I have been wondering for many years now, why the two greatest football clubs of Italy, AC Milan and Inter Milan, share the same stadium (called San Siro by the AC Milan fans and Giuseppe Meazza Stadium by the Inter fans). A lack of money to build a new one seems not to be the problem. So I got on the internet to try to find some more information about this stadium mystery.
AC Milan (you should not say now) was in the early 1900s a team that existed almost primarily of Italian players. But there were a few foreigner players, who felt subordinated in Milan. So they decided to form their own club: Internazionale.
San Siro originally is owned by AC Milan since 1926. In 1947 Internazionale became tenants and the two have shared the ground ever since. The stadium was officially renamed into Giuseppe Meazza Stadium after the star player of Inter in the 1930s, who also played for AC Milan for two years. But AC Milan fans still prefer the name San Siro. When you ask the direction to the Giuseppe Meazza Stadium in Milan to an AC fan, he or she would probably answer that they have never heard of that name.
So, it seems that both of the teams feel a lot of commitment to the stadium and that neither of the teams is willing to ever leave the stadium. On both sides there is a lot of Italian pride. And, actually, it is quite beautiful that these clubs who perform in this huge rivalry and sharing the same stadium. It’s like: keep your enemy close, peace!
It may indeed not be such a big surprise, but Kobe Bryant and LeBron James were the best men again!
Kobe Bryant led the West to the win this weekend in the All-Star Game this year (148 – 143). With 37 points and fourteen rebounds he became the celebrated man and he showed that he truly deserves his fourth MVP title.
At the side of the Eastern Conference, another leading figure of nowadays MBA should to be worth his money: LeBron James. But against the West 29 points, twelve rebounds and ten assists seemed not to be enough. Because Kevin Durant (34 points) made sure the points stayed in the Staples Center with free throws.
It stays a really cool tradition the ‘All-Star Game’, they should try that in other sports as well!
This year’s speed skating season came, I saw it and forgot it. I didn’t fell of my chair by amazement of fast times, groundbreaking world records and performances of supernatural talent. Of course, there was some excitement thanks to Christine Nesbitt, Ireen Wüst and stuff, but still… no actual historical moments occurred.
This is primarily caused by the absence of Sven Kramer, Olympic Champion and former World Champion All-Round, who extremely spoiled us in the previous seasons. Each time when you thought: he can’t go any faster (something rarely happens because with Sven the feeling always exist that we might haven’t seen nothing yet), he did go enormously faster. He set new boundaries to cross. And even when he didn’t win (also something that really rarely occurred), it was again spectacle (disqualification or fall). Never a dull moment.
But without him, the season seemed, for me, like tomato soup without tomato. Quite fun that Ivan Skobrev won those prices, but hey, Sven skated like seven to ten seconds faster on those tracks, so man he would have kicked your ass if he was participating. But he wasn’t participating, some mysterious injury got him off the ice the entire season. Now finally, something is revealed about this mysterious injury. It is a nerve problem in his upper leg and finally on February 17th of 2011, we got the news that Sven could skate on ice again. Thank God!
Groundbreaking news for speed skating loving Holland, I can assure you. We have been in complete insecurity about his situation and that fed the speculations made by the press: is the TVM method devastating his physics (just like it did by Wüst in 2007 and Van Deutekom in 2009 and 2010)? Is he just enjoying a long holiday to recover of the disappointments and efforts of the Olympics in Vancouver to be returned in a shape as never before next season? Or is he so dramatically injured that he might will never skate again, or at least never can skate at the level he used to?
All though I am desperately longing for spring, I still have a small hope for very freezing weather. So there might be an Elfstedentocht (epic ice skating journey of almost 200 km in length through eleven cities in the Dutch province of Friesland). Because Sven always assured us that he would turn everything off to participate in that historical race. So to know what Sven Kramer can or will bring us, that could reveal it.
Let’s hope he can bring real excitement and amazement back on the ice track next season and let’s wait and see if the speed skaters of this moment can break his world records in Salt Lake City this weekend.
Barcelona is worshipped for playing the best football of the world by almost everybody. They win the prices, they get the credits. Any itself respecting sport journalist turns into excitement when the ball is rolling in Camp Nou: let the gallery play start! Superlatives, heroic legendary terms are all mentioned in relation to Barcelona. It somehow seems a sort of religious devotion that the sport press express towards FC Barcelona.
That they can actually play, they showed against Arsenal last Wednesday. For someone who is used to the polder competition of Holland it was pure enjoyment. But I could not help but cheering for the win of Arsenal. Always, when some club is worshipped as a rather divine institution, while it also contains some very nasty players (kicking out and giving head butts are the favorite hobbies of Messi), is naturally making me a supporter of any team that will play against them and might temper these exaggerated views on Barcelona (some loving for the underdog I guess).
And now it was the beautiful Arsenal. The team who played like the most gorgeous football for a couple of years now, but unluckily enough never wins any significant price. I could nothing than support them and be happy with the result. Sorry, godsons of Catalonia.
This week two champions that were accused of doping were set free and entered the competitions again: Alberto Contador and Claudia Pechstein.
In any way someone was fault in these cases.
It was either the athlete itself who fooled the entire sport world by winning matches while doped and now put amazingly much pressure on the sport federations to compete again and the associations bowed for that.
Or it were the sport federations and doping agencies that wanted to make a statement or were too much drifted away from reality by their cause to end doping (any random top sport athlete will argue that the nowadays doping rules are way to inhumane and completely lose sight of their original aims) and Contador and Pechstein were the victims of this exaggerated policies.
Which case is true is not even relevant, there obviously is something bad going on in nowadays sport world. This now has become an ethical discussion. Who in sport is to be trusted? Must we doubt any result? Must we doubt the sport federations, who already showed to be highly corrupt?
Commercial benefits have created a monster. Something that was meant as entertainment, turned into a world where people are living a lie. People who do not have sincere sport hearts are occupying the leading positions in sport federations or are winning prices and money on conditions that don’t have anything to do with sport ethics anymore. When will something changes? Must there be a Sport related WikiLeaks to set the tone or a revolution of fair athletes to show the corruption of the regime?
It seems like a very unequal battle to place these two guys against each other. All men would probably find this a highly feminine argument. Truth is, whether you’d like it or not, Ronaldo brings something on the pitch. Whatever your opinion is about him, he has personality. That’s already more than we could say about our little friend Messi.
But judging by appearance does indeed not legitimate the statement of Ronaldo being a better player of the two. So now, it’s time for some concrete evidence: Messi is only capable to football and score with his left leg, Ronaldo, on the other hand, can football and score superbly with both legs, his head (he had the height that Messi lacks) and he even showed in the recent game against Atlético Madrid, that he can also give passes with his back (on purpose!). So that makes Ronaldo a much more complete player.
Furthermore, I think Ronaldo’s talent is often highly underestimated or at least ridiculed. Because of his showbiz life, he somehow seem to be a spoiled boy that will cry and call for his mummy when things don’t go the way he would like. But one should consider that the guy does a lot of training in his private time (including sprint trainings with Usain Bolt… so thinking about it, Ronaldo beat a Bugatti Veyron… he might be faster than Messi as well) and stays longer at regular club trainings to exercise his free kicks. Many of his fellow players rewarded him for this discipline and motivation. Depicted Ronaldo as just a loud show pony with attitude is way too shortsighted.
I guess Messi often gets the preference above Ronaldo, because football is dominated by men (exclusively men actually). And men seem to naturally have an aversion against Ronaldo, because he has it all. In fact, all men somehow envy his life. He plays football at the highest level, he is handsome, young and rich, and all the supermodels fall for him… The perfect boy dream. So men tend to, guided by this form of jealousy, go for the underdog: the small, strange, ugly boy from Argentina, who happens to be quite good at football as well.
(Saying this, I am not trying to convince you to feel sorry for Ronaldo, because that won’t be quite appropriate and necessary I guess.)
