THIS SUNDAY, THE 2 SIDES (article in English and Español)

We started this February with an incredible Sunday, since we have had great sport moments, where we saw the 2 sides of sport: the victory and defeat, the heads or tails.

The day began with a thrilling duel between the 2 best tennis players of the world- Rafael Nadal (number 1 in the world) and Roger Federer (world number 2)- in which we have been see the usual when these 2 “monsters” play in a court during the last years, since Federer showed a good level but he is unable to find the formula to beat the Spanish tennis player, who has returned to give us a display of power and mental strength, despite his terrible and long semi-final game against Fernando Verdasco last Friday (I think it is not correct that Federer played his semi-final on Thursday and Nadal on Friday), and finally, after more than 4 hours of great tennis, Rafa could win the Australian Open(7-5, 3-6, 7-6,3 -6 and 6-2) and “provoked” the Federer´s tears, the tears of impotency, since it seems that it will be impossible for Roger to beat Rafa, except if the Spanish player has a bad days. Anyway, great show and already we want to see the next big game between these 2 incredible players, which maybe will be in "Nadal´s territory”, Roland Garros.

A few hours later we still see the 2 sides of the sport in the game between Liverpool FC and Chelsea FC, which was another demonstration during this season of the bad performance of Felipao as coach of an European team, because he continues with his “incredible” record of 0 wins when his team play against a top team and besides showing a poor level, especially offensively and for example at Anfield this afternoon it is difficult to remember any Chelsea´s chances to score any goal. We said in September that Chelsea did not convince us, cause the arrival of the overvalued Scolari-his labour as coach of the Portuguese national team can be described as poor- had many doubts and finally, the time is giving us the reason, because this Chelsea play as a modest and small team when it play against a top team like Liverpool FC, which, although this afternoon it has not played its best match, was the just winner, since it was the team with more chances to score, both before and after the rigorous Lampard´s red car and finally it got the victory thanks to the quality of Fernando Torres who decided the match with 2 goals-he scored with his head a good first goal-.After this game, Liverpool (51 points in 24 games) continues struggling with the Manchester United (53 points in 23 partidos9) in order to be the Champions and Chelsea (48 points in 24) says goodbye to the Premier League´s title and it should focus on the Champions League´s round against Juventus, for which, if it want to have any option to win, should especially sack Felipe Scolari, and if it is possible to sign a striker during the last days of the winter market-Anelka is not reliable to play important game and we do not have any news about Drogba until this moment (possibly because he is not comfortable with other members of the squad) -.

Finally, we saw this Sunday again the 2 sides of sport at Zagreb in the final of the World Championship of Handball between Croatia and France, which have played a balanced game until the final minutes when the impressive French defensive line and the superb goalkeeper, Thierry Omeyer, excelled-Omeyer showed again that he is one of the best goalkeepers in the world, or possibly the best, because he became a impenetrable wall for the veteran Croatian players. Besides the great work of Omeyer, we must remark the effectiveness of Michael Guigou (10 goals with 7-7 in penaltys) and the excellent work of the French coach Claude Onesta, who came back to be sensational in his labour, knowing when a player should be in the court or in the bench to see the best level of each player during all the game and of course in the key moments of games. If Onesta was phenomenal, we can not say the same of the Croatian coach, Lino Cervar, who did not take the best decisions during the game and for example he was a little slow to ask for a time out -it is possible that he wanted to emulate the coach of Los Angeles Lakers, Phil Jackson, who has the habit to wait too many minutes to ask for a necessary time out-, since it was a mistake to wait until the 55 minutes to see a Croatian time out when there were a gap of 3 goals. Great final and just winner, because France showed that without any discussion, it is the best team of the world-it is the current World and Olympic Champion- and the score of the final is clear, 24-19. Indeed, alongside France, there were other protagonist in this world cup, since we must remark the lamentable championship of Spain, which played in a pathetic and shameful way, finishing in the 13 position after a horrendous first round, where the players did not seem professional athletes, because he showed a very poor level, both when they “defended” and they “attacked”-the wingers exist!!!!-. If the play of the team was pathetic, what can we say about the labour of the Spanish coach, Valero Rivera-the man, who when he was the chief of the FC Barcelona´s teams of basketball, handball, hockey and futsal, fired the great FC Barcelona´s basketball coach Svetislav Pešić-, who has not resigned until this moment, but this is a topic for another article.

Enjoy with the Super Bowl.

Cheers,

J&F