Torres: Waning? Waned? Or Not Waning?

FERNANDO TORRES hit the net last night, but his Liverpool side slumped to another defeat – this time against Blackpool.

But Torres has found goals hard to come by this season; last night’s was just his seventh in the Premier League.

Those goals have come at a rate of one every 232 minutes, whereas in his first three seasons in England his 56 goals arrived every 107 minutes.

When does a lack of form become an irreversible decline for a top-quality sportsman?

Brazil and North Korea paper over cracks

ON DAY five of the World Cup the tournament finally produced a game that managed to be both evenly matched and satisfactorily entertaining.

Three goals! Three actual goals! From different sides!

All three goals (assuming you believe Maicon, who has previous, meant it) were in fact just like watching Brazil.

A grown man cried at his national anthem, as though his life depended on it. Which it might have done.

Dunga wore a funny coat, which was possibly meant for a lady, but made him look like a camp tugboat driver.

What more could a football supporter want?

But the thirteen games prior to Brazil v North Korea were mainly drivel and emblematic of a worrying trend in world football.

Mourinho attempting to tick ego-boxes

REAL MADRID will finally unveil José Mourinho as their new manager on Monday after agreeing compensation with Inter Milan.

Despite Inter being owed £13.5million under the terms of Mourinho’s contract, club president Massimo Moratti settled for a deal worth between £6 and 7million.

Even though Mourinho is probably the best manager of his generation, this deal means Real Madrid have spent considerably less on him than they did on Jonathan Woodgate.

No cloud in England’s twenty20 silver lining

ENGLAND’S World Twenty20 win has raised questions about the position of test captain Andrew Strauss.

Will he have lost the dressing room? Will they still feel like “his team”? Will the world champions respect his leadership?

However asking those questions shows a lack of understanding of modern cricket or, simply, a failure to read a teamsheet.

Better to have loved and lost than to have never watched the IPL

ON SUNDAY I had my first viewing of the future of cricket.

Maybe it is because it is on ITV4 this year or maybe it is because it is has received more media attention from the non-cricketing press this year, but either way I am following the IPL for the first time.

Except the IPL is not the future of cricket.

Terry to pay price for night away from wife

THIS weekend it was revealed that a footballer had an extramarital affair with a lingerie model.

This is as big a news story as Roger Federer finally ending Switzerland’s six-month long wait for a Grand Slam tennis title.

But the main outrage of John Terry’s tabloid chastising is not that he did the dirty on his wife, but that he did the dirty on his mate.

Giantkillers ruining the magic for everyone

PRESTON North End and Chelsea kicked off the FA Cup fourth round with their Saturday lunchtime clash at Deepdale televised on ITV.

Dennis Wise, essentially representing Chelsea, and Billy Davies, representing Preston, joined Matt Smith in the television studio.

The phrase “magic of the cup” was on the tip of all three’s lips, the unspoken monkey in the room, except that it was frequently spoken.

I personally want Chelsea to beat Preston, just as I would like Tottenham Hotspur to beat Leeds United, Arsenal to beat Stoke City and Manchester City to beat Scunthorpe United in the other televised games.

Babies the key to success in Premier League title race

BACK in September Sir Alex Ferguson, like an embarassing dad, urged Jonny Evans to settle down and get married.

He argued that starting a family was the key to the stability that footballers need to perform at their best.

And this week two top Premier League stars took his advice and reaped the benefits.

Pattern emerges in Pompey exodus

FOOTBALL’S summer transfer window will shut at 5pm tomorrow.

Portsmouth will be one Premier League club especially glad of this.

The south coast club entered January’s transfer window with a squad of players fresh from lifting the FA Cup the previous season.

Since then, though, one-by-one their best players have departed.

Big Four leave door open for Medium Four

TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR and Manchester City continued their unbeaten starts to the new Premier League this weekend with wins over West Ham and Wolves.

Both of these big-spending pretenders, Tottenham in particular, have started the season impressively.

And this may finally be the season when someone makes a firm step into the Big Four.