Channel 7 Just Don't Get Sport

The first thing I want to say here on my return from long service leave is that I absolutely fucking loathe having to change channels during a TV program. It's just one of those little things in life that I can't get past. Can't let go. Can't fathom. Free to air sports programs seem to be the most affected by this abhorrence. And sure, you might say well it's only the click of a button, it's not such a big deal, but quite frankly, it is a big fucking deal and that's one fucking button too many for me. When Channel 7 think that it's okay to make viewers switch channels during a Men's Wimbledon Final, well that just takes the fucking cake. Disrespect and half-assedness of the highest order. A great big slap in the face from the kings of butchering tennis coverage. When Inspector Morse "Endeavour" is deemed immovable by 7, one wonders why the fuck they bother with some piss-ant Wimbledon Final between a World Number 1 and Britain's great hope...  

Things I Learnt During The Australian Open 2010

* That Australia thrashing Pakistan again and again, draws higher ratings than Channel 7's butchered coverage of the tennis. How Channel 7 can insult viewers with this half-assed coverage of a Grand Slam is beyond me. Fuck you Channel 7.

* That $3 on Federer to win a Grand Slam is maybe more just sound finance than skinny odds...

* That Hewitt is definitely yesterday's hero...Tomic is the future for Australia. The young fella had eventual semi-finalist Marin Cilic down two sets to one before hitting the wall physically...my opinion of Tomic will be re-enforced by my next point...

* Cilic has the game to win Wimbledon...

* Nadal might be done...he looks like he's used up all his body can give. The French Open in a couple of months will tell us more, but to me, he looks nothing more than a top 10 player these days.

*That Federer is just a machine...I've had the conversation with many people over the last week...can you remember the guy ever being injured? I can't. No-one I know can. To win 16 Slams and never succumb to injury is just freakish.

* That I agreed with rubbish Brisbane Courier Mail journalist Mike Colman on something...namely, the bullshit Channel 7 coverage of the Grand Slam of the Asia Pacific...

* That a lot of people out there are disgruntled with Channel 7's coverage. Fuck you Channel 7. And fuck you Cougar Town. And fuck you My Kitchen Rules. And fuck you Border Security. But most of all, fuck you Deal Or No Fucktard Deal, fuck you Destination NZ, fuck you Great Southeast, fuck you Today Tonight, fuck you Home And Away, and above all, fuck you Channel 7...

A Grand Slam deserves uninterrupted live coverage. You cannot provide this. So give it up bitches. We can watch every match of every other Grand Slam live and uninterrupted, but we can't watch the Grand Slam of our home country without missing huge moments. FUCK YOU CHANNEL 7!

Australian Open Update

Well since we last chewed the fat, we've confirmed that Bernard Tomic is going to be a top 10 player but Tennis Australia officialdom is going to do their level best to be at odds with him. The young fella made a few blaze comments at 2:30 in the morning, when tired after his first ever 5-setter, and they're all over him? Get a life idiots. He's potentially awesome, so if you really care about the future of Australian tennis, stop nit-picking. It's funny how every time Hewitt has slopped up Australian Open organisers that we heard nothing from these clowns except the subtle sound of balls being groped and fondled, but now every time Tomic sneezes he's the most unruly prick in the history of tennis? It does my fucking head in. Anyway, after the break, we'll talk more tennis...

80 is the new 40...

Welcome back folks, it's 0-15 here, sorry we missed that first point, a 34 shot rally there...Yeah Channel 7, solid as ever. Just like when during the Tomic/Cilic match they had a homeless drunkard doing the scoring...apparently homeless drunkards are very free in dishing out games when it's only deuce...but more about that after this short break...


Okay, is it just me. or is Jim Courier becoming overbearing? If he says one more time that "it's shots like that that make we want to make a comeback", I'll be on the next flight to Melbourne to dish out an old-fashioned nut-kicking.

Home Improvement was a big hit about 20 years ago, but seriously, how can Channel 7 be so insulting to Brisbane viewers as to leave the tennis for Home Improvement. Followed by the most fucked game show in the history of television, Deal Or No Deal. The News, I can understand that, a lot of people watch the News. But old Home Improvement re-runs and Andrew O'Keefe encouraging bogans to throw away $10,000 for a 1 in 10 chance of $50,000 makes me want to lay some smackdown on Channel 7 big-wigs. How can anyone watch Deal Or No Deal? It's fucking retarded and Andrew O'Keefe's best work by far is on Youtube. I must re-iterate: fuck you Channel 7...fuck you very much. You guys suck balls.

On weekends, sub out Home Improvement and Deal Or No Motherfuckin' Deal for Destination NZ and the Great Southeast. We could probably find out more about NZ and the Great Southeast from our local travel agent, or indeed, the internet, but with the Del Potro/Cilic match in the balance, what better time to not watch the tennis? Aaaaarrrggghhh....fuuuuuccckkkkk!!!!!! Homos!!!!!!! (Picture the Captain breaking stuff right about now...)

More to follow people....

Australian Open Preview

One thing we know for sure about the 2010 Australian Open; during the next two weeks we will be bombarded with ads for Cougar Town starring Courteney Cox-Arquette. Thanks Channel Seven, it looks like a cracking show, can't hardly wait. We can also be confident that Seven will cut short many matches just when they're getting interesting, possibly even one of the men's quarter finals like last year. The ad breaks will also run too long so you'll miss the first point of every game after said ad breaks. But enough about Seven and their douchebaggery.

I'm steering clear of Federer again this year. Gone are the days where you'd pencil him in for the final at worst, and he's got a tough draw here. Not playing a lead-up tournament smacks of sheer arrogance and $3 is no value at all. I like Nadal as my top pick at $6. Watching him at Abu Dhabi and Qatar, he looks like he's working back into his best form and will be peaking just at the

right time. It's good to see, there was just something missing in world tennis last year when he was missing/sucking through injury. I've got Del Potro ($10) as my second pick, providing the elbow injury he sustained at Kooyong isn't too serious. I doubt that it is; players withdraw from Kooyong if they get stung by a bee, it being more of an exhibition tournament. My big smoky is Roddick who I think now believes that he can win another slam. He is well-coached and can get

himself out of tough situations much better than he used to. He got blown off the court by Berdych in the first set of his semi-final in Brisbane but impressed me in turning that match around. Wimbledon '09 convinced me there's a new Roddick. I got him at a juicy $38 and he's still around the $21-$26 mark if you shop around.

For the Aussies, I don't need to tell you that Hewitt is no chance. I'm more looking forward to a couple of up and coming guys in Carsten Ball and Bernard Tomic. Unfortunately for Ball, he has

drawn Verdasco in the first round but he's not without a chance. As I predicted, Bernard Tomic is on the way to becoming not only Australia's top player but a top 10 player. He may well even be our next world number 1 down the track. Since a disappointing first round loss in Brisbane, he's chalked up W's over Ginepri, Stepanek, Simon and Djokovic. Exhibition tournaments they may have been, but impressive form nonetheless for a 17 year old, and with a qualifier in the first round, he's a good chance to make some noise in his section of the draw.

Our women's tilt looks shaky at best with none of the gals in great form. As Pat Cash once described women's tennis, it's "hit and giggle", so I don't get into the women's much but it would

be nice to see one of them go deep into their home tournament, like Dokic last year. You would think that it would be someone with the initials S.S who is ranked 13 in the world...I don't want to actually say her name or she'll collapse under the weight of WHAB's expectations, and she doesn't need any help there. Hit 'n' giggle you say Pat?!

So check back during the tournament for all the action and the inevitable Channel Seven grilling.

A Sad Time Of Year...

It's the time of year when, despite being excited by the prospect of an epic NRL Grand Final on Sunday, I start to realise that footy season is nigh on over. And when the Spring Carnival racing is over, all I have to look forward to is a summer of captaincy blunders from Ponting that will go largely unnoticed because it's only the Windies and Paki's touring and we're thrashing them regardless....sigh...and Channel 7 no doubt botching another summer of tennis by trying to cover four tournaments at once in a horrible collage of a set of chicks hit 'n' giggle here, and a set from some Aussie hopeful getting pumped there, to a gripping golden oldies final, and finally the last few games of the deciding set in the men's Brisbane International final....sigh...delayed Oz Open telecasts into Brisbane...Chappelli telling us all about Ponting never running out of ideas against a suckful Windies outfit, and about what a c-word S. Waugh was.....sigh.......

So expect the annual Spring Carnival hysteria on WHAB people!

Fuck you Channel 7. Fuck you very much.

It's 2-sets to one in a cracking men's singles quarter final at the Oz Open, where $151 shot Verdasco leads Tsonga, so what do the fucktards at 7 do? Put on Deal or Fucking No Fucking Deal ...FUCK!!!!!!!!! You fucking ball-sucking assholes!!! I hate you more than anything on Earth you fucking bunch of retards! Would it kill you to can that fucked show for just one fucking day?!?

AUSTRALIAN OPEN PREVIEW

There are only a handful of guys capable of winning the Australian Open in any given year but that doesn't stop a bolter from getting to the final. Over the past few years we've seen Baghdatis, Gonzalez and Tsonga ride the wave of crowd support through to the final so I'm looking for a couple of guys at good odds, who are in good form, and hopefully will go one better. Gilles Simon (can you be a bolter when you're ranked 7 in the world?!) looks great value at $41. Last year, he beat Djokovic, Federer twice, and Nadal in Madrid, where he had the Spanish crowd against him as well. So he looks well capable of going deep into the tournament, so long as he doesn't run into his bogeyman Murray, who repeatedly pantsed him in '08. Another guy I'm liking the look of is Fernando Verdasco. I just had a sneaky fiver on him at $151, but you're more likely to get him at around (only!) $126 with the TAB's. I like the cut of his jib (price).

Onto the big four now; Nadal, Federer, Murray and Djokovic. I've already had a piece of Djokovic as $8 seems way over the odds for the defending champ. Nadal never seems to be at his top at this early stage of the year so the $5 on him seems about right, but I'd be inclined not to take it. Federer won Kooyong to warm up for this and it needs to be remembered that he was out of sorts/had niggling injuries when he was dumped out by the Djoker last year. I'd say that he is a deserving favourite for this year's event. Murray...I think there is a Grand Slam coming his way at some point but I would be laying him in this. Until yesterday, he was listed as equal favourite with Federer, but that $3.50 is too short for me. I'd be taking Federer over Murray as I just don't think Murray quite has what it takes yet to win through a tournament where it's best of five sets, especially if the draw does him no favours. All this being said, any of these four guys could potentially win the 2009 Australian Open.

Other guys just on the cusp in betting include Nalbandian and Tsonga, both at $21. I would never bet on Nalbandian to win a Grand Slam. He gets himself into too many ridiculous situations, seemingly cruising to a straight sets victory and then, all of a sudden, it's deep in the fifth. Tsonga has injury concerns and is no longer a bolter. Just ask Baghdatis and Gonzo...it's harder when you're not the underdog.

At this point, I'd love nothing more than to talk passionately about the Aussie assault on the Open, but for obvious reasons, I won't be saying too much. I'm looking forward to seeing Bernard Tomic continue his development, but I fear Channel 7 will be more interested in showing Lleyton Hewitt's decline.

And now to Channel 7, the bane of my fucking life. You've already fucked up the summer of tennis thus far by stupidly trying to cover three tournaments at once. Why not give at least one of those tournaments to Foxsports you greedy fuckers? But that's okay, I didn't really want to see the first set and a half of the inaugural Brisbane International final. Not to mention missing the first point after every ad break. What the fuck is with that? Thankfully for tennis fans, Foxsports shows what 7 doesn't want of the Australian Open, which is usually a pretty good collection of matches, and gives us a break from the half-assed crew of cretins at 7. But to see the big match-ups and all the Aussies getting bundled out of the tournament we'll have to put up with this:

I have a really cool job, even though I'm a retard who knows nothing about tennis...