All smokes and mirrors as Shanghai gets formula right

TV View: 'Very well done indeed for joining us. Live is always the best way," said Jim Rosenthal from Shanghai, congratulating us on being up at six o'clock on a Sunday morning. After such a warm welcome you just didn't have the heart to tell Jim that he was actually taped and by the time Rubens Barrichello crossed the winning line you still had another three hours sleep to go.

Not entirely live, then, which, come to think of it, is how Formula One has been described of late. Yesterday was to be the shot in the arm the "sport" needed, the first boost the fact that in China not advertising smoking appears to be illegal. Right into Formula One's barrow.

All that was needed after that was for Michael Schumacher to be less than 110-per-cent competitive, so that they could make a race of it in Shanghai. And would you believe it . . . ?

Not everyone, though, was cynical enough to suspect that Schumacher had intentionally spun off during qualifying, resulting in him having to start his race in the suburbs of Beijing, but it was mad handy all the same.

ITV's Martin Brundle, for one, put it down to a genuine driving error but acknowledged that it had been a "sweet and sour qualifying for Ferrari here at the Chinese Grand Prix". Martin? Don't.

Martin's enthusiasm for F1's first trip to China just couldn't be dampened. Ambling down the grid moments before race time he sighed and said: "Just take a look around at this sort of natural theatre. Well, it's not a natural theatre, is it? It's a . . . it's just . . . amazing nonetheless."

It's at moments like this we get to thinking that Brundle is Murray Walker's love child.

What Formula One needs to spice things up and arouse the public's interest is a bit of genuine controversy, something like the Bendix Washing Machine Scandal. This, one of the darker episodes in Irish sport, was re-examined in Up for the Match on Saturday night.

We were shown the offending ad, starring a semi-naked Pat Spillane, posing provocatively beside the reverse-tumble-action front loader (with an economy half-load option), without a care in the world for his amateur status.

Páidí Ó Sé even agreed to talk about the scandal, his face framed in the porthole of a washing machine as he spoke, and was, sadly, unapologetic about the whole affair.

"Yerra," he said, "it got us a holiday in Australia."

Naturally, then, we had no option but to root for Mayo yesterday, a county unsullied by washing-machine-plugging escapades, and unsullied by the presence of Sam Maguire on their home patch for over half a century.

It was looking good, too, after five minutes. First Mayo's very own Galactico, Ciarán McDonald, with a hair-do to match, scored a gem of a point and then Alan Dillon scored a rather splendid goal. After that?

"Basically, Colm O'Rourke, we're looking at a murder scene," said Michael Lyster at half-time.

"Yeah," said O'Rourke, "it's been a bit of an annihilation - and it could have been a lot worse for Mayo."

"Totally devastating," said Joe Brolly. "The Mayo boys will be sitting in the dressing-room like a big truck has run all over them, surveying the wreckage . . . the game's over, Kerry have destroyed them in every way."

The gist of it, then, was that Mayo's first half hadn't been a resounding success.

It was left to Brolly to give Mayo some hope for the second half: "It's just a total disaster, the disaster has been complete . . . you can only see this getting worse and worse and worse

and . . ."

By the 47th minute Mayo fans were leaving Croke Park in their droves. What their team could have done with John, positioned behind the goal on Hill 16, and his 3-16.

Over on BBC Northern Ireland the emails were flooding in.

"Thank God it's over," said the Armagh fan, complimenting the quality of the final, "it was terrible to watch."

"I'm going home to burn this flag. It's just a complete waste of time following them," a slightly aggrieved Mayo supporter told RTÉ as he trudged away from the ground.

"Ah," said Brolly at full-time, "it's just part of the rhythm of life that Kerry win All-Irelands."

In the background the strains of the Rose of Tralee could be heard. If the pale moon was rising above the mountains of Kerry, the sun had declined on Mayo.

Their ambitions drowned in the Kingdom's Whirlpool. Croke Park proving to be too hot a Hotpoint. Mayo football still powerless, bereft of elecTricity. Kerry had entered the sweet shop and gobbled the Candy. Holy Zanussi!