Monzanator

Jacob deGrom started hot in the first inning... but gave up four runs in the next two. Rangers life...

Opening Day! LOLMets are back in business and fast...

Rain has postponed the last QF (Kvitova vs Alexandrova) to Thursday and the second SF to Friday. On paper Rybakina vs Pegula SF feels like the premature final and Cirstea also gets an extra day rest before her SF opponent is even known.

Polish Minister of Sport has said Russian athletes will be allowed to participate in EG (and the fencing World Cup) if they sign a special declaration they are against the war in Ukraine AND the war crimes committed by Putin according to the International Criminal Court. Well, you can stick a fork in anyone signing that document especially that Russia (just like USA, China or India) doesn't recognize ICC to begin with

https://przegladsportowy.onet.pl/igrzyska-olimpijskie/kamil-bortniczuk-wpuscilby-rosjan-do-polski-tylko-pod-jednym-warunkiem/hqzhmcy

They have a team called KooKoo in Finland? I hope that's only a sponsor name

Yeah, that's an honest politician for a change. NRA are the Republicans voters so obviously that party won't do anything but I wonder what is the Democrats excuse? They are also afraid to upset the NRA?

47 minutes ago, rybak said:

I'm afraid that we will, seeing today's response of our Ministry of Sport and PKOl president, they will want support Ukraine until very end of the war and maybe even after, I'm hoping that most of athletes will talk with heads of every federation and before make any official decision they will listen athletes wishes.

 

My only hope to see Russia and Belarus not allowed to compete in Olympics at this point, is when USA will decide to boycott Games as well or when French athletes will not want to compete in their home event, but both seems impossible.

USA will not boycott, NBC paid too much money to broadcast OG to have it without US athletes.

As for Poland, we could have a Civic Platform government in 2024 so whatever the current Minister of Sport says would be immediately rendered useless and it's not worth speculating on until the elections take place.

1 minute ago, rybak said:

Its 99% sure that our NOC will boycott if Russian and Belarusian athletes will be allowed to compete in any way

 

I did read that every single sport federation will decide if let them to compete in Paris and Cortina or not. I guess most of federations will allow them, I'm afraid...

I don't think we will boycott OG, the backlash from the 1984 boycott that effectively hijacked the 1988 OG as well is still to big. There is nothing to gain from these boycotts and you don't even need hindsight for it anymore. The lessons from 1980 and 1984 have been learned, hell, almost nobody even remembers the African boycott of 1976 tbh, a complete dust in the wind fact right now.

Ticket prices for ski jumping are between 50-90 PLN so basically less than 20 Euro for the most expensive ones

Bor Pavlovcic, Tilen Bartol and Cene Prevc will all make their farewell jumps in Planica this weekend. Only Bartol was called up with the domestic quota, the other two as trial jumpers.

7 hours ago, Josh said:

Varvara Gracheva (Women’s Tennis) switches from Russia to France. 

She hasn't done it yet.

WTA Miami 1000 QF:

Martina Trevisan (25) vs Elena Rybakina (10)

Jessica Pegula (3) vs Anastasia Potapova (27)

Ekaterina Alexandrova (18) vs Petra Kvitova (15)

Sorana Cirstea vs Aryna Sabalenka (2)

On 3/26/2023 at 5:13 PM, heywoodu said:

Ironically, Oliveira has been declared fit, whereas Marquez might well miss the next race due to a hand injury sustained in this move.

Oliveira will miss the Argentine GP as well. A terrible opening weekend all around, FOUR MotoGP riders injured so the bike count will be down to 18 next weekend.

Not like anyone cares but Extra League Finals are in the process too. GKS Katowice leads GKS Tychy 2-0 after two away wins.

Poland beats Albania 1-0. A game to forget and we'll only take the points

The underrated Karol Świderski scores in 41st minute! The fact is he's the best striker #2 behind Lewandowski we have in the last 3-4 years. Milik and Piątek can ride the bench all the time...

Meanwhile SNP has a new leader - 37-year old Humza Yousaf. Guess the Scottish nationalism will go into hibernation now unless Muslims are suddenly a majority up there?

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-64874821

Poland squad for the Albania match. Four changes compared to the disaster on Friday.

The combined number of years Netanyahu has served as PM is probably the reason. He's been in power longer than some authoritarian regimes, no wonder people are tired of this guy among other things

1 hour ago, Federer91 said:

Setting aside the Sprints debacle, the people at Dorna have also fumbled the calendar.. Why have these people put half the calendar in September - November   I don't know what genius thought, that only 3 races in April-May is good, when this is the best period. Spring-summer is the most exciting period in the motorsport season, after the long winter layouts. By September things are winding down and when October hits people are switching their interests to other things and are just waiting for the end of the season. 3 of those Asian races could have been slotted in the March-May period easily.

Well, all these Far East races can't be held in April-May since this is the monsoon period AFAIK? Japanese Grand Prix used to be held in April in the 90s and it rained literally every other year   Malaysia was either scorching hot or rain. Putting Argentina and COTA in April is actually reasonable enough. Austria used to be in the spring in the 90s but now the F1 Grand Prix isn't held in August anymore so they can't really stack up Red Bull Ring in back-to-back months? Adding a second UK race in May would make sense but it's not really happening since most UK riders are focused on Superbike racing these days.

Lots of injuries during the first weekend in Portimao. Pol Espargaro crashed into the wall in practice, Enea Bastianini suffered a broken collarbone in the sprint after Luca Marini took him out and now Marc Marquez with a total bonehead move in the GP which took out Miguel Oliveira at high speed. Let's see if he gets a penalty for that one. Should be pitlane start since that was highly dangerous.

Down in Moto3 Joel Kelso suffered a broken ankle after he crashed into the back of race winner Daniel Holgado after the finish line. He was busy taking down his tear-off visor and didn't look what was ahead of him

@BelleAt least you're not Norway

Former Stoke & Newcastle "legend" Joselu - who turns 33 on Monday - scored two goals on NT debut as they beat   3-0

UEFA will have to create some super special rules so that Haaland could play at a major championship. Totally looks like Jari Litmanen 2.0 on steroids.

Germany in off-season mode already? Entered one Felix Hoffmann in the Team Event - who has never competed outside of the Four Hills domestic pool and one-off trip to Sapporo four years ago

I don't remember the exact RR results however I have an impression curling is more competitive these days? How is looking w/o Muirhead though? I seem to recall there was a minor dust-up few years back that Muirhead got all the championship selections by default instead of some domestic prelims like they have in Canada?

Is Chen just taking a season off or he won't show up until the next OG if at all?