Robsk II

Yeah, dirty ****ing paedo.

Oh noes, some gays! Run for the hills! Christ.

You can identify them, apparently. Middle aged or older men, greasy hair, either sort of like Danny DeVito fat, or drawn out and leathery skinned Long coat or dirty looking jumper, shifty looking. Live alone. ALL paedos. Despite this being an understandably emotive issue, people should try to remain objective as possible in their assumptions and so on. People with that sexual inclination don't have an inborn ability to recognise each other or have a sixth sense telling them which children are good 'prey'. Those that allow themselves to offend in this way simply learn to have an idea via observation and so on, surely. Of course no-one wants 'one of them' living on their street, but nor do I want burglars, murderers, fraudsters, gangsters - c*nts in general on mine. It's a nonsense to paint all of them with the same brush. Like it or not, there are probably plenty of people out there with societally and legally unacceptable sexual inclinations, involving children or otherwise. Many adhere to social convention and are never a threat to anyone. It's the ones who don't have normal social understandings and behaviours that are a concern, and the ones who go as far as to be pre-meditated and so on that are the real risk. I for one fully believe it's essentially an illness, and while I accept it is not one that should be allowed to impact on others, I don't agree with the vociferous silliness this tends to provoke. Admittedly, I don't yet have kids, but when I do I hope to be sensible about risks, and not listen to scaremongering and reactionary rubbish. I think anyone who is a risk should be removed from a position where they can harm and exploit others, but the death penalty is a farcical concept. If we can identify mental health and other issues that lead people to kill, and try to understand and deal with that reasonably, in the case of murder, we should endeavour to do the same in other crimes too.

I think he's pretty great actually, after the initial flack he took when he came here. Really stood up to the plate and has turned in some consistently good performances, occasional great / point winning ones. As for staying as well, he should be given plaudits when he does leave.

Wrong forum.

I think it put Jones and Lowe in very difficult positions, but I for one still think there's something to this whole 'innoccent until proven guilty' lark - and it's there for a reason, as shown with this case. Too many people in this stupid reactionary, scaremongering, witch-hunt society seem to have entirely forgotten what that means, or why it is so important. You'd all feel very ****ing different had it been you on a totally false rap, for anything. Yet I agree - in real terms, Lowe maybe had little choice - it clearly affected things, fairly on Jones or not, so I can see a strong case for putting him on gardening leave. The results were not good, either. I don't know if he jumped or was pushed in the end, personally I hope he wasn't pushed. I respect contracts and that tenet of English society and law above. Either way - in the end, the club did the right thing by standing by his contract, and Jones should be blaming those who brought the case, not us. Using the case and playing the martyr, whilst crucifying us, perhaps for his own gain in image terms, is pretty ungrateful, and I have to add that I think the bit where it says in other careers he would have been sacked / non-paid etc is a falsehood, though. Contracts and so on exist in all jobs, and even in a career working with young people, there is no right to do that. You can suspend someone, of course, but can't just not pay them and make them walk. Also, I think that the article is wrong to suggest that all fans came out in support of him. I remember that as being far from true. Perhaps many did, but he got a lot of ****, particularly from away fans. I think this kind of suggestion lets the article down a bit, to be honest, as it's a good piece - but suggesting he was treated well by fans, that the club treated him better than most would have - colour this as being partial. Without those, it would read as an objective, well considered one.

Where exactly is this loony liberal left? Are they those crazies who can actually differentiate between health and safety and politcal correctness? Between simply trying not to be a nasty pr!ck and over-zealous bizarre bueraucracy?

Rip, br.

And random swells, freak waves can ruin an Olympic run. All sports are done for a reason, and loved by many or few, for a reason. Golf is just one of them. Tiger Woods is just a man, and a particularly good sportsman. Like Fox was. Night. This has amused me greatly.

But he wasn't, because he had the chance to come back, surely? Clearly, he didn't take it for various reasons, but the fact remains.

OK - re-read what you've written. I think you do suggest there's no room for error in golf, I suggest there's a bit more in it than in slalom, and demonstrate it. I'm not arguing. just seeing if you can be objective. It doesn't make slalom 'better'.

A fishcake.

I'm not even looking for a fight. I just find your stubborn refusal to be in any way objective baffling.

So I make a valid point about the whole chance to recover thing, and you just conveniently make an excuse when presented with this? An error of that magnitude could not have been recovered on slalom. I'm not even having a go at golf, it's a good game - but why deny the obvious facts about each sport? Golf is what it is because of it being played over 18 holes, slalom is what is is because of its margins for error and recovery.

Surely you can see that the same applies, at least equally, in slalom? I mean, at least in the open, everyone thought Watson had ****ed it on the second of the playoff 4 - but then pulls that lovely shot over the dune to give himself a shot at that putt? Then he ****ed it over the last two holes anyway?

No. That was once the case, and believe me, that's still pretty tight given the nature of the sport. Nowadays, both runs get added together. One **** up, game over.

OK, but you can still get lucky and hole in one or albatross something. Of course at the top level you can't give much away, but if you genuinely **** up in slalom, that's IT.

I never said worse. My point is that, across different sports with radically different systems, competitions etc, you simply can't trot out statistics like that because they bear little relevance. In the World Championships and so on, at the start of the off there might well be 100 boats. Also - if you mess up one move, miss a gate, you've blown it. You can get back on track in golf at least more so over 18 holes. If you touch a gate and get 2 secs added on that can put you well out of contention. Drop low, get an angle wrong, miss a single stroke - it can be game over. Also, international comeptition, as well as the top domestic divisions, have had aggregate runs for several years. It took a bit of getting used to, but now the winners go all out, twice, aiming for two perfect runs, because it's what you need to win those golds. Even in Fox's day, you had one practice run, and two runs to make it count. The rest of the knowledge was gained only from walking the course, reading the water, and preparing for every second in your head. I used to be able to tell you to within 5 seconds how long I'd take down a course of 2-3 minutes without ever paddling it. This isn't a lame rivalry thing, but I honestly think, at the top, this is more unforgiving. You can mess up a bit and be screwed in a competition, less so in golf. You would have to nail everything after to get back in the running, and I mean nail. Try having a quick look.

Um - so Fox had the chance to do it once a year, Woods 4 times a year? And this suggests Woods is better? Whaa?

I think I made a fairly decent and irrefutable point above about comparisons, but it fell on deaf ears, really.

Thanks Rattlehead.

The last one. St Will, I think you failed to see my point. These World Championships were equally important, more so by grace of there only being one a year, at once stage every two years. The world cup races were a series, but always had the best in the world there too, at every race. So I'm not sure of the differentiation you're trying to make.

Careless talk costs lives. Seriously, though - I'm not besmirching the Bundesliga at all, it doesn't get the credit it should - but by most measures, can it compete with the Premiership, Serie A, la Liga? I wouldn't say so.

I think using majors and so on as a statistical basis to prove a point is totally flawed. I'm not really saying Fox is the best ever, as I honestly think it's a silly term - but as an example, winning THE most important title in the world consistently over such a period is incredible - and if you factor in the world cup series, he would be up there in terms of events competing against the best in the world, just like Fed and Woods - and just like their plaudits being given on their ability to adapt and be the best in a range of environments, this applies more than every in kayaking. So I just you need to reconsider what you claim as irrefutable proof. Statistics can be used for anything, but at the end of the day, a number means little without a thorough contexualisation, and we don't have that in any way here. We just CAN'T prove that Fox's ability levels within his sport would not have outstripped that of Woods and Fed. I'm not saying they did, but you can't say they didn't. It's simply not possible to do so. The same applies for people like Redgrave, Armstrong, Bolt, McCoy, Rossi, Ali, Pele, Taylor, etc...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/n/newcastle_united/8172664.stm The german league does seem to have shown some much needed interest and life recently, with some real shake ups, decent players coming through and staying there for a time etc... But I'm not quite sure Martins can even persuade the Deutschlanders that it will be the best league in the world soon. Based on what..? I know he's got to look keen and so on, but.. seems a bit of an excessive claim to me..?