Sporting Rock ‘N’ Rollers

 As wannabe modfather Bradley Wiggins wins SPOTY, which other sportspeople have been known for their rock ‘n’ roll tendencies?

What I know about cycling you could pretty much write on the back of a postage stamp with a fat crayon.  But even I can appreciate the magnitude of Bradley Wiggins’ achievements in 2012.

I’m a huge fan of Jessica Ennis (show me a man of my age who isn’t) and wanted her to win BBC Sports Personality Of The Year purely because she had to withstand more pressure than any other competitor in the run-up to London 2012.  As the poster girl of the Games, she had a good eighteen months of expectation to deal with, and deal with it she did in emphatic fashion.

However, Wiggins’ unique success is worthy of the highest recognition.  Claiming the Tour De France is, on its own, a staggering feat and one never before achieved by a Briton.  As if losing out to Britain in the race to host 2012 wasn’t difficile enough for the French to swallow, here’s some skinny, brash, side-burned fella from these shores winning their race and lording it over the crowd on the Champs Elysées.  To follow that up a week later with Gold in the time trial at London 2012 was nothing short of superhuman.

And did you see him at the Excel the other night at SPOTY?  The studiously brushed-forward hair, the bespoke double-breaster by Soho tailor Mark Powell.  Wiggins’ hero is Paul Weller, in case you’re blind.  He also did his best to remind us that the P in SPOTY stands for ‘personality’, impishly referring to Sue Barker as ‘Susan’ throughout their interview (sorry, Brad, Matt Dawson’s been doing that for years) and, later, urging everyone to make full use of the free bar laid on by the BBC.

So, not only the best-loved and most-garlanded sportsperson of the year but a man who looks, sounds and acts like a rock star.  Mind you, he’d be doing well to match the exploits of the characters below.

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Serena Williams

Everything about Serena Williams screams rock star.  The clothes, for starters.  Black lycra catsuits, knee-high boots, short denim skirts and white trenchcoats are just a few of the items she’s worn.  On the court.  She even has her own apparel label, called Aneres (see what she’s done there?).

Williams has appeared in music videos, lent her voice to The Simpsons, done a turn on a comedy improv show and, if rumours are to be believed and a leaked hip-hop track extrapolated upon, is planning to release an album.

She’s also a complete beast on the court, allying a savage will to win with considerable talent.  I remember watching the Wimbledon final in 2002 when she played big sister Venus, and thinking to myself that only one of them truly wanted it, while the other would be happy to lose graciously to her sibling.  Scope for some proper, deep-seated Freudian analysis there but evidence, for our purposes, of Serena’s unstinting single-mindedness.

Her on-court brutality has, on occasion, manifested itself in ugly outbursts.  When she was foot-faulted at a crucial stage of her 2009 US Open clash with Kim Clijsters, she allegedly told the hapless line judge that she would “…take this ball and shove it down your fucking throat!”  Rather puts McEnroe’s “You’re the pits, man” in the shade, doesn’t it?

Even Pete Townshend would’ve been proud of the abuse she dished out to her racquet that day.

Robin Friday

George Best will be many people’s definitive rock ‘n’ roll sportsman.  But in my view El Beatle couldn’t hold a candle to Robin Friday; if Best had tried, Friday may well have used it to cook up some heroin.

You see, if Serena Williams embodies the glamorous side of being a rock star, then the former Reading and Cardiff City striker represents its seedy, grimy underbelly.  Think Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Doherty or Amy Winehouse in their darkest days.

Friday was a supremely gifted footballer.  He scored goals, he made goals, his vision was on a par with more vaunted flair players of the age such as Tony Currie, Alan Hudson and Stan Bowles.  Friday’s manager at Cardiff, Jimmy Andrews, described him as “the complete centre-forward.”  Many felt he could, and should, have played for England.  When the BBC ran a poll to find the ‘all-time cult hero’ of all English and Scottish league clubs, Friday won the accolade for both Reading and Cardiff.  No other player appeared in the top three of two different clubs.

Friday was as vicious as he was blessed.  On his debut for Cardiff, he lined up against Bobby Moore’s Fulham.  Not only did Friday score twice, but he also grabbed Moore’s testicles, pre-empting Vinnie Jones’ famous attack on Gazza by nearly a decade.  Then there was his sending off against Brighton after he kicked a prone Mark Lawrenson in the face.  With the game still in progress, Friday left the ground.  But not, legend has it, before depositing a large piece of himself into Lawrenson’s kitbag.

Throughout his career, Friday consumed vast amounts of alcohol and drugs such as cocaine, LSD and methadone.  He would binge for days, steal statues from churchyards, dance naked in nightclubs, and turn up to training wearing winklepickers and carrying a plastic bag.

In the end, Friday died a true rock ‘n’ roll death: struck down at 38 by a heart attack brought on, according to his biographer, by a heroin overdose.

Curtly Ambrose

OK, let’s forget all the trappings of the rock star – the drugs, the destructive behaviour, the finery – and talk about someone who’s the real article.

Curtly Ambrose has been playing the bass guitar in the splendidly-named The Big Bad Dread And The Baldhead more or less since the day he gave up terrorising international batsmen.  For good measure, the group also boasts ex-West Indies captain Richie Richardson on rhythm guitar.

If the rhythm section of Big Curtly’s band is as metronomic and menacing as his bowling, ‘The Dread’ will be a tight little outfit indeed.

Have Yourself A Messi Little Christmas

Footballers are complex souls, aren’t they?  Apart from the angelic Leo Messi – who, when not breaking every goal-scoring record in sight, is setting up kids’ foundations or being a UNICEF ambassador or just smiling like the nicest man in the world – they’ve all got a dark side.

Take Didier Drogba.  One minute lavishing the thick end of a million quid on his former Chelsea team-mates (and in the process redefining the word gaudy) or building hospitals in his native Ivory Coast; the next, how to put this delicately, playing at the very limits of the laws of football and falling down far more often than a man of his physique has any right to.

Or Mario Balotelli.  This time last year, it was reported he was dressed as Santa, handing money out to passers-by.  But this came just weeks after the ‘Why Always Me?’ T-shirt, a crass gesture he compounded by chasing Umbro for commission when the sports manufacturer began selling replicas with the slogan.

Then there was Cristiano Ronaldo’s likening of his contract situation to slavery prior to his move from United to Real.  Although, in fairness, he was only echoing the sentiments of some ill-informed, out-of-touch administrator by the name of Blatter.

If only there were a way to puncture footballers’ pomposity by hijacking their names for a frivolous festive game.  Well, there is.

It all started in 1997.  Big Tony and I were tickled by a Sun headline that read ‘Relight Ketsbaia!’ after the Georgian had scored for Tone’s beloved Newcastle United the previous evening.  And it got us thinking.  How many song titles featuring Premier League players could we think of?

In no time, we had a good couple of albums’ worth.  Stand-out tracks included Di Canio Feel It?, Le Saux-ing The Seeds Of Love, Hazy Shade Of Winterburn, Owen Me Owen You and the sublime Do Ginola Way To San José?  Tony kept a notebook of all entries that passed muster, and the list was updated regularly.

The rules, as they evolved, were straightforward.  Both song title and player had to be immediately recognisable.  Songs and players could only be used once on the list, which led to some tough editing choices – would we plump for Ndlovu Is A Battlefield, The Greatest Ndlovu Of All or All You Need’s Ndlovu?  (We went for the last-named, but not before a heated committee meeting.)  Where the player name was the same as a word in the song, this would render it inadmissible.  For example, Old King Cole would not do, whereas London Cole-ing would, as long as it fulfilled the final and most important criterion: that it made us both chuckle.

Inveigling others into The Game held its own perverse pleasure.  First, select your victim: a football fan, certainly; a music lover, ideally; a compiler of lists à la Nick Hornby, definitely; and a player of childish games, crucially.  Next, describe the rules and casually mention some of the doosies you’ve come up with.  Finally, stand back and watch as the target withdraws from social interaction, reduced to a thousand-yard-staring shell of an individual.  Our finest hour was the temporary ruination of our mate Dave, a fervent Manchester United supporter and a man who wrote advertising creative ideas for a living.  After a full hour and a half during which Tony and I had to make our own conversation as Dave muttered under his breath and supped Guinness at the end of the bar, the whole pub was startled into silence by his triumphant exclamation of “Have I Told You Hately That I Love You!!”  The relief was palpable.

The game really caught on.  Hitherto unknown colleagues would whisper coded messages to us in the corridor like Le Carré spies or slip scraps of paper into our hands with suggestions.  IT wanted to know why the newly-installed email system kept crashing under the weight of messages with subject boxes like Love Is In McClair and Emotional Petrescu.  And we appeared to have gone mainstream as Chris Evans started playing suspiciously similar games on his radio show, such as foodstuffs in film titles (The Texas Chainsaw Moussaka, anyone?).  Tony was particularly exasperated, convinced as he was that Evans had also nicked the idea for Don’t Forget Your Toothbrush from him in the late ‘80s.

So it’s with shameless nostalgia and yuletide cheer that I’m resurrecting The Game.  Ladies and gents, I give you…

Deck Fitz Hall With Boughs Of Holly – footballers in Christmas songs

Ding De Jong Merrily On High

All I Want For Christmas Is Mutu Front Teeth

Oh Little Town Of Bentley-Hem

Away In A Manninger

Cazorla Want For Christmas Is You

Rudolph The Redknapp Reindeer

Harkes!  The Herald Angels Sing.

Ronaldo Come All Ye Faithful.

Balotellitubbies Say Eh-Oh (it was Number 1 in the month of December, OK?)

Drogba-by It’s Cold Outside

I’m sure you’ll have your own to add.  Go on, treat yourself.  It’s the Christmas gift that keeps on giving.

Cheerio, Cheerio, Cheerio

As Ricky Ponting says goodbye to cricket, which other sporting farewells stick in the mind?

If any sports people have a more finely-tuned sense of their place in history than Australia’s cricketers, I’d love to meet them.  Ricky Ponting called time on his career in Perth last week, declaring his innings closed on 168 Test appearances.  Exactly the same number as that other Aussie middle-order warrior and captain, Steve Waugh.  In drawing level with – but refusing to pass – Waugh’s record, Ponting echoed Mark Taylor’s declaration when he was on 334 not out, thus equalling Don Bradman’s then Australian record Test score and declining the opportunity to overtake the great man.

It’s a decision that some feel Ponting shouldn’t have been allowed to make.  By his own admission, his form has been some way short of his best and Australian cricket isn’t renowned for its sentimentality.  However, it’s fitting that this wonderful servant to his country should be granted the right to exit the stage on his own terms.  His reaction to the spontaneous guard of honour formed by the South Africans as he walked in to bat for the final time was typical of the man.

“I was a little bit embarrassed and wish it didn’t happen that way, but it was an amazing gesture by Graeme [Smith] and the South African team,” Ponting said, before promising to buy Smith a beer by way of thanks.

Earlier in his career, Ponting was renowned for neither his humility nor his judicious use of alcohol.  He was a fully paid-up a member of the talented group of larrikins – Shane Warne and Mark Waugh being two others – who were the heartbeat of arguably the greatest Test side in history.  They were good but, by God, they knew it.  Winning with swagger, swigging with vigour and chirping at inferior opponents in the manner of playground bullies.  Ponting’s love of a good bet on his beloved greyhounds – and his inevitable nickname, Punter – simply underscored the cricketing public’s view (alright, my view) of him as a brilliant but unlovable tearaway.

It was only in 2005 that my personal opinion of him changed.  Being on the wrong end of the finest series ever to have been played (fact) must have been nigh-on impossible to take.  Especially as it was at the hands of the Poms.  But the way Ponting conducted himself, his honest appraisal of his own side’s shortcomings, and his genuine congratulations to Michael Vaughan’s men marked him out as a man of the highest calibre.  When he retained his stoical and sanguine demeanour through two further Ashes losses as captain, often in the face of hostile recriminations from the Australian media, Ponting became my most respected sporting opponent.  An accolade I’m sure he’ll be ‘stoked’ about.

So, as Ricky sails off over the horizon, who else has made a memorable exit?

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Frankel – 20 October 2012

The life of a racehorse is often planned with military precision.  So the sport’s followers knew this date would signal the end of the career of the most celebrated animal ever to grace the turf.  And they flocked, all 32,000 of them, to a chilly and damp Ascot to catch one final glimpse of their hero.

He won again, superfluous to report.  Ridiculous that we should take his victory for granted.  Trailing in his wake was officially the second-best horse on the planet, Cirrus Des Aigles from France.  The ground was far softer than Frankel would have wanted (and would’ve suited the French raider much better) but, still, Frankel breezed by his rival in trademark effortless fashion to win by a comfortable length-and-three-quarters.

After the race, jockey Tom Queally took Frankel on an impromptu parade in front of the stands.  Queally, who was in the saddle for every one of the unbeaten colt’s fourteen career victories, admitted he deliberately rode further than necessary, “so I could sit on him just a little longer.”  It was a fitting tribute to a mighty equine hero.  We may see Frankel’s like again, such is the idiosyncratic nature of sport, but it’s unlikely.

Meanwhile, I fear for Ascot’s Champions’ Day in 2013.  Without Frankel topping the bill, how can it hope to attract such numbers in the middle of autumn?

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Ayrton Senna – 1 May 1994

Unlike Frankel’s, Ayrton Senna’s exit came as a monumental and tragic shock.  And yet, in some ways, the Brazilian had been saying goodbye for quite some time.  Students of Senna, and particularly those with an interest in conspiracy theories, will be able to point to a number of seemingly prophetic quotes about his own demise.

“If I ever happen to have an accident that eventually costs my life,” he said, “I hope it happens in one instant.”  Mercifully for him, his death at Imola, San Marino, was just as instantaneous as he’d half-predicted.

One of the great paradoxes of the man was this: on the one hand, a sensational, sublimely talented driver whose style and approach bordered on the reckless; on the other, a shop steward of a figure, at the forefront of lobbying F1’s authorities for greater driver safety.  One of the many fantastic scenes in the should-have-won-an-Oscar documentary of his life shows Senna in heated debate with race officials.  He’s basically saying: “This is a dangerous sport, you know.  Someone could get killed.”

After Roland Ratzenberger had lost his own life in qualifying for San Marino, Senna phoned his girlfriend.  He reportedly told her he didn’t want to race but felt obliged to do so because it was his job.  Through the lens of history, this call has a certain valedictory quality about it.

As with many who die young, Senna’s status as a legend was cemented the moment he perished.  And just a small part of his legacy is a safer Formula One.

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Alex Higgins – 14 April 1990

Ronnie O’Sullivan’s always threatening to retire from professional snooker.  In fact, he’s currently taking a year-long sabbatical, from which he may or may not return.  One word, Ronnie.  Boooring.  Retire, don’t retire, go for a run, do whatever, just piss or get off the pot.

If Ronnie, or anyone else, wants a lesson in how to do it, look no further than the granddaddy of all snooker lunatics, Mr Alexander Gordon Higgins.  After losing to Steve James in the 1990 World Championship, Higgins sat in his chair for an eternity, a pathetic figure in the middle of The Crucible, sipping what appeared to be orange juice (but was almost certainly half vodka).  Having had time to collect his thoughts, he delivered one of the most extraordinary, rambling diatribes ever heard at a press conference.  Among the stream-of-consciousness that included accusations of corruption, calls on politicians to investigate the game and an inexplicable “Rock on, Tommy”, Higgins announced his retirement.

“You can shove your snooker up your jacksy,” he slurred.  “I’m not playing no more.”

Yes, it was a sad sight, the very epitome of the tortured genius imploding in an unforgiving media glare.  And I know we shouldn’t delight in the public humiliation of a man battling health problems and psychological demons.  But, on the other hand, what entertainment!  Way to go, Alex.

Now that, Ronnie, is what I call a farewell.