TOP 100 SPORT SITES
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| Giraldo beats Querrey to tie Davis Cup Santiago Giraldo beat Sam Querrey 6-2, 6-4, 7-5 on Friday to give Colombia a 1-1 tie with the United States in their three-day Davis Cup playoff ... rssfeeds.usatoday.com |
Diamondbacks sweep fading Rockies with 10-9 win By JOHN MARSHALL 2010-09-24T07:49:50ZPHOENIX (AP) -- Stephen Drew homered and had four RBIs, Kelly Johnson hit a two-run shot and the Arizona Diamondbacks held off Colorado 10-9 Thursday night to complete a three-game sweep of the fading Rockies.... hosted.ap.org |
David Reutimann clears the air on Kyle Busch altercation Sometimes in life there comes a time when you've got to stand your ground and sometimes you have to do what, at the time, you know is not right ... rssfeeds.usatoday.com |
Rockets beat Nets 91-81, Yao plays 19 minutes By ANITA CHANG 2010-10-13T17:07:10ZBEIJING (AP) -- Yao Ming played only 19 minutes while easing back from foot surgery, scoring nine points and delighting his home fans as the Houston Rockets defeated the New Jersey Nets 91-81 in a preseason game Wednesday.... hosted.ap.org |
Shaun Edwards: Are long-kicks now too easy? The balance of the game is in jeopardy from the Premiership ball which allows kickers regularly to land 60-yard penaltiesDial up Don Clarke on YouTube and you get some grainy black-and-white footage of a big man kicking the living daylights out of the 1959 Lions. Admittedly he scored a try in the second Test at Wellington but the abiding image is of a man with No1 on his back – that is how full-backs were numbered – placing a ball on a mound of earth and then toe‑punting it amazing distances.He was also remarkably accurate considering he was kicking in huge leather boots laced up and over his ankles and with a solid, domed toe cap. On one occasion he is said to have landed a kick – and the balls were leather and laced in those days – from 65 yards. Thank God he is not playing today.I mention Don Clarke because he was unusual. In parts of New Zealand men of a certain age still talk about The Boot – the man who beat the British and Irish Lions by himself. The headline after the first Dunedin Test was "Clarke 18, Lions 17", after he had kicked a world-record six penalty goals to cancel out the Lions' four tries.It is a fascinating piece of rugby history and even the balls Clarke kicked sell for a decent price at auction but I would not have like to be around when a penalty was worth the same as a try.Thankfully we have moved on, which is why I want to talk about balls – not just any balls but the ones we are using in the Premiership. They seem to go miles. Kickers are regularly landing 60-yard penalties and I think there is a danger of the balance of the game being skewed. The lawmakers have not always been my favourite people but hats off to them this time because we now seem to be playing a game where the emphasis is on running rather than kicking, where risk gets its reward and where the supporters get value for their hard-earned entrance fee.From the footage I have seen there will not be many who grumbled at the past two weeks of Heineken Cup but we are back to the league this weekend and back to the Gilbert ball that worries me because I feel it is giving too much reward. Twice, late in the game against Gloucester last month, Nicky Robinson banged over kicks from 60 yards, though I am not complaining because a week earlier we had beaten Leicester with Dave Walder doing a similar job on them.Put simply, I think the ball goes too far and that technology has to be reined in. I am not blaming Gilbert. It is their job to make improvements but things can go too far. For example, golf has had to reconfigure tournament courses as players hit the ball farther and farther and tennis is a very different game since rackets doubled in size.Today's players are extraordinarily skilful but I would still like to see them hitting a running top-spin backhand in the manner of Rod Laver while using a wooden-framed racket that weighs double the ones they use now and has a sweet spot a quarter the size.Technology has changed their game and I do not want it to do the same to mine. I think it is fair enough to go for goal from 40 metres, 45 yards or so, but beyond that I would expect a kicker to have to go for the corners and build the pressure. It is, or should be the way of the game, but last year in Hamilton the Springbok Francois Steyn kicked penalties from 60, 58 and 56 metres at sea level. Now we all know that Steyn is a big kicker – remember the attempted drop from inside his own half to announce his arrival at Twickenham – but what would he do with the Aviva ball?Kickers tend to have specialist coaches to help them out and over the years exercises have been developed to increase the core strengths needed to boot a ball with increasing force. That you will never change but, if technology can be used to advance, then it can also be used to hold things in check.I do not want to see tactical kicks where a punt goes the length of the field – that is too much reward for the kicker and too big a penalty for the attacking side, whose forwards have probably worked themselves close to exhaustion to get up the field. And I want place kicks from Don Clarke's kind of distances to retain that wow factor and not be commonplace.PremiershipRugby unionShaun Edwardsguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |