Whew! What a weekend for AmSports fans and what a one upcoming! As if stuffing my face Easter Sunday wasn't enough, the college basketball tournaments are down to the Final Four and three of the four games went into overtime. It's gonna be tough for the championship finals in St Louis, Missouri this weekend to top last week's games for last-second excitement.

First off, #1 rated Illinois (the Illini), at 36-1 on the season, qualified, as did #2 North Carolina (Tar Heels, and don't ask me why) at 31-4 for the season, followed by Michigan State (Spartans) and Louisville (Cardinals) at 26-6 and 33-4 respectively. Illinois and Louisville meet in one semi-final Saturday night (early Sunday morning across the pond), followed by North Carolina and Michigan State, and each game has its plots and sub-plots.

The championship game will be played Monday night.

Three of the four teams have won two championships in recent years (not Illinios) and there's no sense in me repeating the details of last week. It is reported that wagering on the entire tournament surpasses by 10 times what wagering on pro football's Super Bowl amasses for the benefit of the bookmakers.

If they spent as much educating the kids as they do...

Moving on, Major League Baseball begins its season this weekend, thank goodness. The steroids issue remains and The Boys of Summer move from Arizona and Florida's spring training to play in frigid Chicago, Detroit and Cleveland, where the Great Lakes are currently still frozen, but the ice is breaking up, slowly.

And, in Sporting Blues tradition, we have this item leftover from last week, post-deadline: in the Iditarod sled dog race, the final finisher came in at over 15 days (the winner was nine-plus days) because his dogs had a slight problem on the trail. Three of the female dogs pulling his sled were in heat and the males were somewhat more interested in that fact¹.

As a result, Phil Morgan's team averaged just 2.98 miles per hour, nowhere near winner Robert Sorlie's 4.9 MPH.

And that's not an April Fools joke.

So, once again, this is several a/ka random, heading toward the leftover turkey, ham, potatos, veggies and white choco bunnies that the ears have already been gnawed off, over and out.

Northampton Saints narrowly won on Saturday and delayed the possibility of relegation leaving them probably only requiring just one more win. They were losing 9-13 against Harlequins at half time and defeat loomed when Quins opened the second half with a try/conversion, both executed by the ex Welsh International Arwel Thomas. Saints kept their hopes alive with 2 penalties taking them to just seven adrift and extra time saw them really pile on the pressure. A try from Mark Tucker put them level and the Aussie Shane Drahm kept his cool and converted. With Drahm having contributed 17 points to the Saints scoreline it is a shame that he has decided to leave Northampton and join the ascendant Worcester side. Ironically, Saints will meet The Worcester Warriors on the final day of the current season. With top-flight Bath amongst Saints final three opponents regelation could all boil down to that final match!
Saints 22 Harlequins 20

The Weekend

It is all peace and harmony in our household as both our respective National teams win both their World Cup qualifying matches.

England took to the field first on Saturday as they played Northern Ireland at Old Trafford. A good spell of goalkeeping from Maik Taylor denied England any score in the first half but the Irish couldn't stop the goalfest of four, including an unfortunate own goal by Baird who was trying to block a shot from Rooney. Joe Cole, Michael Owen and Frank Lampard were the players with their names in lights.
England 4 NI 0

Holland, meanwhile, made their mark very early on in their game against Romania with Cocu scoring in the first minute of play. For a long time it seemed as if that would be the only goal of the match but then Babel scored five minutes before extra time.
Romania 0 Holland 2

Other interesting results included:
Wales 0 Austria 2
Italy 2 Scotland 0
Israel 1 Rep of Ireland 1

Wednesday

Again the Dutch went for an early lead when Castelen scored in the third minute. Nistelrooy added another half an hour later and that is how the score remained.
Holland 2 Armenia 0

Despite dominating pretty much from start to finish England finished the first half with no score - again. Rooney, Lampard, Owen and Beckham had their chances, but all missed. After the break the English goalkeeper had to save a goal early on but then the pressure was all on the Azerbaijan players and first Garrard and then Beckham scored. A few more missed opportunities meant no further changes to the scoreboard. England will need to find the finishes when they take on Poland and Austria later in the year.
England 2 Azerbaijan 0

Other interesting results included:
Poland 1 NI 0
Austria 1 Wales 0
Serbia & Montenegro 0 Spain 0
Israel 1 France 1

Standings

• Group 1 Holland lead by 1 point from Czech Republic and Romania lies 3^rd
• Group 2 Ukraine lead by 3 points from Greece, Turkey are 3^rd
• Group 3 Portugal and Slovakia share the lead, Russia is 3 points behind
• Group 4 France and Israel share the lead with Switzerland and Rep of Ireland both 1 point behind.
• Group 5 Italy lead by 4 points from Norway and Slovenia, Scotland lie 5^th, 10 points adrift
• Group 6 England lead by 1 point from Poland. NI lie 4^th, 13 points adrift and Wales are 5^th, 14 points adrift
• Group 7 Serbia & Montenegro lead by 2 points with Spain and Lithuania breathing down their necks
• Group 8 Croatia lead by 1 point over Sweden

Did I Leave The Iron On?

Archive

Several a.k.a. Random 

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