from Reuters Soccer Blog:

Who will be the Angels and Demons in Rome?

The new Angels and Demons movie is based in Rome so it got us thinking who might end up being an angel or a demon after Wednesday's Champions League final between Manchester United and Barcelona.

Will one of the goalkeepers drop a clanger or will Cristiano Ronaldo belt one in again from 40 metres? It's a big pitch at the Stadio Olimpico, but I can see Lionel Messi running the length of it with the ball at his feet...

New thread on this here...

from Reuters Soccer Blog:

United happy to be wearing white…just like 1991

New thread on this here...

Manchester United's Red Devils will be wearing angelic white in Wednesday's Champions League final, just how Alex Ferguson likes it.

Barcelona are the nominal home team for the 'dream final' in Rome and as their famous claret and blue tops clash with United's usual red and their first choice blue away kit, the holders will wander onto the pristine Stadio Olimpico pitch in white.

Leinster lay unwanted reputation to rest

“The naysayers have been silenced for good,” read the lead of the Irish Times sports pages this morning after Leinster finally turned unrivalled potential into serious silverware by edging twice-champions Leicester to the Heineken Cup on Saturday.

After the humiliating semi-final defeat to Munster in 2006, the embarrassingly tame last-four exit to Perpignan three years earlier and only a couple of Celtic League titles either side, a beaming Brian O’Driscoll understandably said he’d been waiting ten years for such a day.

Leinster had been simply aching to prove their critics wrong for just as long. After a decade of underachievement, it had been thoroughly etched into the public consciousness that the province had no backbone, no heart, no bottle. They were individuals, never a team.

Essentially they weren’t Munster. In a very definite urban-rural divide, Leinster were the fancy city boys — all style and no substance while the southerners were the antitheses and had two Heineken Cups to prove it.

from Reuters Soccer Blog:

A Champions League final with no fear of failure… It could be a classic

Major finals featuring the best teams and the best players, the ones we talk up in advance as being for the connoisseur, often turn out to be the most disappointing, don't they? Maybe it's stage fright, too much respect for the opposition or the stakes being just too high, but great teams often seem to save their worst football for finals.

There are exceptions, of course. The 2005 Champions League final between AC Milan and Liverpool produced exquisite football in the first half from the Italians, and drama that will live long in the minds of anyone who watched it as Liverpool came back.

But when you look back on other Champions League and World Cup finals, how many can you remember for the quality of the football more than the result itself?

There was little on show in last year's game between Manchester United and Chelsea so why are so many people expecting this year's contest between United and Barcelona to be so different?

Monaco madness

You can charter Flavio Briatore’s Force Blue ‘yacht’ for $235,000 a week during the low season. For that, you get five decks, a gymnasium, Turkish steam bath, cinema and cabin space for 12 guests.

There’s also a mud bath and massage room.

Unfortunately it’s not available during Monaco Grand Prix week, but then life is full of disappointments.

from Reuters Soccer Blog:

Wenger makes his point with customary elegance

"Highly intelligent" and "Arsene Wenger" sit neatly together in countless newspaper columns outlining the exploits, achievements and travails of the cerebral Arsenal manager.

Consequently there was no elaborate deconstruction required following an interview with a French television channel at the club's training ground this week.

Wenger, who habitually brushes aside any question of his allegiance to the north London club, was asked his thoughts about yet another approach from Real Madrid if Florentino Perez returns as president.

Murray handed awkward French Open draw

French Open third seed Andy Murray has been given a really tough first round opponent in Argentina’s Juan Ignacio Chela.

Just a couple of years ago Chela would have been the favourite to win on Roland Garros’s clay.

Women’s top seed Dinara Safina has drawn Britain’s Anne Keothavong, who became the first British woman in 26 years to reach the semi-finals of a clay-court tournament in Warsaw this week.

The French Open starts on Sunday. Here’s a link to the full draw.

Daly brightens up Wentworth (and it’s not just down to the trousers)

World number seven Paul Casey may be less than enamoured with John Daly’s dress sense but he remains a big fan of the colourful American’s golfing skills.

Twice major winner Daly is in the middle of a five-week run of tournaments in Europe and while his golf has been largely unspectacular, his multi-coloured trousers have certainly captured everyone’s attention.

“I saw John today and look at his trousers, they were outrageous,” Casey told reporters at the PGA Championship at Wentworth on Thursday. “I hope he’s getting a lot of money (for wearing them).

“But today I saw him hit this four-iron fantastically and he stopped it on the green and it was from about 230 yards. That was something. There are a lot of great players out here but John creates memories. When he’s out on the golf course he brings a smile to people’s faces and that’s the most important thing.”

World Games proves a tough sell for Taiwan

After the globe giggled at Athens in 2004 for letting swathes of Olympics seats go empty, organisers of the far more obscure 2009 World Games in equally obscure Taiwan are doing whatever it takes to pack the venues for such unlikely events as billiards and beach handball. Tug-of-war, anyone?

Whatever it takes, in this case, includes selling seats to China. World Games host city Mayor Chen Chu travelled there on Thursday for a four-day visit, intending to sell the 90 percent of events tickets that are unclaimed so far before the curtain goes up on July 16.

Chen is a leading figure in a Taiwan opposition party that wants formal independence for self-ruled Taiwan, which mighty Beijing claims as its own for historical reasons and has threatened to take by force.

But she’s also “realistic and pragmatic,” to quote Taiwan political scientist Andrew Yang. She knows Beijing can use its authoritarian rule to send hordes of travel-hungry Chinese tourists to the World Games, quickly quashing any Athens-style absenteeism.

Australia look good but Symonds omission could weigh

In an earlier post, Julian Linden argued that Australia’s cricketers have all the firepower needed to retain the Ashes in England despite some relatively new faces in the squad.

Here Ed Osmond takes a different view, wondering if the absence of Andrew Symonds and Australia’s lack of spin options may help the English.

England should be highly delighted by Australia’s decision to omit all-rounder Andrew Symonds from their Ashes squad.