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Compiled by PHILIP REID

Hosting Formula One tour a costly business

REMEMBER THOSE half- hearted attempts to find an Irish venue for a Formula One race at the height of the Celtic Tiger?

Let’s be glad they never amounted to anything, if the sounds emanating from Melbourne – which will now play host to the year’s first race after the “postponement” of the Bahrain Grand Prix – are anything to go by.

Politicians in Melbourne have been critical of the cost incurred in staging the Grand Prix.

As Michael Danby, whose Melbourne Ports constituency includes the Albert Park circuit, put it: “The Grand Prix might have been a good deal in 1996 when it cost the government only $1.7 million, but with falling crowd numbers and taxpayers footing a $50 million-a-year bill, the government should cut its losses and walk away.”

Sounds like we got the rub of the green on that one, for a change.

Given deserves more for years of excellence

THE 13 to 8 generally offered by bookmakers on the Republic to qualify for the European Championship seem to be far from generous odds, especially in the light of Shay Given’s latest shoulder injury which will rule the goalkeeper out of the upcoming matches – home and away – against Macedonia.

Although he has been playing second fiddle to Joe Hart at Manchester City this season, Given’s value to the Irish team can’t ever be overestimated. Since making his international debut back in 1996, the Donegal man has gone on to become Ireland’s most-capped player ever – with 110 caps – and his shot-stopping has made him one of the very few international-class players at Giovanni Trapattoni’s disposal.

Goalkeepers tend to have a different lifespan in terms of their professional careers than other players, so, at 34 years of age, Given could have expected to be around for quite a while longer.

Injury, though, and especially one which is of a recurring nature and that requires specialist treatment, doesn’t hold out any regard for a player’s age.

And unfortunately for Given, this latest shoulder injury – with estimates of his unavailability ranging up to three months or even longer – could mean that a fine professional career could reach an earlier-than-scheduled conclusion and without any meaningful honour to show for his acrobatic and often fearless dives at the feet of strikers.

One championship medal (for winning promotion to the English Premier League with Sunderland) all the way back in the 1995-96 season seems like an inadequate reward for his years of service to clubs and country.

Mayweather-Pacquiao row rumbles on

MANNY PACQUIAO, the Filipino boxer considered the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world and also an elected public representative in his homeland, is having quite an out-of-ring tussle with would-be opponent Floyd Mayweather.

Although recently stripped of his WBC title because, in the eyes of that organisation, Pac-Man possessed too many world title belts and that it would be good to share these things around, Pacquiao will be back in the ring on May 7th for a WBO welterweight title bout with American Shane Mosley.

As part of his build-up to that bout, Pacquiao recently paid a visit to the White House to meet US President Barak Obama. Mayweather’s response to seeing newspaper pictures of Pacquiao with the most powerful man in the world was to issue photos of his own he had taken at Super Bowl with former president George W Bush. Jealousy, it would seem, is a powerful tool.

The only pity is that the two won’t get into the same ring together for some real Queensbury Rules fare, rather than indulging in playground antics.

Visit to iconic stadium a Real treat for football fans

THE IMPORTANCE of being able to plop your bum on a seat in a sports stadium shouldn’t be lost on anyone. It remains to be seen how the FAI’s belated, if nonetheless welcome, decision to reduce ticket prices influences the attendances at Ireland’s upcoming European qualifying matches but most of us with a passion for sport will know that, apart from being the actual executor of sporting history, the closest thing to experiencing that sensation is by being present when someone else’s blood, sweat and brilliance sends a tingle down the back of your neck.

In midweek, I got another taste of how an iconic stadium impacts on your very body and soul when visiting the Santiago Bernabeu stadium, a soccer cathedral which acts as a city’s heartbeat.

The invitation to visit came late and unexpectedly – while in Madrid for another reason – but, with a number of personal boxes ticked over the years which involved visits to such sporting theatres as Yankee Stadium, Old Trafford and the Nou Camp, the opportunity to visit the home of Real Madrid was one to be grasped.

For sure, there was a feeling of being invited into someone’s home while the owners were away – Real Madrid were actually playing the first leg of their Champions League match in Lyon at the time – but the welcome was typically Spanish, open-armed and generous, and it involved visiting parts of the stadium that are usually no-go areas for members of the public.

So it was that we were allowed stand on the pitch and touch the grass, to visit the presidential suite where photos of Real’s historic five-in-a-row European Cup-winning teams adorn the walls, and, most memorable of all, to access the home dressing room.

As locker rooms go, an area usually reserved only for Real Madrid’s Galacticos and those closest to them, this is a quite extraordinary place.

For one, the sheer size of the room is impressive – but in terms of serving the egos of multi-millionaire footballers, this is a room that makes each and every player seem as special as Senor Mourinho.

Each player, naturally enough, has his own, generous-sized locker space: however, over each locker, is a framed numbered jersey with the player’s name and, on the door, is a full sized photograph of the player in action. The photo is actually selected by the player himself (from a dozen or so photos provided) and the only criteria is that the ball must be at the player’s feet in the high-definition photograph.

The presence of the photographs on the locker doors and the framed jerseys above them are the biggest difference between the home dressing room compared to the away dressing room, while the only other detail which differs is that the home dressing room is also equipped with an ice pool – conveniently located beside the hot water jacuzzi – to speed up recovery from aches and pains. There are also five masseuse tables in an adjoining room, where physiotherapists work before matches, at half-time and after games.

Money, of course, is the primary factor in enticing players to join any modern football club, while the chances of success and the way a team plays are also other factors. But the Bernabeu is an imposing place and you can readily understand why players like Ronaldo – who, incidentally, has a locker right next to Kaka and who has his own private box to entertain his guests at matches – would want to make the move.

The Bernabeu is not the biggest stadium in the world – that honour currently goes to the May Day Stadium in Pyongyang in North Korea which can cater for 150,000 – or even in Europe. But it is special and iconic and, even when empty, has a capacity to make you believe in sport.

That point hasn’t been lost on those who make the pilgrimage to the stadium on non-match days, to such an extent that only the El Prado Museum which houses one of the greatest collections of art in the world attracts more daily visitors to any site in Madrid.

Woods's aura continues to wane

THESE ARE still very early days in the golf season but there are already signs that Tiger Woods – despite the work he has done with his latest coach Sean Foley – is simply not the player that once seemed destined to smash Jack Nicklaus’s record haul of major titles.

Woods’s defeat to Thomas Bjorn the other day in the Accenture Matchplay was significant for the manner in which he lost.

The old intimidation factor that once acted as a 15th club in Woods’s bag is no longer a factor. Nobody is scared of him any more, nobody second guesses how they should play a hole when in his company.

It seemed for much of Woods’ career that it was only a matter of time before he would overhaul Nicklaus, who finished his career with 18 major championships to his name. When Woods won the US Open at Torrey Pines in 2008, it represented the 14th major title of his career and, given that it was achieved when playing almost on one leg as he prepared to undergo knee surgery, it was the last real occasion that he seemed superior to any other golfer who has ever lived.

Of course, much has changed in Woods’s personal and professional life since he won that 14th major. He is no longer married and he is no longer the world’s number one. Nor is he automatically chosen as the greatest golfer who has ever lived.

There is a new appreciation of what Nicklaus achieved in his career, and of Nicklaus as a person.

If Woods is to break Nicklaus’s record of major wins, he will have to approach the Golden Bear’s longevity in winning those championships – Nicklaus won 18 over 25 years, Woods has 14 in 15 years and counting.

But it should also be noted that Nicklaus had a remarkable 19 runner-up finishes in the majors and had no fewer than 73 top-10s in them throughout his career.

Woods is not the player he was 10, five or even two years ago. His aura of invincibility has been replaced by a fragility, to such an extent that the projected march to beyond Nicklaus’s record has become a possibility rather than a probability.

Interestingly, apart from Augusta where he has won four Masters titles, the venues for the other majors this season – Congressional, Sandwich and Atlanta – represent unconquered terrain for Woods.

His boyhood dream of passing Nicklaus’s record is no longer the guaranteed sure thing it once seemed; if anything, it is looking increasingly like a pipe dream!