the year of sport so far...

So far in 2011 sport has already gave us great entertainment and value for money. 9-darters in darts world final, England triumph in the ashes, the 6 nations has kicked off, a grand slam in tennis, a new form of snooker and lets not forget that football has continued to briing excitement and debate on and off the pitch.
    I'll start with the darts then. The PDC world championship darts final took place at the beggining of the year and opitimised everything I love about watching darts. With 'The Power' failing to reach the final it meant there was a chance for a new champion. Brilliant Sid Waddel commentary accomodated high quality darts which included a wonderful 9 darter from the eventual winner Adrian 'The Jackpot' Lewis.
     England brought great national pride by winning the ashes 3-1 in Austrailia for the first time in 24 years. The 6 nations kicked of this weekend and saw England win, Ireland win (just against Italy!) and France comfortably beat Scotland. In the Austrailian open Djokovic won beating Andy Murray comfortably in the Final. Incidentley this was the first grand slam final in 11 grand slam tournaments in which Rafa Nadal or Roger Federer didn't reach the final. The new and innovative shoot out snooker produced great television and saw Nigel Bond win.
    Now onto the football. The premier league has continued to produce unpredictable results, which has seen 43 goals scored in the 10 premier league games this weekend. This included Manchester United's unbeaten run coming to an end against the bottom of the table Wolves. However the two bigger stories are off the pitch. The first being the sacking of Andy Gray and resignation of Richard Keys. No matter what your take is on the comments they have made, you have to love some of the coverage they have produced in particular the commentary for that Gerrard goal. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kM5XP-Ps7tk&feature=related
     The other big football story was the transfer window. The deadline day saw hundreds of millions of pound spent, including the transfer of Torres to Chelsea and Carrol and Suarez to Liverpool. However the transfer story which interested me was the Malaga spending spree. Malaga who have been bought by Qatari owners spent big in January including the signings of Julio Baptista and Martín Demichelis, but almost also signed Adebayor. This almost happened as a deal between the two clubs was agreed however Adebayor wanted to hold out for the expected offer from Real Madrid who desperately wanted a number 9.
     More blogs from Statman coming soon...

Thank-you Andy Gray and Richard Keys for some brilliant and unrivalled coverage of football. take abow son.