Last year while I was back in Australia, I departed the homeland on the weekend of the both the AFL and NRL Grand Finals. Why I planned my departure for the biggest sporting weekend in the country, I still don’t know, but next time I will be sure to look at a calendar before purchasing my tickets. It doesn’t seem that long ago that I was having a great time with all my friends and family back home, but it has been a year and it’s Grand Final time yet again!

In the AFL Grand Final, it’s a rematch of last year’s closely fought battle between the West Coast Eagles and the Sydney Swans in a match where the Swans ended up winning their first premiership (since moving to Sydney) by 4 points. This year the teams have played two extremely tight games, with the Eagles winning their round 15 match by two points and the Swans winning in the first round of the finals by one point. The Swans will be fired up after Adam Goodes won his second Brownlow Medal, and the last time the two same teams played in consecutive Grand Finals (2002 & 2003), the team that won the first Grand Final also won the rematch. I think this trend will continue and Sydney will win back-to-back Grand Finals.

The AFL trophy

In the NRL Grand Final, the Melbourne Storm play the Brisbane Broncos. Melbourne ran away with the Minor Premiership, winning 6 more games than Brisbane did during the regular season, and in their only meeting this year, the Storm beat the Broncos 10-4. Melbourne have easily been the most impressive team during the course of the season and should win Sunday’s match, but Brisbane can never be underestimated and have a knack of rising to the occassion - especially on the biggest stage. However, Melbourne will win their match and their second premiership.

The Provan-Summons trophy

As much as I hate to admire anything that a player for Liverpool does, this video is incredible. What is even more amazing is that Xabi Alonso has scored a goal from even further out than this. Stay tuned for that video next week.

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The best goal since David Beckham’s effort from a similar distance

Week 1 Top 16:

1. Pittsburgh Steelers (1-0) - Defending Super Bowl champs lose starting quarterback, but still come out and dismantle the supposed Super Bowl contender, Miami Dolphins.
2. Indianapolis Colts (1-0) - Peyton outlasts little brother, Eli. They’ll need a better running game to be a serious contender this year.
3. Baltimore Ravens (1-0) - Whoa. Look out for their defence this year. Shut-out Tampa Bay (a playoff team last year) at Tampa Bay - impressive.
4. Chicago Bears (1-0) - Most hyped defence in the league, prevents Green Bay from scoring a point for the first time in 15 years.
5. Atlanta Falcons (1-0) - Made every critics NFC pick to make the Super Bowl, Carolina Panthers, look like a high school team.
6. Cincinatti Bengals (1-0) - Looked good against a potent Kansas City offence.
7. Philadelphia Eagles (1-0) - T.O. who? Stallworth will fill the void without the drama.
8. Seattle Seahawks (1-0) - Either Detroits defence is superb or the Seahawks are going to be ordinary this year. The signing of Deion Branch will boost a sub-par receiving corp.
9. New York Giants (0-1) - If Eli Manning can maintain the level of play he displayed against the Colts, it will be a very good year for New York
10. San Diego Chargers (1-0) - Will LaDainian Tomlinson be able to handle the workload this year? My fantasy football team sure hopes so!
11. New England Patriots (1-0) - Bad start against Buffalo, first play from scrimage resulted in a Buffalo defensive touchdown, but you can never write off a team that has Tom Brady as their quarterback. However, the loss of Deion Branch will hurt the Pats this year.
12. Jacksonville Jaguars (1-0) - Came from behind to defeat the more fancied Dallas team. A sign of things to come or a flash in the pan?
13. Dallas Cowboys (0-1) - Allowed 17 unanswered points against Jacksonville. After one week and there are already calls for quaterback, Drew Bledsoe’s head. When will T.O. join the chorus?
14. Miami Dolphins (0-1) - Daunte Culpepper looked rusty in the opener, but there is still hope that this team will win the AFC East.
15. Minnesota Vikings (1-0) - Quarterback Brad Johnson did what he needed to do to earn the victory, but he has an inexperienced receiving corp which could prove troublesome as the season progresses.
16. Arizona Cardinals (1-0) - Their offence was never going to be an issue, but if you give up 27 points to San Francisco, you won’t be able to score enough points against a good team in order to win.

The rest:

17. Washington Redskins (0-1)
18. New Orleans Saints (1-0)
19. St Louis Rams (1-0)
20. Detroit Lions (0-1)
21. Buffalo Bills (0-1)
22. New York Jets (1-0)
23. Carolina Panthers (0-1)
24. Kansas City Chiefs (0-1)
25. Tampa Bay Bucaneers (0-1)
26. Denver Broncos (0-1)
27. San Francisco 49ers (0-1)
28. Houston Texans (0-1)
29. Cleveland Browns (0-1)
30. Tennessee Titans (0-1)
31. Oakland Raiders (0-1)
32. Green Bay Packers (0-1)

It seems Fernando Alonso is still upset at a penalty that he received after qualifying in this past weekend’s Grand Prix at Monza. The stewards believed that Alonso had blocked Ferrari’s Felipe Massa. Implying that Massa’s teammate, Michael Schumacher, was the reason that the stewards imposed the penalty (in order to benefit him in his quest for an 8th World Championship title), Alonso forgets that his engine blew and it wouldn’t have mattered if no penalty had been imposed because his engine wouldn’t have lasted the race anyway. Let’s not forget that Schumacher was penalised earlier in the year at the Monte Carlo grand prix, but Schumacher’s penalty was to be moved from pole position to the last position on the grid - Alonso was only penalised 5 grid positions, moving from 5th to 10th.

Alonso after his engine blew at the Monza Grand Prix

Once Schumacher retires at the end of this season, there will be an obvious replacement for the most arrogant driver in the championship and it will be Alonso.

In reference to Schumacher’s retirement, Alonso provided the media with this little gem: “Michael is the most unsporting driver with the largest number of sanctions in the history of Formula One.”

Nice.

What a match. Andre Agassi displayed his fighting skills and superior fitness in a thrilling 5-set victory over Marcos Baghdatis, 6-4 6-4 3-6 5-7 7-5. The 21 year old Baghdatis succumbed to cramps late in the fifth, while Agassi, 36, seemed to be moving fine thanks to the cortisone shot he received following his first round victory. Agassi has made breaking down his opponents physically a trademark of his play - I’ll never forget the 2001 Australian Open semi-final when he was trailing one of my idols, Patrick Rafter, two sets to one, when Rafter also succumbed to cramps and eventually lost the match.

Andre plays a forehand shot during his epic victory over Marcos Baghdatis

Thursday night’s match was one of the most exciting in recent memory, and the atmosphere at Arthur Ashe stadium must have been electric. At certain times throughout the match, you could see the emotion on Agassi’s face. In the 4th set, Agassi blew a 4-0 lead to lose the set 5-7, and he admitted in the post-match interview with John McEnroe that he choked.

In the next round, Agassi plays Benjamin Becker of Germany, who is playing in his first US Open. Supporters of Agassi will be hoping that he will have a relatively easy match against Becker, as Agassi’s first two matches have been very lengthy and challenging. If Agassi manages to win his next match and progress through to the 4th round, he would most likely face fellow American Andy Roddick. In what could be a very symbolic match between the old and new of American tennis, Roddick could find himself holding the short-end of the stick for the first time in New York when it comes to crowd support - it would be one heck of a match.

I must apologise to anyone who has been checking here regularly only to find a lack of updates. The reason for the sporadic entries is that my mum is currently visiting from the homeland, and I have been trying to spend as much quality time with her as possible. Before my mum flew over though, I had asked her to pick up a couple of sporting books that I have been wanting to read for quite some time - one of those being Steve Waugh’s autobiography, “Out of my comfort zone.”

Steve Waugh’s patented ’slog sweep’

Any number of the guys that grew up with me playing cricket, whether it was outdoor, indoor, or in the driveway, would tell you that my idol growing up was Steve Waugh. A brilliant cricket player who struggled early in his career but proved his worth when he returned to the team and later went on to captain the most successful cricket team in history. Steve Waugh was at his best when the odds were stacked against him, and I will always remember the partnership he had with his twin brother, Mark, during which he scored his highest test score of 200 and won the series against the West Indies in 1995.

Steve Waugh at the launch of his autobiography

The autobiography itself is rather lengthy at just over 800 pages. However, the book provides a history and insight into how the game and business of cricket evolved during Steve’s time in the team, and it is an extremely interesting read. In his renowned down-to-earth manner, he writes about relationships within the team dynamic that, up until now, have been kept under close guard. One moment that stands out was during the 2001 Ashes tour when he had to inform former opening batsman, Michael Slater, that he was being dropped from the team. Slater responded with “You can all go and get f..ked” and left the room. As the Australian team always seemed to get a long so well, this was a rare insight into the team dynamics and the pressures that the Captain of the team was presented with.

For any cricket fans out there who have not read this book, I suggest that you do.

I found an interesting article in the tech section at smh.com.au. I don’t normally read the tech section, but I found this and decided to take a look.

I have to applaud Cricket Australia for their decision to cancel a reported 1300 tickets for this summer’s (Australian) Ashes series that have been bought from auction sites such as ebay. It is always frustrating when you wait hours upon end to buy tickets online only to miss out, but no more than 5 minutes later the tickets are up on the auction sites with asking prices that, at a minimum, are twice the face value of the original ticket price.

The headline following England’s first ever cricket defeat

Ever since the English regained the Ashes for the first time since 1989, the rematch in Australia this year has been one of the most anticipated sporting events, for both countries, in recent memory. Cricket Australia has done the right thing by trying to ensure that the action will be available at a reasonable price for those who are lucky enough to get tickets, but hopefully they will learn from the mistakes they made while selling the tickets online and implement new systems in the future that ensure the general public, and not online scalpers who are out to exploit the public, get the best access to these tickets.