phelps

Taiwan's professional Baseball League CPBL should have started a few minutes ago (playing in empty stadiums)... unfortunately, the opening game has been postponed because of heavy rain... therefore, it's all delayed to tomorrow (11.05 a.m. CET) at least... all about CPBL... http://cpblstats.com/ p.s. beside the official paid live & VOD streaming service, free online streaming of the league's games is also normally available (check the "online stream" section of the website linked above)...

no, Italian requests have never been about that... we never asked anybody to pay for our previous, present and future debts not related to this health emergency... Italy only asked to put on the market a common European financial coverage (through dedicated products, call them as you want, if you don't like the word "Corona Bond") for the damages brought by this health emergency, in order to avoid the usual speculation over the weaker National only emitted certificates... but Germany (who are so coward to send on the front line one of their politically "satellite Countries" like the Netherlands and not taking over the discussion by themselves) only wanted Italy and Spain to agree on that fraud named MES, in order to become the true owner of those Countries, who obviously after a shock like this will never be able to cover the obligations included in the MES (and don't say me this agreement has no conditions, because the EU Constitutional Agreement has all those fuckin' obligations and if someone use the MES funds...and they will always be subject to fill that contract -or, better, true extortion- sooner or later)... so, all in all, once again it's true when we say "Country A doesn't want to help Country B"...MES is only intended to act as "Country A wants to raid over Country B as soon as possible"...that's its nature...that's what it was built for...that's what it really means...

are you kidding me??? Italy has been sold with no dignity...basically they gave up to all what the Northern europeans greedy raiders wanted... hope the government is gonna go down immediately so to avoid any chance for Gualtieri to sign an official document... I never felt so sad and ashamed of being Italian like today (yesterday)...I thought that we couldn't reach a lower level after the Monti/Fornero dynamic duo, but now we're finally at the point of no return...

some good old gossip... it looks that there are clouds in Tom Brady & Gisele Bundchen's sky... https://people.com/sports/tom-brady-says-gisele-bundchen-wasnt-satisfied-with-our-marriage/

no... more about them... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romani_people but those data for certain Countries, I can tell you, are widely underestimated... in Italy, for instance, they are way more than reported...for those 120/180,000 "regulars", we have at least a million Rom (the Italian name for them, but most people here always use for them the derogative expression "zingari" = "gypsies") "illegally settled", not registered anywhere...and of course dedicated to all kinds of criminal activity...

by the way, it looks that here in Italy we've finally reached the plateau and maybe we're even going to start a positive trend with more recovered people than new cases... unfortunately, most of the Italians can't wait to jump out of their homes in a hurry, which would lead to a second wave worse than the first...

good luck to all those who still believe the EU is there to help all of their members, all of their citizens...

the title of this thread is about the WC "Finals"... so, first of all, I'm going with those games only ranking... 1 - 1954, West Germany vs Hungary...most likely, the best 45 minutes in the history of the game dramatically overturned and followed by the most amazing comeback in WC history...not to be forgotten, all the arguments that followed that games for years and years... 2 - 1982, Italy vs West Germany...probably, the highest point in the Italian football history...no Italian National team has ever played such a good and dominant football like our team did in the last 4 games of that championship (after having gone through one of the worst group stage exhibition, with that still nowadays discussed 3rd match vs Cameroon)... 3 - 1958, Brazil vs Sweden...the first magical appearance on the world scene of the most dominant football team that ever played the game, Pele's Brazil... 4 - 1986, Argentina vs West Germany...the celebration of another magician in the history of the game through a very entertaining match... 5 - 1974, West Germany vs the Netherlands...a true heartbreaker for all the fans of that Oranje team that did show the world a new exciting way to play football... special mention also to 1990, West Germany vs Argentina...the worst final game ever (with one of the worst referees ever, too)... but since someone started to include also games of the early stages, here some of my highlights outside the Gold Medal matches... 1 - 1982, Italy vs Brazil (2nd round, group stage)...one of the most amazing games in our football history and one of the major uspets in the WC history... 2 - 1994, Brazil vs the Netherlands (QF)...one of the most exciting games I can remember (among those I watched live at the time)... 3 - 1982, France vs West Germany (SF)...another amazing match, even if it's also remember for one of the most shameful episodes ever happened on a football field ("Toni" Schumacher's foul on Patrick Battiston)... 4 - 2002, not a single game, but a triple-header...South Korea vs Portugal (group stage), South Korea vs Italy (Eightfinals) and South Korea vs Spain (QF)...no need to say why? basically, the death of football...the worst corruption scandal ever in WC history (even more than the ghost goal in the 1966 final between ENG and GER)... 5 - all the other very entertaining games played in the history of the WC...and there are so many (also among those basically irrelevant for the outcome of the tournaments) that I just can't mention them all...

if the pace doesn't slow down quickly, soon you're going to catch Italy in this tragic ranking... frankly, I don't know if our lives will ever be anything close to the days before this thing started...

here we go...just a few days where the numbers seem to slow down (not even stopping or decreasing, just growing slower than earlier) and in Italy all the economical, political and religious lobbies are going to put enormous pressure on the government to lift the lockdown after April 13th (the end date for the current lockdown)...

talking of Rio 2016, this week I watched all rowing finals, the women's field hockey medal matches, a few athletics finals (100m, 200m, 400m, 100/110m HS, 400m HS, all of them M + F) and some badminton medal matches (women and mixed doubles)...

here all barber shops are definitely closed... I'm always used to have quite long hair (especially in winter), but now the situation is going out of control...my hair look like Mario Kempes' at Argentina 1978 (it's good 10 months I don't go to the barber shop)...

by the way, talking of the situation in Italy, the numbers are always not that good...they are always stable and don't show any sign of decrease, even if because the good weather and the already quite long lockdown are starting to make people more and more indisciplined, with way too many not staying at home...and there's no police control that can stop them... so, from tomorrow here in Lombardy we have another obligation...nobody can go out without masks (or at least a scarf covering mouth and nose)...

they're a bunch of liars... there are photos and videos of Czech officials taking away from trucks going to Italy hundreds of crates full of masks and ventilators, crates with the flags of Italy and China and written good wishes and salute in both Italian and Chinese language... they first denied everything, then they were forced to admit they did it, but they never presented Italy any official excusation nor showed the intention to at least pay some money for what they stole (and they didn't send anything back to Italy)... by the way, this thing happened a few weeks ago, when Italy was starting to pile up deaths and other European Countries were still discussing what kind of countermeasures to use against this pandemic...it's not something new... p.s. technically, that's more than enough to ask for Czech Republic's ejection from EU (stealing medical resources intended for a Country already in heavy need of them is almost an act of war)...but our government just closed their eyes and didn't even try any official action -not even a formal protest- against the Czechs... if I were in charge, they would get out of it so easily...

so, first they steal masks and ventilators intended for other Countries and then they ask people to use those things most of them are lacking of because they stole from them? congrats! a truly good example of solidariety and ethic behaviour! please, don't force me to say what I think of them and what I wish them right now...

Belarus Extraliga Final series (best-of-7) Game #1: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk 5-1 (Yunost lead series 1-0) Game #2: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk 2-3 (OT) (series tied 1-1) Game #3: Shakhtar Soligorsk - Yunost Minsk 1-2 (OT) (Yunost lead series 2-1) Game #4: Shakhtar Soligorsk - Yunost Minsk 0-3 (Yunost lead series 3-1) Game #5: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk 3-2 (OT) (Yunost win series and Extraliga title 2019/2020 by a score of 4-1) Game #5 Highlights coming up later...

as far as I know, most matches are available through betting websites... something is also on Youtube, for instance in this page: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPzZr57FrXWPbXrWkV0D2Qg p.s. by the way, on the Belorussian tv (Belarus 5) you can watch also the local Football and Handball league (of course you need a vpn, the free extension for chrome browser Hola works well)...

Belarus Extraliga Final series (best-of-7) Game #1: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk 5-1 (Yunost lead series 1-0) Game #2: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk 2-3 (OT) (series tied 1-1) Game #3: Shakhtar Soligorsk - Yunost Minsk 1-2 (OT) (Yunost lead series 2-1) Game #4: Shakhtar Soligorsk - Yunost Minsk 0-3 (Yunost lead series 3-1) Game #5 (possible clincher): Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk, Today @ 7 p.m. local time (6 p.m. CET) Game #3 Highlights Game #4 Highlights

in the meantime, I discovered that the small village where my granny (my dad's mom) was born is basically one of the only places in Italy with no cases of coronavirus at all... OK, it's a small place with about 1,100 inhabitants, but it's also located in the middle of the original red zone of Lombardy (and Italy)... and 25% of my DNA comes from there!

what makes me angry about the Olympic Channel (Italian version, at least) is the fact that they also have an app for android TV/apple TV 4K, but basically it has only a small part of the content you can watch on the PC website... and guess what's the part you can't watch on the app? of course it's the live extra feeds (the only available one is the regular Olympic Channel TV e the only extra events were the Olympic Boxing qualification tournaments, nothing else) and all the Olympic replays... basically, the only consistent stuff are the mags/bios/special videos, but no "events"... imho, they're just a bunch of idiots...

Belarus Extraliga Final series (best-of-7) Game #1: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk 5-1 Game #2: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk 2-3 (OT) Game #3: Shakhtar Soligorsk - Yunost Minsk 1-2 (OT) - Highlights coming later... Game #4: Shakhtar Soligorsk - Yunost Minsk, tomorrow, April 1st @ 7.30 p.m. local time (6.30 p.m. CET) Game #5: Yunost Minsk - Shakhtar Soligorsk, Friday, April 3rd @ 7 p.m. local time (6 p.m. CET) Game #1 Highlights Game #2 Highlights

in Italy all those mythological poems/books are basic part of our literature studies at high school level (all sort of schools, also those with a more scientifc disciplines oriented program)... so, we normally read all of them from 14 to 18 years of age...and most times the teachers do whatever it takes to make us hate them... but if you have the chance to read them once again in the following years, with no "evaluation pressure" and when you're supposed to be more mature and have a more qualified background, it's easy to discover they are actually a lot more interesting and entertaining than you thought when you were younger... E.A. Poe's Tales of Terror isn't actually a single book, it's the translation of the Italian name given to the whole pack of his Tales, like the Pit and the Pendulum, the Murders in the Rue Morgue, Ligeia, the Tell-Tale Heart, the Black Cat and many, many more... Camilleri's books (especially those based on the Il Commissario Montalbano character) are the absolute bestseller in Italy...and the TV movies based on those books are the only fictional programs which normally have a rating comparable to the Sanremo Song Festival and the Italian National Soccer Team official matches... unfortunately the author died less than a year ago (2 months before turning 94), but he's supposed to have left many more books still to be published (he was still working when he got heavily sick a few months before his death)...

by the way, today @ 6.30 p.m. CET, it's also time for game #3 of the Belarussian Ice Hockey Extraliga Final Series (series tied 1-1 after 2 games)... live streaming available on the usual websites (and TV Channel) already posted in the past days (check previous posts)...

where and when?

nice thread... I must admit that I'm not a big reader... but my favourite books are definitely Edgar Allan Poe's "Tales Of Terror" and the endless collection of the Andrea Camilleri's books (Camilleri is the author of all the "Il Commissario Montalbano" tales)... meanwhile I never liked those "stones" of the classic Russian writers, which were so "fashionable" in the past years here in Italy (for instance, Fëdor Dostoevskij's "The Idiot" has always been considered a cult book among all the Italian actors)... if we talk about Poems and Myths, my favourite ones are surely Dante's Inferno and Homer's Odyssey...but that's not my most beloved genre, as I'm rather into academical books, especially those about History of Economics and Sociology... however, there's no need to say that the only book truly in my heart is called "Milano: il Trionfo dell'Hockey", dedicated to the magical night of March 2nd, 1991, when the Italian Hockey title came back to Milan after more than 50 years thanks to the only team I've ever been a true hardcore fan of, the Hockey Club Milano...