Now we watch TV on the thing. The biggest story of the decade wasn't what Pacquiao did but where you could watch him do it."

This is one revolution that will be televised. The old models of image and information dispersal have been demolished. For all the dramas on the field of the play technology is the real story of sport in the so-called Noughties. At Premier League football grounds now it is common to sit behind a fan who is watching Jeff Stelling in the Sky Sports Soccer Saturday studio while also observing the game on the turf below.

For some, text alerts, hot clip downloads and breaking news are now part of the package of being a supporter. Sensory overload is available with a few prods of a phone screen. In the United States sports pages fight a losing battle for immediacy against NFL and NBA clubs who broadcast their post-match press conferences straight on to their own websites. Why wait for the next day's paper when you can hear what they said, right here, right now? A newspaper man will answer: because Pravda was not the best source of insights into Kremlin politics, but no one knows how much spectators value the objectivity that an independent media bring to analysis.

Tennis: US Open 1972

Re-posting this on the first day of the US Open and just for fun. Also the NYTimes takes a look at Rod Laver's record in majors. Had he had a full career in majors, Federer would still be chasing him. NYT

In applauding Federer, the commentators ignored Laver’s empty years from 1963 to 1967, when he disappeared into that era’s all but invisible professional tour. In those five years, Laver, a 5-foot-10, 160-pound red-headed Australian left-hander, could have won 10, if not more, of the 20 Grand Slam events, which were open only to amateurs. If Laver had 21 or more major titles, Federer would still be chasing as he awaits the United States Open. Laver would rightfully reign as the best tennis player in history, no arguments.

Originally posted July 6th:

On a day Roger Federer makes some tennis history, I thought it appropriate (or at least thematic) to show some scanned images from the 1972 US Open. I was not in attendance at Forest Hills and all these were taken by PND(OBE). Tennis was on the cusp of radical change; no Borg, McEnroe or Lendl. Connors seeded 15th lost in the first round. The total purse on the men's side was $166,000. Played on grass and you could even reach out and touch the players. (Flickr)

Champions (Again)

The nill nill draw with Arsenal gives United their 18th title and third successive league title. With one irrelevant game left in the league next week, it's on to Rome to meet Barcelona in the Champions League final. Looking forward to a repeat of our win last year. Old Trafford is the European Capital of Trophies.

Another Cairns on the Offensive

Apparently some other obnoxious basta'd named Michael Cairns is sticking it to the English cricket board. (Guardian)

Lancashire have launched a fresh and withering attack on Giles Clarke's leadership of the England and Wales Cricket Board, and have also criticised their fellow counties for allowing him to survive the Stanford affair.

Michael Cairns, a heavy-hitting businessman who succeeded Jack Simmons as the chairman at Old Trafford last year, claims in his annual report to members that "there is a serious lack of governance, transparency and accountability within the leadership and administration of the board".

"The Stanford debacle was a disgrace but regrettably only one example of mismanagement that the ECB have been guilty of over the past year," Cairns continues. "If such a performance was evident in any of the organisations that I have been associated with throughout my business career, the management would take it upon themselves to do the right thing and resign, or face the alternative.

Under Clark, the ECB struck an almost pornographic deal with "Sir" Alan Stanford who of course is apparently a crook. Basic due diligence (as with Madoff) would have made that clear at the outset.

Romancing Rugby

I think I'm going to be ill. (Time)

Holly, a virgin and a waitress, was recently dumped by her fiancé, and the subsequent turmoil has fueled an addiction to chocolate wafers — and resulted in an expanding waistline. As her self-esteem tanks, she learns that she must serve dinner to Prince Casper of Santallia in a hospitality suite at Twickenham, the home of England's national rugby team. Within minutes the playboy prince starts making passes (and not of the sporting kind), Holly slides across a table, and, for the first time in her life, she feels like a "rider clinging to the back of a thoroughbred stallion." It's pure bliss until cameramen beam the encounter on the stadium's Jumbotrons.

Typically, England go on to loose.

Tennis

Saturday' s tennis was memorable for one thing the weather wrought. That was the shriek of jet engines over Queens which other than the lack of a green court and quick camera views of Mayor Dinkins reminded us of how far the US Open has come. Federer is vulnerable but Nolo offered only passable resistance. In the booth during Federer's quarter final, Boris Becker and John McEnroe conversed in some of the best tennis analytics I have ever heard. Discussing how Federer is less confident, is playing several feet back from the base line and far less confident he can overwhelm his opponents. Far better discussion than the tedious repetition about about Uncle Tony, rankings, and Andy Murray's muscles.

Oh, by the way GB (o.k. Scotland) has a tennis player in the finals of the US Open. I feel very sorry for Rafa: given his year I would have loved to see him take the US Open as well. Que Lastima.

GB Gold Overflow

Just an unbelievable performance by the Great Britain team over the weekend. Four gold medals on both Saturday and Sunday has pushed us up to the heady heights of third on the medal table. We're running just ahead of Michael Phelps. And it's not over yet.

How good a Games has this been for Team GB? Well, a gold today will make this our most successful since 1920. The 11 collected so far matches our total in Sydney in 2000. We are well on course to make this our second best Olympics ever. BBC

Best of British: 1908 (London): 55 golds

1900 (Paris): 14 golds

1920 (Antwerp): 14 golds

2000 (Sydney): 11 golds

Everything's Live in Prime Time

I grew up in Hawaii. Lucky me. When John Lennon died we got to experience it twice. Why, because of ‘satellite delay’. Hawaii is so far west that most ‘live’ television was taped. When most of the nation heard Howard Cosell on Monday Night Football announce that John was dead we didn’t hear him say that for more than three hours, and by then we had been listening to the monster block to end all monster blocks. Almost 30 yrs later, you could be forgiven for thinking ‘satellite delay’ had disappeared along with wooden tennis rackets, members only and Journey. Not so.

When NBC and USA broadcast Wimbledon this year they showed the majority of the matches live; that is, except for the first men’s semifinal which Federer won. Unaware viewers found out the result of the first match during the second match which was shown live. There was some hue and cry about this at the time but tennis fans are generally a polite group. Remember the world cup in Japan/Korea? Well, luckily I was in Australia but in the US fans were left scratching their heads when live games were delayed.

In 1980 there wasn’t any alternative to watching events live if the broadcaster didn’t want us to. We had no choice. Clearly that is not the case now yet NBC continues to believe they know best what the viewer is interested in. NBC believes viewers want to see ‘live’ action in prime time. Forget the fact that this morning the NYTimes had images from the opening ceremonies, we won’t see the pictures live until later tonight. Which is just about when day two action starts.

Gary Zenkel, president of NBC Olympics, said. "We have three main constituency groups: our affiliates, our advertisers and our audience. To our affiliates and our advertisers, our responsibility is to (generate) the biggest audience that we can. And to our audience, our extensive research shows, that means putting it on when they say they want it, which is when they're available to watch it - and that's in prime time." Guardian

This type of ostrich like behavior is what’s so wrong with established media. While everything has changed the media companies try to pretend by force of will they can impose the old paradigm (on the ‘audience’). We’re all smarter than that and despite the 2,000+ hrs NBC are set to broadcast many viewers are going to be disappointed. NBC is not giving us the choices we have become accustomed to in the internet world. How far out of touch are they? An amusing anecdote regarding the LA Times which publicly patted itself on the back for a huge boost in on line traffic. Only the problem was their traffic was dwarfed by upstart Gawker media. SiliconAlleyinsider

Paradoxically, NBC maybe its own worse enemy; they recently launched Hulu.com which is a fantastic site and exactly what choice, selection and access is all about. Every Olympic event should be on Hulu the minute it finishes. I bet the traffic would be immense. On top of that I would guarantee viewers would settle in during prime time and watch again.

There are work arounds. Several web sites have jumped on this issue already. So if you are willing to stay up all night to watch curling check out alleyinsider.com for all the details.

Champions Again (Of Europe)

Only wish I was there. BBC Report.

Champions Again

Manchester United retained their Premier League title this afternoon with a tense win away to Wigan. Away to Wigan meant that most of the ground was filled with United supporters some of whom were paying $1000 a ticket to get into the ground. We are now one win away from an impressive double. The Champions league final against Chelsea is a week on Wednesday. The season didn't start so hot and the team went from this one off the bottom:






to the top having pushed aside the hated Arse but almost letting in Chelsea by the back door. You may wonder why I have this screen shot from the start of the season but I had faith the team would win.

I hear red is still the prevailing color choice in Moscow.

Giants

I don't profess to be much of a football fan, but that was some game. In a strange way the last drive had the air of inevitability....Now for the ticker tape parade and it won't be in the parking lot at Giants stadium either.

File Under Any News is Good News

Personally, my interest in the Tour Dey France ended the day after Floyd Landis won last year and we found out he was a doper. The feel good story bleed to death. After watching the tour through the Lance years Mrs PND and myself now have no interest; however, we are unique because Versus (candidate for dumbest brand name change of the year) the cable channel is reporting the highest viewship ever. This proves that any news is good PR and notoriety is paramount.

Weekly Update

As mentioned London Bookfair is next week and posts will be sporadic.

Deal News:
Wicks buys Thomson Education Direct (Distant Learning) Times Tribune
Torstar may be under attack and what of Harlequin? National Post
A possible buyer of the Borders' Australia and New Zealand stores. NZ Herald
Media finance conference in Europe announced. Release
Buyers are less then enthused with Primedia enthusiast magazines. Reuters
Reed Elsevier advised to gear up. The Independent
Nancy McKinstry thinks Germany is ripe for new deals. Reuters
Axel Springer likely to do more deals soon (doubtful in publishing). The Australian

Google News
Lorcan Dempsey linking to comment on Google and Publishers Blog
Adam Hodgkin on publishers grumbling about Google Blog

Education:
Harcourt have had a lot of problems in School academic testing this year. Casper Trib. ZDNET
Thomson revolutionizes marketing text Release
There will be more on this: Wikipedea 'broken beyond repair' according to founder. ITNews

Other News:
Penguin obsession Blog
Peter Brantley's lively discussion over a $58 Paperback Blog
Mike Hyatt on Imprints and the decision to do away with them Blog
GalleyCat linking to a Bookseller article about what works here but not there. Blog
Joe Wikert gets all riled up about the logic of Print Blog
Reed Elsevier can't trade mark 'Lawyers.com' Bloomberg
SmartMoney wonders why no one is excited about Gannett. Smartmoney
The commercial E-Book market is broken. Blog

People:
McGraw Hill Hire Dan Caton as Head of Learning Group Release
New Board Members for SIIA. Release
Riverdeep/Houghton Mifflin announce appointment of President. Release

Sport:
Man Utd into the Champions League semi-final in style BBC

Englishman in New York

One of the great things about living in New York (technically, I live 1.5miles to the west) is that you can find just about anything and if you work it right you can live in a neighborhood or interact completely with people from your own land. In my case, there are numerous opportunities to bond with fellow English (or Greater England) in bars and stores in lower Manhattan. On Saturday afternoon, I visited my favorite corner shop for a few pork pies, sausage rolls and some bangers. As a quite considerably displaced English person (via Thailand, New Zealand, Australia and Hawaii), I can still remember the first time I walked into Myers of Keswick. (This is not a good picture). I almost expected Ronnie Corbett to to be standing behind the counter. (Thankfully the shop assistants are considerably better looking). At Myers, you can find everything from Flake and Crunchie bars to Ribena to Branston Pickle all of which are favorites of mine. A side effect of the limitation on traveling with liquids has been a significant reduction of my direct importation so I am lucky to have Myers.

At the store, I also found out for the first time that a number of local West Village stores are attempting to designate the area bordered by W14th, Greenwich Avenue and W10th as “Little Britain”. The campaign was undertaken by Tea and Sympathy (a tea shop) and is also supported by Virgin who bring loads of us back and forwards from the UK. There does seem to be some support for the idea. If you navigate to the ‘map’ segment on the web site you will find all the local ‘little Britain’ attractions. Highlights are Myers, A Salt and Battery and The Spotted Pig.

Following my shopping visit to Myers, I wandered around the west village neighborhood and at one point joined a crowd outside a full pub named The Red Bull where the group were watching South Africa attempt to match the incredible 40 over total of Australia (377 and they won). Standing outside in a group of about 20 were people from England, South Africa and New Zealand all joined by their interest in Cricket. At the same time on a TV screen further inside the bar England were dismally performing something closely resembling football. I love New York.

St. Patrick's, Andrew, George, David, (and Ringo) Day

So when the news came out, I couldn't wait to tell Mrs PND who, while the family came over in 1820 or so, is still apparently Irish. Well perhaps not. Little did we know that those Spanish sailors marooned on the shores of Ireland in 1588 - thanks mainly to the weather - were actually about to be reacquainted with their long lost relatives. When I told her the Great in Great Britain is more a geographic reference (perhaps it should be 'Greater' Britain) and that we are all related I thought she was going to tear up. Not so fast, she has started to insist I am Irish... Still this bit of DNA revisionism is a story almost as strange as the one earlier in the year about co-joining France and England under the Queen.

To my mind what has been ignored through out the subsequent depressed drunken discussions about our heritage is why on earth our ancestors migrated from Northern Spain. What were they thinking? Why once they suffered through the first dank, dark and damp winter/spring/autumn didn't they high tail it back? We deserve ancestors so dumb. So anyway, in celebration of Sts Patrick, Andrew, George and David day, Mrs. PND dutifully got the corned beef, potatoes and leeks and made dinner. She did not however take my advice and deep fry the meat, boil the crap out of the potatoes and vegies, serve it lukewarm and knock it back with a few tumblers of Laphroaig. All for the best.

Nevertheless, this concatenation of nationalities has its benefits because it will give the English (who remember as a nation rarely win anything of note) that many more chances at glory. And as if to underline the potential rampant opportunities in store, the "Irish" Cricket Team beat Pakistan yesterday in perhaps one of the more noticeable victories ever in a World Cup. Go "Ireland" "Scotland" "Wales" and England!

News From Australia

SYDNEY(AP) - A seven-year-old boy was at the centre of a Parramatta, NSW courtroom drama yesterday when he challenged a court ruling over who should have custody of him. The boy had a history of being beaten by his parents and the judge initially awarded custody to his aunt, in keeping with child custody law and regulations requiring that family unity be maintained to the degree possible. The boy surprised the court when he proclaimed that his aunt beat him more than his parents and he adamantly refused to live with her.

When the judge then suggested that he live with his grandparents, the boy cried out that they also beat him. After considering the remainder of the immediate family and learning that domestic violence was apparently a way of life among them, the judge took the unprecedented
step of allowing the boy to propose who should have custody of him.

After two recesses to check legal references and confer with child welfare officials, the judge granted temporary custody to the English Cricket Team, whom the boy firmly believes are not capable of beating anyone.

Mr. Charkin had a recent post along the same lines. Dispair.

Spare a thought for my parents who have taken to spending the English winter in Australia but this year they got torential rains on Christmas Day, the Cricket team sucked and this week brush fires caused a power outage in Melbourne. Oh well...

Beckham: The Third Coming

First Pele came to the Cosmos, then Bestie came to San Jose and now Becks is to play for the LA Galaxy. Can Beckham save North American soccer? I wonder.

Both Pele and even Best had a very experienced supporting cast but that may not be the case with Beckham and his team. After all the LA team is one which not so long ago fielded a player who was also an actor on Melrose Place. (He has since disappeared from both acting and soccer). I believe there is still some great football left in David Beckham and it is a shame that we will not see him contend at the highest level in Europe.

It should be noted that The LA Galaxy are run by Alexi Lalas and he might be their best asset. The current team is coach by Frank Yallop who has coached the Canadian national team and played for Ipswich Town. An interesting dynamic will be the player coach relationship here. Becks has worked for the best in the business; Ferguson, Capello, Erikson....

With this move it is highly unlikely that he will ever play for England again - the chances were slight in any case despite England's dismal performances since he was dropped from the team after the World Cup. The deal which could bring him as much as $250mm is astonishing money and he would be a total mug not to accept the deal. So he is blameless. I can only hope that he maintains his fitness and plays at the highest level he can and not turn into the pale reflection of himself that George Best did when he was in the US. I wouldn't be surprized to see more big European stars signed under the so called Beckham rule. How about Zinedine for the Metrostars?

BTW - Harpercollins published his 'autobiography' a few years ago and I suspect there will be a second updated edition sometime soon.