Monday 8 September 2008

The end of the sporting summer

I marked the return of winter sport with a trip to see Bristol Rugby lose at home to Bath. Any derby defeat is depressing, but with Bristol tipped for relegation, there was no encouraging defiance. Excluding, of course, the David Lemi wonder try which was easily one of the best in my two seasons on the Memorial Ground terraces. Scant consolation, though.

The summer has been much more enjoyable. Although England lost the test series to South Africa, the Pieterson era promises much - certainly excitement, if not success. I was at the Oval for his first game in charge and saw him batter that century. Since then the Proteas have convincingly been seen off in the one day series, and I'm looking forward to the Ashes with a renewed optimism.

Of course, the Olympics was fantastic, and I'm suspending all personal concerns and looking forward to 2012. It will be London's Olympics, but the lesson of Beijing is that its heroes are as likely to be from Mansfield or Edinburgh as they are from the capital.

We need to ensure that the Olympics are Britain's games, no matter what face we present to the world.

1 comment:

Andrew Brown said...

Who would have thought that Pieterson was captain material, but as you say the potential seems exciting again.

But lets get through the tour of India before we get too excited about the Ashes, and then there may be Sri Lanka and the new mystery spinner to contend with.