On a dark, cold, winters night in Wigan...

My Sporting Weekend 25-27^th of February:

Warm-Up's:

Super League (Rugby League):

St. Helens V Warrington Wolves, This was Saints first game at their new, temporary, home of the Stobart Stadium in Widnes, but the vocal support of the Warrington fans made it sound more like a home game for them. Warrington made a great start with Lee Briers getting 2 trys and 1 for Richie Myler to open up a 18-0 lead within 20 minutes, Saints came back with 5 back to back sets, but fantastic goal line defence from Warrington, kept Saints out. holding up St Helens 3 times in the first half Louis Anderson got the first try of the second half, after 13 minutes, extending Warrington's lead to 24 points as the rain started to fall and both teams started to make handling errors. Michael Shenton finally got Saints first try on 66 minutes, but a drop goal on 70 minutes form Lee Briers all but sealed the 2 points for Warrington. Chris Flannery and Lee Gaskell got consolation trys Saints in the last 5 minutes, but the final score, of 18-25, did not reflect on how good Warrington's defence played throughout the game.

6 Nations (Rugby Union)

England V France, even though each team had only played 2 games before this match this was seen as the decider for the 6 Nations 2011. Penalty's dominated the scoring in the first half with both teams scoring 3 each, towards the end of the first half France had more of the possession and started to dominate the match, as mistakes leaked into England's game. England started the second half strong with Ben Foden getting the first try of the game on the 41^st minute, England then had two other close try scoring opportunities, with Chris Ashton being pulled back for a forward pass from Toby Flood and Mike Tindall's effort chalked off after English players were off their feet at the previous ruck. France didn't really create any good scoring opportunities during the match, and England always looked like they were going to win after getting the try early on in the second half.

A win in two weeks against Scotland and England will have all but won the 2011 title and they would have put themselves in a fantastic position to complete the Grandslam.

La Liga (Football):

Mallorca V Barcelona, on 40 minutes a fantastic piece of skill, chesting the ball on the run before a looping header over the keeper, from Lionel Messi, after a good flick over from Seydou Keita gave Barcelona the lead. Up to that point Mallorca played well in defence, not allowing Barcelona to create many chances, but after that Barcelona had virtually all the possession for the rest of the first half, creating a couple more good chances. In the second half Mallorca's defence couldn't catch out David Villa with an offside trap as he went through to score a 1-on-1 with the keeper, up to that point Mallorca's defence played quite deep, which helped to cut out Barcelona's forwards runs through the defence. Barcelona were in complete control after their second goal and Pedro got his 20^th goal of the season on 66 minutes with a looping shot from outside the area.

Barcelona were missing several key players, Xavi, Victor Valdes, Danni Alves, and at time's this made a difference, like the incisive, defence splitting, passing of Xavi, Alves creating 1-on-1's down the right hand side by pushing forward, and way Valdes plays the ball to his defenders feet, but a win was never in doubt.

Cricket World Cup 2011:

India V England, this was going to be England's big match, going to India's home of cricket the 90,000 capacity Eden Gardens, Kolkata, to take on the hosts, but after building delays the match was move to the smaller, 40,000 capacity, M. Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore, but the atmosphere was just as hostile with the Indians cheering their team on all throughout their innings, but they calmed down as England started to catch India's score and came back alive towards the end of the game. India built their innings well with Sachin Tendulkah getting his 5^th World Cup century , but England failed to take enough wickets, to slow down India's scoring, until the last 5 overs when they got 7 to bowl India out for 338, 1 ball short of 50 overs. Tim Bresnan's bowling at the end of India's innings was excellent taking 4 wickets in his last 2 overs, as well as Virender Sehwag's opening wicket early in the game, but James Anderson was poor again taking only 1 wicket and being hit for 91 off his 9.5 overs. England started their innings well with the opening partnership of Andrew Strauss and Kevin Pietersen put them in a good position to catch India's score, until a fantastic catch from bowler Munaf Patel dismissed Pietersen for 31 off 22 balls. Spin slowed down England's run rate and India got their 2^nd wicket with Piyush Chawla getting Jonathan Trott out for 16. Strauss and Ian Bell formed a good partnership, lasting 26 overs, with Strauss getting his 1^st World Cup century, but they both fell in the 43^rd over to Zaheer Kahn, Bell for 69 and Strauss for 158. Collingwood and Prior came and went pretty sharpish before Michael Yardy and Bresnan steadied the ship, for 2 overs anyway, until Yardy was dismissed for Patel's second wicket, at this point it looked as if India had the victory as England needed 32 of 15 balls to win. After 15 runs and Bresnan's wicket in the 49^th over England needed 14 to win, in the last over Graeme Swann got 3 off the first 2 delivery's before Ajmal Shahzad hit a 6 facing his first delivery, a bye followed next before Swann got 2 more, on the last ball England needed 2 to win but all they could get was a single. A draw was probably a fair result with Zaheer Kahn and Tim Bresnan being brilliant with the ball and Sachin Tendulkah and Andrew Strauss excellent with the bat.

Main Event:

World Club Challenge (Rugby League):

Wigan Warriors v St George Illawarra Dragons, the big rugby match of the weekend, pitting together Southern Hemisphere champions St George Illawarra Dragons against Northern Hemisphere champions Wigan Warriors. After a great start from Wigan, with George Carmont scoring after a pin-point accurate kick from Paul Deacon, the Dragons came back with Brett Morris and Matt Cooper getting a try each down the left side. Carmont then got his second try after a fantastic weaving 40 metre run, but Bret Morris also got his second try out on the left wing, the half then finished with a drop goal from Sam Tomkins, for Wigan to take the lead 15-14.

The Dragons got the next two scores with Cameron King scoring the first try of the 2^nd half on 54 minutes, after a knock on from Darrell Goulding who was attempting an interception, and a drop goal from Jaime Soward on 68 minutes. This meant that Wigan needed a converted try to tie the scores. Wigan then put the pressure on during the last 10 minutes, with Morris having to make a try saving tackle on Goulding, but after back to back sets they could not get a score.

This was a great game of rugby league played at a high standard with both teams playing well, but Wigan just didn't have enough to crack the Dragons defence in the second half, who had a fantastic performance, and the Dragons came away with a 21-15 win to win the World Club Challenge.

Cool-Down's:

Gary Megson got his first win as Sheffield Wednesday manager, but getting into the play-offs now looks like an impossible task, so it looks like they are now building for next season.

Well done to Birmingham for winning the Carling Cup against Arsenal, I was glad they won after during the build up to the game everybody thought that Arsenal would just turn up and win their first trophy in 6 years and now Birmingham have playing in Europe next season to look forward too as well.

After a 3^rd loss in 4 games Sheffield Eagles are now out of the Northern Rail Cup as the group stage is now complete. Next week they are playing Leeds Met University in the Challenge Cup, at home, which they should defiantly win and the week after the regular season starts, and hopefully the team will be up to speed ready for a good go at trying to win the Championship Grand Final.

I read a story, here, from the NASCAR website over the weekend about Joe Denette who won the Virginia lottery in 2009 and now owns a Camping World Truck Series team and this got me thinking if I had a big win in what ways would I spend the money. Now I am not a big fan of 'Sugar Daddies' in sport and I think that teams, leagues and organisations should be self-sufficient so I don't think that I would put any money into any teams I support, apart from buying seasons tickets to all my local teams, (but not Sheffield United, obviously) and I would just probably travel going to watch different sporting events and matches all around the world.

Recent Results:

Npower League 1 (Football): Carlisle 0 Sheffield Wednesday 1

Evo-Stik League South Division (Football): Sheffield FC 3 Shepshed Dynamo 2

Northern Rail Cup (Rugby League): Sheffield Eagles 12 Hunslet Hawks 16

Uploaded by enemyofreality, 28^th of February

The Cup Is King

My Sporting Weekend 18-20 February 2011:

Warm-Up's:

Super League (Rugby League):

Hull FC V Leeds Rhinos, before the game started the Hull crowd sang 'Old Faithful ' in tribute of David Kirkwood, the club president who died during the off season. Personally I think that a sing-song or a round of applause is a far better tribute than a moments silence at a sporting event, and one of the benefits is that it drowns out any inconsiderate arsehole that feels to need to boo, or be disrespectful in any other way. Hull played the same way they played in Cardiff pretty poorly, the game was played in quite good conditions, for a Friday night in February anyway, but Hull didn't create many chances and their kicking game was pretty non-existent. Individually they had a few good performances, with Tom Briscoe looking dangerous on the few occasions he got the ball, Will Sharp got his 2nd try in 2 games for his new club and Richard Whiting who made a try saving tackle in the first half. In the first half Leeds opened the scoring with a try from Brent Webb, after a good run and off load by Keith Senior. Mark O'Meley then brought Hull level with a try before scores from Ryan Hall, Rob Burrow, and a fantastic 70 metre try from Ben Jones-Bishop extended their lead. Chris Clarkson opened the scoring in the second half for Leeds, and then Hull responded straight away, winning the ball back from the kick-off, with Mark O'Meley going over for his 2nd try of the game. Weller Hauraki got a try on his debut for Leeds, before Will Sharp got the final try of the game, for Hull. Towards the end of the second half Leeds started to tire as they ran out of interchanges and fit players, and the game petered out, as Hull couldn't get hold of the ball and Leeds had numerous drop-goal attempts, to a 32-18 win to Leeds.

La Liga (Football):

Real Madrid V Levante, an easy win for Real, Levante allowed Real to attack them by dropping deep and playing with a back 5 and 2 defensive midfielders. But as Real play with only one forward and don't commit that many players forward, as say Barcelona, there was always spare defenders crowding the final 3^rd of the pitch, this may be a tactic to help track attacking runners more easily, but it just allowed Real to keep possession around the center of the pitch. If Levante were more attacking and moved the full backs further up the pitch they would have a better chance of holding on to the ball and creating better attacking play. Levante did go forward a bit more in the second half but at 2-0 down they were never going to get back into the game, and the match finished with a final score of 2-0.

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (Stock Car Racing):

Daytona 500, the biggest race of the year also kicks off the season with a trip to the spiritual home of NASCAR, the Daytona Speedway. The newly repaved surface led 2 car drafts easily outrunning large packs, leaving the spotters running around to find partners for their drivers to draft with. The big one happened on lap 29 with about half the field involved after Michael Waltrip took out team mate David Reutimann, during the incident 3 of Hendrick Motor Sports cars sustaining damage, Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson and Mark Martin. During lap 107 Juan Pablo Montoya spun his car coming off turn 3, but made a great save to keep control of the car and not to go a lap down, he then crashed again on lap 143 after a coming together with Greg Biffle, but didn't lose a lap. Overall the race was a bit tedious with the amount of caution flags, a record 16, and the shortness of the green flag runs, with the longest being only 19 laps. But the last green flag run, before the Green-White-Checker finishes, produced some exciting racing with several lead changes and a group of, up to, 14 cars battling for track position up front, until an accident on lap 197. After a crash on the first attempt of the Green-White-Checker finish pre-race favourite Dale Earnhart Jn was left wrecked and the race was completed on the 2^nd attempt of the G-W-C with Trevor Bayne taking the win on his Daytona 500 debut and only his 2^nd Sprint Cup race. JP Montoya finished 6^th.

Main Event:

FA Cup 5^th Round (Football):

The FA Cup, one of my favorite competition's in sport, it gives the opportunity for tiny clubs to play huge clubs on a field behind the local sports center, or in a modern day amphitheaters of sport. Some people say that it has lost of the glamour of days past, but I disagree, anyway the time of the year has come around again when the it is belittled and various suggestions are made to jazz it up by the media and the FA, mainly to earn them even higher profits out of football. The only change that I think could benefit the tournament would be to scrap replays and for games to be completed on the day, just like the semi-finals and final. And the only reason for this would help with fixture congestion at all levels of the pyramid, as clubs in the qualifying rounds regularly lose money by having to travel, further than normal, to play mid-week games in front of small crowds. Obviously there wouldn't be results like Leyton Orient drawing with Arsenal or Notts County drawing with Manchester City to force replays, but how many of these lucrative ties crop up in a season, 2 or 3 at most. But I think that the main issue that should be looked at with the FA Cup now is the selection of games for TV, Manchester United have had all their 3 ties broadcast by ITV up to now and their next game is virtually guaranteed to be on against Arsenal or Leyton Orient, these games should be shared out, with more teams being on in a season. Also a 4^th round replay shouldn't take the place of a 5^th round match, especially when the original match was on that channel as well.
Birmingham City V Sheffield Wednesday, I started to watch this as Obafemi Martins put the ball into the back of the net, on 17 minutes, for Birmingham's second goal, leaving Wednesday a huge task to get anything out of the game. The game was then pretty even up to half time with each team creating a few chances each. In the second half David Murphy's goal on the 52^nd minute, for Birmingham, all but ended the game as they then cruised to the final whistle with a 3-0 win. Their was very little fightback from Wednesday as they found it hard to pass to team mates and to go forward with any attacking flair whatsoever, the Wednesday supporters, about 5,000 of them, gave a better account of themselves by travelling well and singing and chanting non-stop throughout the game.

Manchester United V Crawley Town, this had been billed as a proper FA cup tie, but is it. In some ways it was, with a non-league team, Crawley, taking the opportunity to go to a big team and try to get a result with a large support following them and enough of the gate receipts to keep them running for a few years. And in some ways it was not, with Man U fielded a second string team (yes all of the players would walk into top tier teams all around Europe and some are regular internationals), showing that their upcoming tie in the Champions League is obviously more important and the fact that Crawley are not your normal perceived non-league team. With a full-time squad and backing from rich owners (for that level anyway) the non-league team actually playing football and just didn't try to hold out for a draw and a lucrative replay.

Crawley played well, and kept Man U scoreless until Wes Brown scored on the 27^th minute, and even had some good attacking play of their own, and even at 1-0 down at halftime they were still in the game. During the second half Man U didn't really gel as a team and they allowed Crawley to have the ball and attack, while not really creating very many good opportunity's to score themselves. The game finished 1-0 but Crawley seemed to shrink the 4 division gap between two the teams with a excellent team performance with lots of good attacking play.

Cool-Down's:

Wakefield Trinity Wildcats finally sealed a deal with new owners and came out of administration, but after losing some key players, and signing a couple of good loan players, they went down to Perpignan and hammered the Catalan's 38-14. This was a great result for Wakefield, but Catalan's could be in trouble this season, even after the last season was meant to be the one of transition.

Sheffield Eagles suffered a very heavy defeat to Leigh losing by 62 points, but a win against Hunslet next week should be enough to book a place in the quarter finals. The 3 results this season do seem pretty worrying, only beating Gateshead by 12 when they got hammering's in their other 2 games, Drawing with Whitehaven, who have lost to Workington twice, and now taking a hammering in Leigh. If they want to have a good finishing in the league, and a good run in the playoffs they need to improve fast, maybe not playing any pre-season friendly backfired, and more playing time is required before the team is up to scratch.

Recent Results:

Evo-Stik League South Division (Football): Spalding United 3 Sheffield FC 2

Northern Rail Cup (Rugby League): Leigh Centurions 68 Sheffield Eagles 6

Comebacks In Cardiff

My Sporting Weekend 12-14^th of February:

Warm-Up's:

Premier League (Football):

Manchester United V Manchester City, A lucky win for Man United as Man City had a really good team performance, with Yaya Toure and David Silva working well as outlets for the defence, they creating good attacking chances and committing players forward, unlike in previous games. Both teams started the game playing 4-5-1, but Man United were the more defensive team and didn't really hold the ball well especially in the first half. Luis Nani scored the first goal of the game from Wayne Rooney's flick on off a Edwin Van der Sar clearance, Zabaleta was just not fast enough to track Nani across the pitch and Vincent Kompany got stuck in no mans land in between Rooney and Nani. In the second half Man City changed tactics and went to 4-4-2 with Edin Dzeko coming on for James Milner, and Yaya Toure dropping deeper into the midfield, on the 60^th minute, this gave Carlos Tevez the opportunity to drop deeper to pick the ball up, bringing him more into the game. Silva scored soon after with a lucky deflection, Dzeko took a shot that ricocheted off Silva's back into the top left corner, giving Van der Sar no chance to make a save. Man United then went to 4-4-2 with Dimitar Berrbatov coming on for Oliverira Anderson, on the 77^th minute Rooney scored a spectacular overhead kick off Nani's cross. Man City deserved at least a draw but Man United took their chances and came away with the win.

Evo-Stik League (Football):

Sheffield FC V Carlton Town, Sheffield started the game well having most of the possession and some good attacking play until Carlton's Terry Hawkridge picked the ball up on the wide right edge of the area and cut across the box, unchallenged, before easily slotting past Sheffield keeper Dan Whatsize. For the rest of the half possession was about equal with both teams creating a couple of good chances, with the best one being a penalty for Sheffield, Carlton's keeper Neil West brought down Sheffield's Robert Clark as he was going away from goal, earning him a yellow card. But Cusworth shot straight down the middle into West's body, and the follow up shot went 10ft over the bar. Sheffield's main problem was that they did not have any width, apart from Matt Roney who started on the right wing and swapped to the left mid-way through the first half, so their was no outlet when going forward leaving the middle of the pitch too crowded to play through. The second half was dire with each team only creating 2 or 3 genuine goalscoring opportunity's each as the pitch deteriorated and most of the game was played in the middle of the the pitch. Before the game their were a few ruts already on the pitch, and it started to cut up straight away, an excuse of the amount of games played their could be used but I think it is because the drainage is obviously inadequate because of how wet the pitch was. Cusworth saved a point for Sheffield, deep into injury time, with a overhead kick that was not as technically brilliant as Wayne Rooney's earlier in the day but just as spectacular.

Main Event:

Millennium Magic Weekend, Super League 2011's opening weekend:

Game 3, Castleford Tigers V Wakefield Trinity Wildcats:

The first half was quite tight until Sam Obst was sin-binned for Wakefield, and Castleford then looked like they were going to run away with the game. But after Castleford's 51^st minute try from Adam Milner Wakefield started to fight back with some good defence and trys for Dale Ferguson, on the 58^th minute and Luke George on the 63^rd minute to take the score to 28-20. Daryl Millard was sent for the sin-bin for persistent offences and Paul Jackson got a try Castleford soon after, all but sealing the game for the Tigers. The game finished 40-20, but Wakefield played well in patches and it would have been a lot closer if they could keep 13 men on the pitch for the full game.

Wakefield are going to have a tough season ahead of them after going into administration, and losing some of their better players, but at least it will give opportunity's to their youngsters which is only good for the game overall.

Game 4, Wigan Warriors V St Helens:

The replay of last years Grand Final, was going in Wigan's favour after getting two trys in the first half, with Ryan Hoffman and Harrison Hansen touching down, and a 3^rd, from George Carmont, 9 minutes into the second half. Wigan were playing well, especially their defence as they kept St Helens from scoring until the 63^rd minute, but a great offload from James Roby created a gap for Jon Wilkin to get their first try. Play then swayed in St. Helens favour with Tony Puletua getting a try on the 70^th minute, Wigan them came back into the game with the majority of possession until Francis Meli got St Helens 3^rd try of the night, with Jaime Foster missing the conversion from out wide on the left taking the score to 16-16. Sam Tomkins had a go at a drop-goal from 40 meters with 2 minutes left, for Wigan, and missed, and Kyle Eastmond also missed a drop-goal attempt, for St Helens, with the last kick of the game. St Helens did excellent to come back in the last 15 minutes and earn themselves a point in the Magic Weekends first every draw, but Wigan must be truly disappointed at throwing away a game they look set to easily win 15 minutes from time.

Game 5, Crusaders RLV Salford City Reds

Crusaders sporting a retro style kit on their return to south Wales for the first match of day 2 of

the weekend. The Welsh team started off well with a good cut out pass by Clinton Schifcofske to Welsh international Reece Williams on the wing for their first try on 5 minutes, Daniel Holdsworth scored Salfords first try on 11 mins with their first sustained attack after Crusaders had dominated the game up to that point. Michael Witt and Stuart Reardon scored Crusaders second and third trys respectively. A good set play from the 10 meter line with a chip through by Matty Smith on the last tackle led to Luke Patton getting his first try for Salford. Crusaders finished the scoring in the first half with a Clinton Schifcofske penalty from the 40 meter line. In the second half Salford started with some good, strong, defence until Jason Chan scored on the 53 minute, fighting through 3 players to get the ball over the line, Crusaders then started to run away with the game with 2 try's from Michael Witt on the 60th and 62nd minute, and a try from Stuart Reardon, on the 70th minute Salford had a really poor 2nd half and only really created two or three good opportunity's, without scoring any points. The game ended with between Salford's Wayne Godwin getting sent off for coming in late with a punch on Clinton Schifcofske, the game finished with a final score of 42-12.

Crusaders played well and should be exciting to watch this season as Iestyn Harris seems have to invention to have his team try different thing, ie short kick offs.

Game 6, Leeds Rhinos V Bradford Bulls

Ben Jones-Bishop got the opening score of the game with a try out on the right wing for Leeds after some good passing play. Bradford responded well putting pressure on the Leeds goal line on the back of consecutive penalty's and Brett Delaney being sin-binned with Elliot Whitehead scoring on the 11th and 19th minutes. Patrick Ah Van got in a good position for an interception and 70 meter run to get his first try for Bradford on his debut on the 22 minute, Ryan Hall being just short to make a try saving tackle. Ryan Hall then responded with his own try and Kevin Sinfield pulled the score back to 10-16 with a penalty with the last kick of the half. Bradford started the second half strong with Matt Diskin getting their first score of the half finding a gap in Leed's defence on the goal line, and Elliot Whitehead got his hat-trick on the 52nd minute from a cross-field kick that the Leeds defence let bounce and Whitehead picked up and went over for a pretty simple score. Patrick Ah Van nearly got Bradford's third score of the half but it was ruled off by the video ref for a knock on. Trys from Ben Jones-Bishop, on the 62nd minute, Kylie Leului, on the minute 65th, and Rob Burrow on the 68th minute brought Leeds back into the game with a score of 28-26 to Bradford. For the final 10 minutes Leeds had all of the possession and were awarded a penalty try after Gareth Raynor tackled Ben Jones-Bishop after he had kicked the ball into the in-goal area in front of him, to give Leeds a lead of 32-28.

Bradford's new signing Kyle Briggs fitted in well after stepping up to Super League from Championship side Featherstone Rovers, proving that 2nd string Aussies are not always the best option, and that their is talent out their in the lower divisions of the UK, as well as the Super League academy sides. Leeds did well to come back, but Bradford were unlucky not to win and played well.

Game 7, Hull FC V Hull KR

Hull FC's Kirk Yeaman got the first try in the final game of the weekend, with Lee Radford scoring soon after to give FC a 12 point lead over their city rivals. After a flash point between KR's Scott Murrell and FC's Craig Fitzgibbon, Danny Tickle kicked the penalty to further extend FC's lead. Momentum then switched in KR's favour with Blake Green getting their first try on the 21st minute, after some good play keeping the ball alive. Clint Newton then got KR's second try on the 29th minute, and Ben Galea got their 3rd on the 31st minute to take the lead. Ben Galea got his second try in the second half, and Kris Welham extended their lead even further with a try on the 56th minute. FC started to get back in the match but had a try disallowed for being out of touch, handling mistakes cost them field position, but they eventually got a try on the 69th minute with Will Sharp scoring out on the right hand side. Kris Welham got his second try on th 75th minute to seal the victory for KR. Kirk Yeaman also got his second try on the 78th minute as a consolation for FC, with the game finishing with a final score of 32-22.

After a fantastic start to the match Hull FC faded and never really created any try scoring opportunity's, allowing Hull KR to come back into the match and take the victory.

From the games that I saw the quality of rugby league on show was good, and playing under the roof led to some good kicking, skillful runs and not many handling mistakes, that wouldn't normally be seen at the start of February, domed stadiums and retractable roofs are surely future for rugby league as I don't really like getting wet also.

About 30,000 people turned up each day, but the biggest disappointment was that the crowd looked quite sparse during the Crusaders game, I don't know what kind of promotion was done in the local area but I've read in a few placed that it was not much, although on the other hand if people are not interested in going to watch rugby league then it doesn't matter how well promoted or how cheap the tickets are, people aren't going to turn up, even if their is a lot of quality on show.

In the other 2 games of the weekend Huddersfield beat Warrington 28-18 and Harlequins beat Catalans 11-4.

Cool-Downs:

After Monday night's 0-0 draw with Fulham, Chelsea's title hopes look all but over, and they were lucky to even got a point after Clint Dempsey's penalty miss during injury time.

Chesterfield lost on Friday night, extending their non winning run to 4 games, they are still 4 points clear at the top of the table but if they don't start picking up wins soon they will start to slip down the league, this upcoming weekend 2^nd place Shrewsbury take on 3^rd placed Rotherham which may give Chesterfield a chance to extend their lead at the top of the table if it ends in a draw.

And finally Sheffield Wednesday also extended their non winning run to 8 games in the league, and this weekends FA cup tie against Birmingham looks like an impossible victory, unless they are just luring them in to a false sense of security and are easily capable of beating anybody and are looking to win the cup.

Recent Results:

Npower League 1 (Football): Rochdale 2 Sheffield Wednesday 1

Northern Rail Cup (Rugby League): Sheffield Eagles 16 Whitehaven 16

Lombardi Is Coming Home

My Sporting Weekend 4-6 February 2011:

Warm-Up:

6 Nations (Rugby Union):

Wales V England, a fantastic 26-19 win for England, with England taking their chances and Wales not. This was not the best free-flowing game ever but still a good one nonetheless played in front of a sell-out crowd at the Millennium Stadium that produced a fantastic atmosphere. The half-back combination of Ben Youngs and Toby Flood works great for club and country and this will hopefully leave detractors saying Johnny who. For Wales to break their losing streak they need to make changes, with the main one being moving James Hook to fly-half as he gives that extra skill level that Stephen Jones does not.

Italy V Ireland, an expected 13-11 win for Ireland, not the best game but Italy were well disciplined and were unlucky not to get the win, the drama ratcheted up for the last 10 minutes following a sin binning for Ireland's Dennis Leamy. Luke McLean's try out wide gave Italy the lead, and hope of a first ever win over Ireland, but a Ronan O'Gara's drop goal with 2 minutes to go dragged Ireland back into the lead. The game finally petered out with an awful drop-goal attempt from Italy's Luciano Orquera after some good work moving the ball around.

France V Scotland, this was the best of the 3 6 Nations games this weekend to watch, with France winning 34-21. A fantastic piece of skill, on the 54^th minute from François Trinh-Duc, with a pass between his legs to Imanol Harinordoquy, lead to a try that gave France a seemingly uncatchable lead of 17 points, from then on they played without fear, but only scored 1 more try. Scotland played well, but France were just too good, making better use of their time with the ball. After this display I think that France will go on to win the 6 Nations but will probably struggle against Australia, South Africa and New Zealand later this year in the World Cup.

IRB 7's Series Wellington (Rugby Union):

I only caught the cup final, with New Zealand beating England 29-14, their was a great party atmosphere that couldn't be dampened by the wind and rain. The 7's series provides great events and it would be fantastic if they could expand to 12 or 14 events a year, bringing in places such as Argentina, Brazil (home of the 2016 Olympics), Canada, France, Japan or Russia.

La Liga (Football):

Villarreal CD V Levante UD, a good attacking match with a fantastic team performance from Levante giving them only their second away win of the season with a final score of 1-0, even though Levante set their team out quite defensively they still got forward and created lots of good chances, Villarreal also had some good attacking play but could not break down Levante's defense, and only had 3 shots on target, leaving the keeper with little to do.

FC Barcelona V Athletico Madrid, Barcelona made a great start with 2 goals in the first half, Athletico came back into the match at the start of the second half but could not get a goal. Messi completed this hat-trick on the 78 minute for his 40^th goal of the season, with 24 in the league. With a 3-0 win Barcelona just make winning look so easy, and have now got the record for most consecutive La Liga wins, with 16. But the amount of work each player does, with and without the ball, is incredible, and there is no place for lazy players in the team.

Main Event:

Super Bowl XLV Pittsburgh Steelers V Green Bay Packers:

American's provide some of the biggest spectacle's in sport and the Super Bowl is no different with the tag line 'The Biggest Show On Earth', and thankfully the overawing event didn't seem detract from the game of American Football that was taking place. But as much as I do enjoy American sports why does the National Anthem have to be sung A Capella, as it just ends up being an over dramatic warble with undistinguished words and Christina Aguilera's version was no different.

Green Bay had a great start to the game, scoring 2 touchdowns within 25 seconds towards the end of the first quarter, the second being a pass interception returned by Nick Collins, taking the defense's tally to 7 touchdowns for the season.

During the second quarter Pittsburgh came back with a field goal, which was followed by a touchdown for each team. Towards the end of the second quarter Greens Bay's defense started to drop like flies, and they lost veteran Charles Woodson for the rest of the game.

The Black Eyed Peas half-time show was a bit bitter-sweet with the performance being brilliant with dramatic entrance's, fluorescent lit dancers and moving sections of stage. But they just didn't have the songs to fill a 13 minute slot, having to draft in Slash for a rendition of 'Sweet Child of Mind' with Fergie, and Usher, who just looked like any other nondescript dancer, to do his own song OMG, backed up with a few yelps from will.i.am.

The third quarter only saw one score with Pittsburgh's Rashard Mendenhall rush for a touchdown. This led to the Pittsburgh fans increasing the volume and getting out their terrible towels, as momentum continued to shift in their favour.

In the fourth quarter a fumble recovery by Green Bay led to Greg Jenning's second touch down of the night, but Pittsburgh weren't finished yet and with a touchdown from wide receiver Mike Wallace and a 2 point conversion brought Pittsburgh to within 3 points of Green Bay. Green Bay responded with a field goal, which were the final points of the game.

Ultimately turn-overs cost Pittsburgh the game with Green Bay scoring 3 of their 4 touchdowns from them, but it was a well deserved win for Green Bay, with quarterback Aaron Rodgers taking the MVP.

The official attendance for the game was 103,219, which thankfully fell short of the record attendance, set in 1980 at the Rose Bowl for Super Bowl XIV, as paying spectators inside and outside of the stadium that didn't have a seat or even a view of the field counted towards the official attendance. The record would have been broke but some temporary seats were not able to be used as they did not receive a safety certificate as they were installed too late.

Cool-Down:

Another 2-2 draw for Sheffield Wednesday, if they can't beat teams finishing games with 9 men how do they expect to end the season in the play-offs, I cant see Gary Megson doing much and would of rather liked to see Chris Hughton or Gary Johnson take charge.

Another loss for the England Cricket team, in ODI cricket, to finish the series with Australia losing 6-1. I don't think that it is going to be injury's that impedes us in the World Cup, it will be that we lose wickets high up in the order too easily.

Stoke's set pieces against Sunderland during the Premier League's Saturday lunchtime kickoff worked brilliantly, they caused chaos among the defense, thus creating scoring opportunity's to who ever got their first.

And finally a winning start to the season for the Sheffield Eagles, beating Gateshead Thunder in the Northern Rail Cup group stages, I think that this season they have a genuine chance of brining home some silverware, and hopefully they can build on last seasons success of moving too Bramall Lane, with higher attendance figures, and maybe other matches being played their too (cup semi-finals or internationals)

Recent Results:

Npower League 1 (Football): Sheffield Wednesday 2 Milton Keynes Dons 2

Evo-Stik First Division South (Football): Goole AFC 2 Sheffield FC 5

Northern Rail Cup (Rugby League): Gateshead Thunder 20 Sheffield Eagles 32