tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79474638182790105332024-03-19T03:50:51.457+00:00SCRIBBLING IN THE SUNExpat British journalist DONNA GEE's often controversial views on life in Spain, the UK and just about everywhere elseAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comBlogger158125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-56806085001550665992017-07-15T19:59:00.002+01:002017-07-17T23:10:50.716+01:00Nicola Kuhn is blond, he's brilliant - and he's an ATP tennis champion at 17<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">.<b>Blond and brilliant..budding superstar Nicola Kuhn on his way to glory at the Braunschweig Open</b></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>F</b>our years ago, the legendary Boris Becker took a peek at a promising young tennis talent of German extraction and asserted that Nicola Kuhn was ''a better player than I was at his age.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Becker remains the only unseeded play to win the Wimbledon men's singles - an astounding feat he accomplished at the age of 17. However, tennis has changed so much since 1985 that nobody realistically expects Herr Becker's 1985 cruise to glory ever to be repeated.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Apart that is, from blond six-footer Kuhn, the Spanish-reared son of a German father and Russian mother, who this week achieved the next best thing by winning a major ATP Challenger title at the age of just 17 years and three months. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">That's four months younger than Becker was when he beat Kevin Curren in that memorable SW19 final 32 years ago.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">And what's more, the unseeded Kuhn was the youngest player in the €127,000 Sparkassen Open draw and had to battle through the qualifying tournament to join a first-round field that included eight of the world's Top 100 players. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Few people expected the Torrevieja teenager to reach the first-round proper, let alone advance to the later stages. But this afternoon (July 15), an enraptured German crowd saluted the unlikely champion, who at number 501 in the world, was the lowest-ranked player in the tournament.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">On his seven-match glory run, Kuhn even had the audacity to see off Slovakian star Jozef Kovalik, whose recent successes include a victory over Wimbledon finalist Marin Cilic at the Chennai ATP 250 tournament.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Th only disappointment is that his moment of glory was dimmed by the retirement of opponent Viktor Galovic through injury in the final set. But Kuhn, after losing the first set 6-2, was already in a winning position at 4-2 in the decider when Galovic conceded defeat.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The 32-man lineup at Braunschweig traditionally includes several players who exited early from th<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: inherit;">e Wimbledon main draw - and this year was no different, with Andy Murray's second-round victim Dustin Brown among the more familiar names in the draw.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Kid Kuhn - playing in only his second Challenger tournament - found himself face to face with at least one player TWICE his age as he battled to tame experienced professionals seven and eight years his senior.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Yet the Torrevieja youngster, the lowest ranked player in the competition, demonstrated his world-class potential by flattening the opposition in a week-long victory spree. His unlikely victims even included Slovakian Jozef Kovalik, who beat Wimbledon finalist Marin Cilic at the Chennai ATP 250 tournament earlier this year.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Kuhn's hopes seemed to be over when he trailed 0-4 in the deciding set against Kovalik in the quarter-final. But remarkably, he managed to break back twice and squeeze out a nailbiting 8-6 win in the tie-break.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG4NCkpvmzdzChELh-iLEsp7AlwrWpoqWqfDmLJurdh9XmIYA_1p0HeCYNIU5_Y8cGNOUl7W9MhInQqa7PQvQSYXA2ncnxzyvxYzSd2YxUsF7HiBC0HhlDJKtitdCycVSNOrPvGLhDBB4/s1600/Nico+and+young+fans+in+Germany+July+2017.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="900" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG4NCkpvmzdzChELh-iLEsp7AlwrWpoqWqfDmLJurdh9XmIYA_1p0HeCYNIU5_Y8cGNOUl7W9MhInQqa7PQvQSYXA2ncnxzyvxYzSd2YxUsF7HiBC0HhlDJKtitdCycVSNOrPvGLhDBB4/s320/Nico+and+young+fans+in+Germany+July+2017.JPG" width="180" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>Nico and fans in Germany</b></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"This has been the best week of my life, that's for sure,'' insisted Nico, who won his first ITF Futures tournament in Hungary only last month.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"I always wanted to play in an event like this at a young age but I certainly didn't expect to come through the qualifiers and then win the entire tournament!</span></div>
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<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">"</span><span style="font-size: x-small;">My original goal for this year was to make the ATP top 200 but with that now in sight it would be great to have some success perhaps in an ATP 250 tournament. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">''My preparations for Braunschweig were really good particularly from the fitness side. I played some great tennis and was also mentally very tough throughout the tournament.''</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Nico, started every round in Germany as underdog against experienced pros aged between 22 and 34, whose average ranking was more than 300 places above his own ATP status.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The125 ranking points he receives for winning the tournament lifted him 259 places to number 242 in the world rankings this week. And he'll no doubt savour that achievement just as much as he will enjoy spending his €18,290 winners' cheque.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">For the record, Kuhn's astonishing week-long run to today's (Saturday) final against 26-year-old Galovic went like this...</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Qualifying 1st round - bye;<br />Qualifying 2nd round: Beat Julian Onken (Germany, ATP rank 791) 6-4 6-3<br />Qualifying 3rd round: Beat Michael Linzer (Austria, ATP 275) 6-3 6-3<br />First round: Beat Goncalo Oliveira (Portugal, ATP 277) 6-4 6-2<br />Second round: Beat Carlos Berlocq (Argentina, ATP 80) 6-4 7-5<br />Quarter-final: Beat Jozef Kovalik (Croatia, ATP 159) 7-6 5-7 7-6<br />Semi-final: Beat Marco Fucsovics (Hungary ATP 109) 7-5 4-6 6-4</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Final: Beat Viktor Galovic (Croatia, ATP 491) 2-6, 7-5,4-2 RETIRED.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">FINAL WORD on kid Kuhn from losing finalist Galovic<span style="font-size: x-small;">: "Yeah, at his age I was at home playing PlayStation" </span></span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-32610689736388951722017-07-05T23:58:00.002+01:002017-07-06T12:39:38.192+01:00Kuhn and Kecmanovic: Introducing the Special Ks of 21st century tennis<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><b>Nicola Kuhn....with Miomir Kecmanovic a future Special K of men's tennis</b></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Tennis
superkid Nicola Kuhn has taken two more giant steps towards his target
of reaching the world's top 200 by the end of this year.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The
Spanish teenager, who has opted out of the ITF junior circuit in
order to boost his assault on vital ATP ranking points, pulled out of
junior Wimbledon after reaching both boys' finals at the French Open
last month.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /> Instead, he launched a double assault on the
world's experienced pros - beating a string of older players in reaching
the semi-finals of both the Belgian F1 and German F5 Futures events.</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
Kuhn, 17, was left cursing his luck at Kamen in Germany when heavy rain
turned the clay courts into a dirty mud surface during the later stages
of the competition. And despite a courageous fightback, he was finally
beaten in three sets by eventual winner Alexander Vasilenko of Russia.</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
The six points Kuhn receives for reaching the last four in Germany
should lift him to around 480 in the world when the next ATP ranking
list is announced next Monday. He moved up to 501 on the strength of
reaching the semi-final at Havre in Belgium, where he bowed out against
the world's No.1 junior Miomir Kecmanovic, despite romping away with the
first set 6-1.</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /> Kecmanovic and Kuhn, who is five months younger
than the Serbian, are rapidly establishing one of the game's most
intriguing rivalries, each having won two of their four encounters - all
of them exciting three-set marathons.</span></span> <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3GQb5ILXl81aujs2vUxKlTjXziru-L_AQmgRKU4O9MSaXmOrhXedyXVhVDhHvMJCQ_xx2nxhlg55WCM7XS27YIx1K0Q5mhlEziC2qDeMnNgmwLYLxpxgSBVioFvGVJqkkQ7y7ftQl3eg/s1600/Kecmanovic+US+Open+2016+final.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3GQb5ILXl81aujs2vUxKlTjXziru-L_AQmgRKU4O9MSaXmOrhXedyXVhVDhHvMJCQ_xx2nxhlg55WCM7XS27YIx1K0Q5mhlEziC2qDeMnNgmwLYLxpxgSBVioFvGVJqkkQ7y7ftQl3eg/s320/Kecmanovic+US+Open+2016+final.jpg" width="212" /></a></b></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><b>Kecmanovic...world's top junior</b></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /><span style="font-size: small;"> Perhaps the most
exciting of all their matches was the junior French Open semi-final,
where Kuhn triumphed 7-6, 2-6, 7-6 after an exhausting nailbiter at
Roland Garros. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Ironically, that Paris confrontation was probably the
final junior tournament for both the Special K's, whose focus is now
firmly on a place in the prestigious Next Generation finals at the end
of 2018.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">HEAD TO HEAD. Miomir Kecmanovic (born Belgrade, Aug 17 1999) v Nicola Kuhn (born Innsbruck, March 20 2000))</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">2015: Osaka Mayor's Cup - World Super Junior Tennis (hard) Winner KUHN 2-6 6-4 6-3.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">2016: Junior US Open quarter final (hard): Winner: KECMANOVIC 6-2 5-7 6-4.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">2017: Junior French Open semi final (clay): Winner KUHN 7-6 (5) 2-6 7-6 (4).</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">2017: Belgium F1 Futures (Havre) semi final (clay): Winner KECMANOVIC 1-6 6-3 6-1.</span></span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-20858318611357139282017-06-13T19:25:00.000+01:002017-06-14T00:59:58.406+01:00Weary champ Kuhn pulls out of Wimbledon in quest for pro tennis glory<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Nicola Kuhn: The junior French Open doubles champion has pulled out of Wimbledon</b></td></tr>
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<b style="background-color: white; font-family: arial;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Weary tennis champion Nicola Kuhn has played his last match as a junior after making both the singles and doubles finals at the French Open last week.</span></b><br />
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<b><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">The Spanish whizkid and doubles partner Zsombor Piros were crowned junior champions at Roland Garros after a convincing 6-4 6-4 victory over US pair Danny Thomas and Vasil Kirkov in the final.</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Three hours earlier, exhausted Nico missed out on the coveted singles crown, losing 7-6 6-3 to lanky Australian Alexei Popyrin after coming through a near-impossible three-match pla</span><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">ying schedule the previous day.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Ironically, Torrevieja's blond belter became</span></b><b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"> a victim of his own success after storming into both finals on Friday, during which he dispatched the top seed, world number one Miomir Kecmanovic in a nailbiting singles semi-final.</span></b><br />
<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">And this week Nico announced that he was withdrawing from next month's junior Wimbledon, at which he would have been among the top seeds.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">The build-up at Roland Garros reached its peak last Friday, when Kuhn inflicted a rare defeat on Kecmanovic, then teamed up with Piros to plough through two tough doubles matches and set up a Saturday showdown with Thomas and Kirkov.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Austrian-born Kuhn, whose colourful background embraces a German father, Russian mother and Spanish residency since he was three months old, </span></b><b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">went into Saturday's matches on the back of nine straight wins over the previous five days. But after effectively playing EIGHT sets of pressure tennis on Friday, something had to give.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">The crunch came in his singles showdown on Saturday morning with the lanky Popyrin, whose route to the final had been eased by an early exit from the doubles and a relatively easy singles semi-final against Spain's Alejandro Davidovich Fokina.</span></b><br />
<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Ironically, Kuhn might well have won the singles crown had he accepted an offer from Piros to ease his playing burden by withdrawing the partnership from the doubles.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Nico had been urged by his family not to take on the enormous task of competing for both the singles and doubles titles. And as his schedule began to get out of hand, Piros – who had already been knocked out of the singles - offered to abandon his own progress by withdrawing the partnership from the doubles.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Kuhn, who was 17 in March, will be eligible to play at junior level until the end of 2019 but says he will no longer compete in 18-and-under tournaments after pulling out of next month's junior Wimbledon in the wake of his Paris exertions.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">He would have been among the top seeds for the junior singles title at Wimbledon but the lure of full-time professionalism and stronger opponents has not surprisingly won the day.</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">"No more junior tennis for me,'' he joked in an email to me this week. "It is all work and no pay and I am done with it!''</span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Kuhn and his back-up team, headed by coach Pedro Caprotta, will now focus all their attention on the men's circuit and maximising Nico's assault on the ATP rankings. </span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">He is c</span></b><b><span class="aolmail_m_1663804916181564196aolmail_aolmail_text_exposed_show" style="color: #1d2129; display: inline; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">urrently listed 521 in the world behind No.1 Andy Murray and has targeted a place in the top 200 by the end of the year, which could well make him the highest ranked 17 year old on the planet.</span></b></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-30082341675891160962017-06-10T20:07:00.004+01:002017-06-11T00:19:29.294+01:00Weary champion Nicola Kuhn counts cost of too much tennis<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Shining stars: Zsombor Piros (left) and Nicola Kuhn celebrate their French Open junior doubles success</b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">Exhausted tennis hero Nicola Kuhn missed out on becoming a double Grand Slam champion on Saturday after refusing his playing partner's offer to help ease his path to the French Open singles title.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">All-action Kuhn and Hungarian teenager Zsombor Piros, the top seeds, went on to win the junior boys' doubles crown at Roland Garros – but a near-impossible playing schedule during the week eventually cost Nico a 7-6 6-3 defeat in the singles final.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Paris singles champ Alexei Popyrin (left) with runner-up Nicola Kuhn</b> </td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">Torrrevieja-based Kuhn, 17, one of the tennis world's top emerging talents, had been urged by his family not to take on the enormous task of competing in both singles and doubles. And when all-conquering Nico found himself facing a bottleneck of THREE important matches on Friday, Piros – who had already been knocked out of the singles - generously offered to abandon his own progress by withdrawing the partnership from the doubles.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">Ever-keen Kuhn decided, however, to take on the near-impossible triple challenge and went on to win all three matches – a singles semi-final against world No.1 Miomir Kecmanovic plus a doubles quarter and semi-final.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">The strain of arguably the most exhausting schedule faced by any competitor at Roland Garros finally took its toll on Saturday morning, when a clearly weary Kuhn lost 7-6 6-4 to lanky Australian Alexei Popyrin in the singles final.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">Three hours later came the happy ending as he and Piros took the boys' doubles crown, convincingly beating American duo Danny Thomas and Vasil Kirkov 6-4 6-4 in the final.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">Kuhn will be eligible to play at junior level until the end of 2019 but is unlikely to compete in under-18 tournaments after next month's Wimbledon.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-weight: normal;">Currrently ranked 529 places behind world number one Andy Murray, he has targeted a place in the ATP top 200 this year – an achievement that could well make him the highest-ranked 17-year-old in the world.</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-76198810143028991922017-06-09T12:55:00.003+01:002017-06-09T16:18:11.346+01:00Grand Slam kid Kuhn, 17, chases French tennis double <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Spanish tennis sensation Nicola Kuhn beat the world's No.1 junior in three nailbiting sets to reach his first Grand Slam final in Paris today.<br />
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The 17-year-old Torrevieja superkid defeated US-based Serbian Miomir Kecmanovic 7-6 2-6 7-6 - extending his winning run of matches at the 2017 French |Open to eight junior singles and doubles matches.<br />
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A couple of hours after beating Kecmanovic at Roland Garros, Kuhn was back on court with doubles partner Zhombor Piros - beating American pair Sam Riffice and Gianni Ross 6-4 6-4 to advance to his second final of the day.<br />
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Kuhn, who won his first professional title in Hungary two weeks ago and has since leapt to 530 in the ATP men's rankings, has now lost just one of his last 13 singles matches, eight of which have been on the professional circuit. <br />
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Blond-haired Nico, who was 17 in March, fought back impressively against Kecmanovic after going a service break behind to the American-based Serb in both the first and final sets. The Innsbruck-born Spaniard, son of a German father and Russian mother, went on to win the tiebreaks 7-5 and 7-4 to demonstrate that intense pressure brings out the best of him. <br />
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In the boys' singles final, he will face Australia's Alexei Popyrin, who beat Spaniard Alejandro Davidovitch Fokina 6-4 6-2 in the other semi. <br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-89070519181825963632017-06-08T12:44:00.000+01:002017-06-09T00:12:26.443+01:00Semi special Kuhn on path to double tennis glory in Paris<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Nicola
Kuhn confirmed his status as one of the world's hottest young tennis
talents by storming into the Junior French Open semi-final at Roland
Garros on Thursday morning.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">And on a sensational
day during which the Torrevieja kid had to play THREE matches, he and playing partner Zhombor Piros also stormed into the last four of the junior doubles.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Kuhn, who has now chalked
up seven successive victories at Roland Garros, thrashed
Australian contender Blake Ellis in a morning singles showdown – 'bageling'
the 2016 Australian Open doubles champion 6-0 in the first set to
crown a week of triumphs.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">In earlier rounds he
despatched German Marvin Moeller (7-5 6-1), Japan's Naoki Tajima (5-7
6-2 6-4) and Chun Hsin Tseng of Taipei (6-1 6-3).</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Kuhn, 17, was seeded 11 in the boys' singles, despite holding an ATP world
ranking at senior level bettered only by top seed Miomir Kecmanovic
of Serbia, who will face Nico in Friday's semi-final.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The seedings were no
doubt influenced by Nico's lack of junior action this year as he
concentrates on climbing the ATP men's ladder. Roland Garros is his
first junior tournament of 2017, as a result of which has seen him
drop in the rankings from world number five to number 96.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Meanwhile, Kuhn and
Hungarian Pilos - the top seeds - eased their way into the doubles
semis with TWO victories on a day when Kuhn saw more action than any
other player in the entire tournament.</span></span>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">They had to
fight back from a set down in both matches, winning the deciding
tie-break sets 10-2 and 10-5 respectively.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Kuhn, who rarely plays
doubles, has been in blistering singles form since teaming up with
his old coach Pedro Caprotta at Torrevieja Tennis Club earlier this
year. He spent five years living and training at former world No.1
Juan Carlos Ferrero's Equelite Tennis Academy in Villena before the
switch. </span></span>
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<div align="LEFT" class="western" style="font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; widows: 129;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">' '<span style="color: #1d2129;">I
</span><span style="color: #1d2129;">wanted to make a change because I
thought it would be best for me and my tennis,'' says Nico. “At the
moment it is proving so. These things happen, there are times when
you need a different direction and look for a change.''</span></span></span></div>
<div align="LEFT" class="western" style="font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; widows: 129;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #1d2129;">Kuhn,
who recently became only the second player born this century to win a
men's professional title, is currently ranked 530 by the ATP.
American-based Kecmanovic is ranked 466 but it is honours even in
previous contests, Kuhn having beaten the Serb in three sets in Osaka
in 2015 and Kecmanovic reaping revenge, also in three sets, in last
year's Junior US Open quarter final. </span> </span></span>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-51396162313681604282017-05-24T14:29:00.000+01:002017-05-24T22:37:26.692+01:00All systems pro as Kid Kuhn joins tennis elite<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">TORREVIEJA tennis sensation Nicola Kuhn has joined the elite list of juniors to win a men's professional title – just two months after his 17</span><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><sup>th</sup></span><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"> birthday.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">Blond-haired Kuhn, youngest player in the entire draw, thrashed Davis Cup star Attila Balasz 6-4 6-0 in a one-sided final to take the $15,000 Hungary F2 Futures crown on the shores of picturesque Lake Balaton.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">Top-seed Balasz, 11 years older than the 6ft 1in Kuhn and seven times champion of Hungary, had no answer to Nico's versatility and confidence as the Spanish teenager powered to victory in just 104 minutes.</span></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Hungary F2 Futures champion ...and Nico is hungry for more success </b> </td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129;">the previous four days, unseeded Kuhn had seen off four other experienced east European pros, all of them at least three years his senior,</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">Saturday's glorious achievement came just two weeks after Nico produced the shock of the Mutua Madrid Open in beating world number 61 Nikoloz Basilashvili 7-5 6-0 in the qualifying competition.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">The Basilashvili win catapulted him exactly 100 places up the ATP ladder to world number 612 – and the 18 ranking points he earned for Saturday's Futures victory in Hungary will lift him to the fringe of the top 500 when next week's rankings are announced.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">Kuhn, who has targeted a top 200 ranking by the end of this year, has been virtually unstoppable since severing his six-year tie with the prestigious Equelite Tennis Academy in Villena earlier this year.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129;">The academy, run by former world No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero, was a major influence in Innsbruck-born Nico's development – but constant commuting between La Mata and Villena took its toll on him and his parents, who moved to the Costa Blanca when Nico was three months old. The family eventually decided to put Nico's future into the hands of Torrevieja-based Pedro Caprota, the man who coached him before he moved to Villena, along with</span></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129;"> a new fitness coach, Cristian</span></span></span><span style="font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"> Ramajo, a new nutritionist and a new physiotherapist.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">Nico is now playing the best tennis of his life and becomes only the second player born this century to win a pro title. He began the year as the world's fifth-ranked junior, but is now concentrating on climbing the ATP rankings list and thus avoiding the qualifying rat-race at senior level.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Top team: Nico with coach Pedro Caprota</b></td></tr>
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<span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">“<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">I wanted to make a change because I thought it would be best for me and my tennis,'' he says of the decision to leave the Ferrero set-up. “At the moment it is proving so. These things happen, there are times when you need a different direction and look for a change.''</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Nico, who is seeded number five at this week's F3 Hungary Futures tournament at Balatonalmadi, plans to compete in only two junior competitions this year – the French Open and Wimbledon.</span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">His lack of recent action at junior level has seen him drop from number five to 28 in the world rankings. However, he's more than happy with the compensation of having climbed almost 200 ATP places this month.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129;">Balasz was ranked almost 400 slots higher than Kuhn before Saturday's final - but the ease of Nico's victory in Hungary and the earlier win over Basilashvili suggests that the Torry teenager is a far better player than his current ranking suggests.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">''Right now the biggest handicap for me is the physical one,'' he confesses as he prepares to take on the biggest, strongest and most experienced stars of men's tennis. “It is something that the team and I are training to improve. The opponents I have faced recently are already men - and I am still a child.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: small;">“<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">Right now my priority is to win the maximum possible matches and to keep improving''.</span></span></div>
<br />
https://www.facebook.com/NicolaKuhntennis/</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-68774251233482584062016-08-30T23:35:00.002+01:002017-05-25T13:41:31.875+01:00New York beware! Tennis superkid Nico is on a US Open mission<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES: Nicola Kuhn (centre) with tennis legend John McEnroe at Wimbledon in July. Also pictured are men's singles finalist Milos Raonic (second right), Nico's coach Fran Martinez (extreme left) and Raonic's coach Carlos Moya, himself a former world No.1 </b></td></tr>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">EUROPEAN tennis wonderkid Nicola Kuhn is</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"> on the verge of the big-time after leaping more than 400 places up the ATP men's world rankings in just two weeks.</span></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">And the 16-year-old Spanish sensation's stunning form comes at the ideal time with the junior United States Open scheduled to begin at Flushing Meadows this weekend. .</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Nico, his country's top-ranked junior and ranked No.17 in the world at 18-and-under level, headed for the States brimming with confidence. "I am very happy with my form,'' insisted the star pupil of former world No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero's Equilite Academy in Villena.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">"Last year's US Open was my first Grand Slam experience and I learnt a lot from it. I'll be spending much of my time working on my game and my fitness - and I am confident I can do well.''</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Multi-lingual Nico, whose international pedigree includes Spanish, Austrian, German, Russian and even British connections, had to play through three qualifying rounds last year and went out in the first round of the main competition. This time, he goes straight into the main draw seeded as a genuine contender for the title - an achievement that would make him one of the youngest players to win a junior Grand Slam. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">In his first taste of the senior ATP Challenger circuit, the blond six-footer celebrated his wild card entry by beating world No.320 Juan Pablo Paz of Argentina in the first round at Meerbusch in Germany two weeks ago.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">He followed that up by storming into the semi-final of last week's ITF Futures tournament in Santander. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">The seven ranking points that went with the Challenger victory lifted Nico to No.1015 behind the legendary Novak Djokovic - a jump of nearly 1,000 places since the beginning of the year.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">And the six points he amassed in Santander will lift him another 100-plus places when the next rankings list is published. .</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">Although he lost 6-2 6-3 at Meerbusch to eventual tournament winner Florian Mayer, the Kuhn kid was far from outclassed by a 32-year-old player who has beaten both Andy Murray and Rafel Nadal and has twice reached the Wimbledon quarter-finals.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Kid Kuhn in action at the Meeerbusch Challenger tournamen</b>t</td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">Top-seeded Mayer, once world No.18, dropped out of the top 100 after a succession of injuries. However, the German's recent form has been scintillating, and he has soared back to No.59 after a run of ten successive victories and back-to-back Challenger tournaments wins.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">None of Mayer's subsequent opponents at Meerbusch did any better than Kuhn, who has targeted a place in the top 600 by the end of the year.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">In his first taste of the senior Challenger circuit, Spain’s top junior celebrated his wild card entry by beating world No.320 Juan Pablo Paz of Argentina in the first round at Meerbusch in Germany.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">The seven ranking points that went with the victory lifted Nico to No.1015 behind the legendary Novak Djokovic - a jump of nearly 1,000 places since the beginning of the year.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">And although he lost 6-2 6-3 at Meerbusch to eventual tournament winner Florian Mayer, the young pretender was far from outclassed by a player twice his age, who has beaten both Andy Murray and Rafel Nadal in the past - and twice reached the Wimbledon quarter-finals.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><b><img class="AOLAttachedImage" filename="NIcola Kuhn in action at the French Open in Paris.jpg" height="320" partid="3" src="https://mail.aol.com/webmail/getPart?uid=29451483&partId=3&scope=STANDARD&saveAs=NIcola+Kuhn+in+action+at+the+French+Open+in+Paris.jpg" style="border: 1px solid rgb(218, 218, 214); margin-bottom: 30px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; max-height: 275px; max-width: 275px; visibility: visible;" width="244" /></b></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Nico on his way to the junior French Open <br />semi final at Roland Garros earlier this year</b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.8px;">Nic</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">Top-seeded Mayer, once ranked world No.18, dropped out of the top 100 after a succession of injuries. However, the German's recent form has been scintillating, and he has soared back to No.59 after a run of ten successive victories and back-to-back Challenger tournaments wins.</span><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">Nico said of the Mayer experience: "It was a match with some opportunities. I broke him two or three times on his serve, but couldn't hold mine because I can't serve as hard as he does. I also made </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">some mistakes and he also had some luck. </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">"The second set was more open till 3-3, then he went a gear higher and I couldn't break him back. I feel I have the level, but I need to improve my fitness. He said I played good and I should continue like this.''</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">None of Mayer's subsequent opponents at Meerbusch did any better than Kuhn, who has targeted a place in the ATP top 600 by the end of the year. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Kid Kuhn, whose dad is German and mother Russian, was born in Austria three months before his parents moved to the Costa Blanca and settled in a predominantly British expat community in the Costa Blanca holiday resort of Torrevieja.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;">With a multi-national background like that, Nico could open up a whole new world of fame if all goes well in New York.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif;"> </span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-40106928731727798822016-04-15T19:56:00.000+01:002016-04-15T19:56:21.218+01:00Spain and able! Tennis champ Kuhn heads for top of the world<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b style="text-align: left;">TENNIS tug-o'-war kid Nicola Kuhn celebrated his official switch to Spanish citizenship by winning the nation's top junior tournament on Sunday. And in the process he blew away the challenge of top-seed Jay Clarke, the Derby youngster being touted in Britain as a future Andy Murray. </b></span><br />
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<b>Just three weeks after his 16<sup style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">th</sup> birthday, the most prodigious young talent in Spain won the Juan Carlos Ferrero Trophy at Villena – the country's only Grade 1 tournament for players aged 18 and under. </b></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>It was his second tennis crown in a row after he bagged the Grade 2 title at Vinaros, near Castellon the previous week.</b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>And to emphasise his huge talent, the superfit six-footer from Torrevieja was the youngest competitor in each tournament.</b></span></div>
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<b><span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">The back-to-back titles earned Kuhn a mammoth 250 ITF ranking points, rocketing him to No.21 in the world rankings, one of only two players in the top 100 born in the 21st century. His success has </span><span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">also and providing a timely morale-booster for his first tilt at the French Open at Roland Garros next month.</span></b></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>The son of a German father and Russian mother, Nico and his family have lived in Torrevieja since he was three months old. However, he switched his tennis allegiance to Germany when the country he regards as home felt unable to help with his colossal travel and equipment costs.</b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Over the past four years the Kuhn kid has led the German juniors to a string of successes, including the Final of last year's Junior Davis Cup, in which he was voted the tournament's Most Valuable Player.</b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Despite those successes, Nico never felt totally comfortable playing for Germany, even though he speaks the language fluently, along with English and Russian.</b></span></div>
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<b>The process proved to be far more complicated than Nico and his parents had expected – not least the red tape involved in obtaining a Spanish passport in addition to the one Nico already had.</b></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>The official switch finally came last week, coinciding with the Juan Carlos Ferrero tournament – which also happens to be his 'home' base. He has trained and studied at former world No.1 Ferrero's's academy since he was 12 and his victory in Sunday's final against fellow Spaniard Alejandro Davidovich Fokina confirmed him as Spain's top junior player.</b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>The manner of his victory in the final was not ideal, Fokina retiring with a back injury with Kuhn takng the first set 6-3 and leading 1-0 in the second set.</b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>But the No.7 seed had been in supreme form all week, as epitomised by his 6-1, 6-3 thrashing of 17-year-old Clarke, Britain's No.1 junior,– in the quarter-final.</b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Nico, who began 2016 ranked No.70, is well ahead of schedule in his declared aim of reaching the world Top 10 this year. He has also set his sights on climbing into the ATP's top 600 and providing a springboard to fulfilling his lifelong dream of becoming a top professional player.</b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>At his current rate of progress, it seems merely a matter of <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">when</i>, rather than <i style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">if</i> King Kuhn will achieve his ultimate ambition. He has already sampled the Grand Slam atmosphere at the 2015 US Open and this year's Australian Open. </b></span></div>
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<span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b>Now he feels he is ready to make a serious challenge for a major junior title - and has earmarked Wimbledon in July as his prime target this summer.</b></span></div>
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<b>He has little or no experience of playing on grass but will practise on carpet to replicate the All England Club's surface. And he says: "I believe I can do well there.'' </b></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-39991450159526967632016-02-08T19:58:00.001+00:002016-02-08T19:58:07.644+00:00The new Nadal: El NIco sets sights on Wimbledon breakthrough<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Tennis superkid Nicola Kuhn aims to put the experience of his 21,000-mile round trip to the Australian Open to good use - by soaring to new heights in his quest to become Spain's next Rafa Nadal.<br />
And the Torrevieja-based has a hunch that Wimbledon 2016 could be the tournament that launches him as a genuine Grand Slam contender of the future.<br />
Nico, one of only two 15-year-olds in the world's Top 50 juniors, celebrated his flying visit to the Southern Hemisphere's only Grand Slam tournament by reaching the Junior Doubles quarter final in Melbourne.<br />
That unexpected success alongside Japan's top junior Toru Horie followed a singles horror show in which Austrian-born Nico failed to progress beyond the last 64 after being given the medical all-clear to compete following a foot stress fracture.<br />
“Just being there in Melbourne was a great experience but I definitely needed more preparation time,'' he told me just hours after arriving back in Spain. “One thing is for sure. Next year I will try to get there a week before the tournament.''<br />
In a ploy designed to counter the effects of jet-lag, blond six-footer Kuhn – a top pupil of former world No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero's Equelite Tennis Academy in Villena, near Valencia - stayed up all night at home in Torrevieja immediately before boarding his flight from Madrid to Doha en route to Australia.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6MiAc5qbqHCW6LMfkFR7tFax2MeweYILSrMtmxTNUjEHXWNCxuWXiwBzvYE3XGhVvt3A3w93s8Sv5H6HicsbGWjfRG_8M7Q0X-kiiCTltw9I6doD-7DG7LdaAqnJ4R7X85ggusZQJI_Q/s1600/Nicola+Kuhn.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6MiAc5qbqHCW6LMfkFR7tFax2MeweYILSrMtmxTNUjEHXWNCxuWXiwBzvYE3XGhVvt3A3w93s8Sv5H6HicsbGWjfRG_8M7Q0X-kiiCTltw9I6doD-7DG7LdaAqnJ4R7X85ggusZQJI_Q/s400/Nicola+Kuhn.jpg" width="266" /></a></div>
The outcome of the eat now, sleep later exercise was particularly hard to swallow as, three days later, Nico was beaten by Canada's Jack Mingjie Lin after powering into a commanding 4-1 first-set lead in his opening match in Melbourne.<br />
Lin went on to hit a streak of sensational form to take the match 6-4 6-3 and the lad from La Mata, who speaks Spanish, English, German and Russian fluently, generously conceded: “You can't do a lot to break someone's serve when your opponent is banging down three aces in his service games.''<br />
However, Kuhn's overall game was about to come up with an unlikely ace of its own – a winning doubles partnership with Horie.<br />
“Playing two matches in one day has been a bit too much physically in my career so far,'' Nico admits. “Now I find I can handle that sort of demand, so when Toru Horie suggested we partnered up for the Australian Open, I thought 'why not?' We had a tremendous match against each other in the Junior Davis Cup finals in October, when I won after saving two match points, and we also get on pretty well together.<br />
“Our first match was a little crazy,'' reflected Nico on the new Horie alliance. “Basically we were both playing our own game but as things settled, it seemed to work OK and we started to feel more like a team.''<br />
The first-round victory over Turkey's Irgi Kirkin and Aussie Alexei Popyrin and a shock success against No.4 seeds Yousef Hossam and Alberto Lim, took the unlikely lads into the last eight.<br />
Kuhn and Horie finally capitulated to the eventual champions, local heroes Alex De Minaur and Blake Ellis, but Nico believes he and the highly-ranked Horie are destined for more success as a doubles pair.<br />
Kuhn, who will be 16 next month, still has three more years' eligibility as a Junior, though his involvement with the ITF circuit is likely to be limited from now on as he pushes to climb the official Association of Tennis Professsionals ladder.<br />
“My target is to be in ATP top 600 by the end of the year,'' he says, ''and also hopefully to reach the Junior Top 10.''<br />
Climbing 1400 places up the ATP ladder (he is currently ranked 2009) will probably necessitate winning two Futures tournaments against adult professional opposition.<br />
However, he already has enough ranking points to qualify for the main draw of all four junior Grand Slams and sees this summer's Wimbledon as the brightest ray of sunshine on the immediate horizon.<br />
“The next Grand Slam challenge is the French Open at Roland Garros but Wimbledon is the one I am really looking forward to,'' he says. “I think I can do well there, even though playing on grass will be a new experience.''<br />
More immediate on the agenda is the passport that will finally enable Nico to play under the flag of Spain, the country he has always regarded as home. His parents Alfred and Rita moved to Torrevieja when he was three months old and by his third birthday was already wielding his first tennis racket, a gift from mum and dad.<br />
As the silverware mounted while still at junior school, the tennis authorities in his father's homeland Germany offered to finance Nico's rapidly increasing travel and equipment expenses – something their cash-strapped Spanish counterparts could not afford. And for the past four years Kaiser Kuhn has provided the main thrust of a highly successful German junior team.<br />
The pinnacle was his record run of 11 successive singles victories in leading his father's homeland to the Final of the Junior Davis Cup and winning the tournament's Most Valuable Player award into the bargain.<br />
That was to be Nico's final team appearance for Germany pending the long-anticipated arrival of the Spanish passport which will enable him to switch his national allegiance to the country he has always regarded as home.<br />
Ironically, Nico is due to play in an ATP Futures tournament in Murcia on the day those passport formalities are scheduled for completion – adding yet another complication to the mass of red tape he has had to endure to be accepted on the international stage simply as El Nico, the blond tennis kid from Torrevieja who made good.<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-16132844217048716822016-01-14T21:05:00.001+00:002016-01-15T16:12:40.835+00:00Why Spain's tennis superkid is tearing his Herr out at the Australian Open<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
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<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Costa
Blanca tennis sensation Nicola Kuhn must compete in next week's
Australian Junior Open championship as a German – thanks to Spanish
administrative bungling.</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Kuhn,
arguably the best 15-year-old player on the planet, has lived in
Torrevieja since he was three months old. Yet he has been competing
in team events for his father Alfred's homeland since he was 12, when
the Germans beat the cash-strapped Spanish tennis authorities to the
ball by offering to contribute to Nico's ever-increasing travel and
equipment expenses.</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Two
years ago, the blond Costa kid led his adopted country to the World
Under 14 title and last October powered Germany into the Junior
Davis Cup final, winning 11 singles matches on the trot and picking
up the tournament’s Most Valuable Player award.</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Despite
a truly international background, Austrian-born Nico's heart has
always been with Spain. His mother Rita is Russian but he admits: “I
have always felt more Spanish than anything.'' </span></span>
</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">He
has been given permission to compete for Spain as an individual in
future tournaments, subject to obtaining a Spanish passport .</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2DjHh9wQ0ZzjyWnx9uqoszzi9F6i5Es2ZafpNbQBhy74khbJZpS-ixmmqF4DtwHnwm5RslGKVVSCXsHrFDR7wU6yAPkby3D9MKgstpJd-KIkvUzvxsCYuHo8bd_7gRIN2rzt3wEHtSwM/s1600/NICO+MVP+OF+JUNIOR+DAVIS+CUP+2015.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="color: black;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2DjHh9wQ0ZzjyWnx9uqoszzi9F6i5Es2ZafpNbQBhy74khbJZpS-ixmmqF4DtwHnwm5RslGKVVSCXsHrFDR7wU6yAPkby3D9MKgstpJd-KIkvUzvxsCYuHo8bd_7gRIN2rzt3wEHtSwM/s400/NICO+MVP+OF+JUNIOR+DAVIS+CUP+2015.jpg" width="281" /></span></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">The
paperwork should have been a formality but as those of us who live
here are only too well aware, nothing ever runs smoothly in Spain –
and El Nico is still waiting for the elusive document several months after applying for it.</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Ideally,
he would be competing as a Spaniard in Australia, the first Grand
Slam tournament of 2016, but following frustrating bureaucratic
delays, his father Alfred concedes: "As long as Nico has to
wait for his Spanish passport, he has to play under the German
flag.''</span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"> <span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Young
Kuhn also faces two years in limbo before he can put his German
international allegiance fully behind him and compete in team events
for Spain.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">By
the time he was 12, Nico had amassed a treasure chest of silverware
in local tournaments. Hooked on tennis since Rita and Alfred bought
him a racket for his third birthday, he joined the prestigious
Equilite Tennis Academy run by former world No.1 Juan Carlos
Ferrero.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"> <span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">For
the past three years he has commuted almost daily between his home
in La Mata and the academy in Villena. That adds up to a round trip
of 208 kilometres for his regular chauffeurs, namely his overworked
parents.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"> <span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">And
after a sensational 2015 and three months before his 16th birthday,
Nico began 2016 as one of only two 15 year-olds in the world’s top
50 junior (18 and under) players. He also has a chance to make
tennis history in Melbourne as one of the youngest players ever to
win a Junior Grand Slam title.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Kuhn's</span></span>
2015 form earned him enough ranking points to go straight into <span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">the
main draw for the Australian Junior Open – and after disposing of
three of the current World Top 10 in that record victory sequence
in the Junior Davis Cup, he looks capable of beating any of the main
contenders.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Nico's
coach Fran Martinez, intent of keeping the youngster's feet firmly on
the ground, plays down suggestions that he is the world’s best
player born in the 21st century. Yet official ITF records show that
he has achieved more at the age of 15 than Novak Djokovic, Roger
Federer,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
Andy Murray or Rafael Nadal managed in their youth.</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Nico’s
mentor Ferrero predicts: "I think he can be a great player and
can reach a very high level if he continues working with the same
mentality."</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"> <span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Boris
Becker, who won Wimbledon at the age of 17, went even further after
watching Kuhn in action a couple of years ago. ''He’s a better
player than I was at his age,’’ conceded the</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
German legend.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
</span></span>
</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Kuhn’s
remarkable progress in 2015 won him the title of Alicante province's
Most Promising sports star – and prompted Spain's national football
authority La Liga to provide an extra kick by roping him into a new
sponsorship package involving three top junior sports stars.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
''I am not 100 per cent happy,’’ Nico says of his current
international status as a German player. </span></span>
</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">''The
ITF rule says I can’t play team competitions for Spain for two
years - but I can</span></span><br />
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">
play under the Spanish flag.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"></span><br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">''As
for my tennis, I know I can get great results. But I need to work
hard and focus on the next year.’’</span></span><br />
<br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9PdWfckxDozzY0md0Z9FRFZsms-LblkVzCFipwEIdvnbcerqZLpOBmVD0dTdaNPcLEwG7XwDtKl3_5Mokfh-w8dMhiGjuNAZ5KCtSiRcRKv56iNardI8L8JbFL4tHE_7nAk1quDOZmEM/s1600/festoon-flags-germany-spain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="85" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9PdWfckxDozzY0md0Z9FRFZsms-LblkVzCFipwEIdvnbcerqZLpOBmVD0dTdaNPcLEwG7XwDtKl3_5Mokfh-w8dMhiGjuNAZ5KCtSiRcRKv56iNardI8L8JbFL4tHE_7nAk1quDOZmEM/s400/festoon-flags-germany-spain.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-71814436962727862282015-12-12T23:34:00.000+00:002015-12-12T23:34:06.317+00:00Stop the bus in Spain - I want to get off where life is fine and fair<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Dashing
up the steps of </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">an Alicante-bound jet at
</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Manchester Airport in pouring rain and a
furious early-morning gale is a favourite memory of my ever-dwindling trips
home to the UK.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The race across
the runway to the aircraft was invariably sheer pleasure because I was about to
swap the cold, miserable British weather for the Costa Blanca life I
so adore.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Apart
from the shivering, soggy climate, my visits to the UK continue to highlight why
living in England today is more of a penance than a joy.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Yes, the
beautiful countryside, unique historic buildings and ironic British sense of
humour are still intact. But the breakdown of law and order and increasingly
large sub-culture of yobbism, alcoholism and drug addiction is frightening.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I won’t
go into the most controversial subject of all – the over-immigration which is
polarising rather than uniting the country. That would be politically
incorrect, even if my personal viewpoint is considerably less extreme than that
of many native Brits.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">One subject that really does make my blood boil is the unnecessary traffic chaos
and the incompetence of the faceless bureaucrats responsible for the massive
disruption on motorways and trunk roads.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Everywhere
I drove, I seemed to be held up – from an enforced 30-mile motorway detour to
accommodate a bridge-building exercise, to temporary traffic lights causing
hold-ups on virtually every main road. The general philosophy of the transport
bureaucrats seemed to be, ‘‘Cause maximum disruption to as many motorists as
possible at the time the traffic is heaviest’’.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I don’t tend to drive in busy areas in Spain,
but in ten years of part-time residence in the </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">southern Costa Blanca, I have
never seen a traffic jam, let alone the
gridlock of vehicles that snarls up UK cities almost permanently.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Spanish attitude to traffic accidents and road maintenance seems to be the
exact opposite to that of the British authorities. The priority after a pile-up
is to get the traffic moving again – and to carry out repairs only when they
are essential. Hence the road surface can be very iffy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The consolation Is that
you’ll never be caught in a 10-mile queue on the M6, with two lanes blocked by
a cone army and an invisible work force. </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">In
England, I rarely go out without being stuck in a queue of crawling cars.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I also
had the dubious pleasure of clashing with the council jobsworths who monitor
minor traffic offenders in Bury, Lancashire, where my UK home is. I lost the
battle, of course, because being fair did not tally with their mission to fill the town coffers with as much
cash as possible from the softest touches of all – law-abiding motorists.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I was
blissfully unaware that since the my previous visit to the UK, Bury Council had
decided to prohibited one particular bus lane to other vehicles from 7am to 7pm
on weekdays, rather than the normal 7-10am and 4-7pm double slot which operated
for every other bus lane in Greater Manchester<u>.</u></span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">My
‘crime’ was that I went on a lunchtime shopping trip on a quiet weekday and, at
12.38pm, moved my little Kia Picanto into the empty bus lane momentarily to
allow the only other car on the road to pass me. It hadn’t crossed my mind to
check the hours of prohibition first – I naturally assumed the rules were the
same as everywhere else.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Gotcha! </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
council spiders had set up a camera to trap heinous criminals like myself in
their devious web. And three days later I received photographic evidence of my
car tootling along in the bus lane at 25mph, plus a demand for £60 – reduced to
£30 if I paid within 14 days.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">How kind
of them to penalise an unknowing pensioner for being courteous to another
driver and clearly having no intention of using the bus lane to jump a queue or
for any dubious reason.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A few
days later I received a written reply from Bury’s Parking Services Manager in which grammar and accuracy were given low priority.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">(Sic) ‘’I
have noted your comments, however, upon further investigation of your case it
is apparent that full payment of the Notice has been made,’’ he wrote, as if
that was a reason the fine could not be reversed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">‘‘I can
confirm that there is ample signage at the entrance to the bus lane specifying
the relevant start and end times. The onus is on the motorist to check the
information before making the judgement to enter a bus lane.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">”Thank
you for your prompt payment, however, I would like to inform you that any
further right to appeal is lost and the case is now closed.’’</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">That’s it, then. Guilty as charged, and no
reference whatsoever to my explanation. </span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In Spain,
the Trafico has some weird regulations and if you are unlucky, you could find
yourself forking out 100 euros for driving in flip-flops or carrying your
shopping on the back seat.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">If you
are really unlucky, you might even be fined for speeding in Barcelona when you
have never been within 300 kilometres of the place. Fortunately, the photo
accompanying the ticket showed a different make of car – albeit with what appeared to be the
registration number of my Kia Picanto. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A quick
call to the Trafico sorted that one out. They cancelled the ticket even more rapidly than Bury council’s greed machine scoffed my credit- card payment.</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-64318069205029708442015-11-21T21:28:00.000+00:002015-11-21T21:28:01.114+00:00If you're planning a holiday in Spain, beware!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
The gullibility of Brits in the Spanish Costas, and not only tourists, never ceases to amaze me.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Virtually every day I hear that someone or other has been the victim of a pickpocket or handbag snatch.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
The experience of being mugged in public is both traumatic and disruptive, particularly if your passport happens to be among the stolen items. Which is why I have always been ultra-careful when it comes to protecting my possessions.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
I have never been robbed – unless you count the evening I found 45 euros in notes on the floor of the Irish bar in El Raso and gave it to a tipsy punter who claimed he had dropped it. I realised when I got home that the money had fallen out of my own purse!</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
OK, that was stupid – but nowhere near as daft as those male tourists who wander around Spanish markets with their wallets wedged in the back pocket of their shorts. And the women who leave their handbags on a table or chair while they chat to friends, only to discover when they come to pay the bill that they have no money…and no handbag.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
It happened to a friend of mine a while back. She went for a coffee after a busy day at work, plonked her handbag down alongside her and when she next looked - whoosh, it had vanished.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
The sting was that this particular lady invariably carried all her documents, including her passport, in that bag, not to mention a considerable amount of money. It was an experience that will live with her until her dying day – and the saddest thing of all is that it could have so easily been avoided.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
My friend has been living in Spain for some time, but most of the victims of the petty thieves tend to be tourists. They are so hell-bent on enjoying themselves that being robbed is the last thing on their minds. What juicy pickings for the villains...<img align="right" alt="" border="2" height="299" hspace="2" src="http://www.eyeonspain.com/userfiles/Pickpockets.jpg" style="border: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" vspace="2" width="400" /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
I follow a regular procedure with my handbag. When I am in a public place, I always wrap the strap around my wrist so it can’t be snatched. And when I sit down, the strap goes under a chair or table-leg so it can only ‘vanish’ accompanied by an entourage of furniture.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Oh, and I NEVER take a bag to market – I carry cash in notes and wedge them into my bra. It means that no-one can rob me without being arrested for indecent assault!</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
My advice to men is that if you go anywhere where there’s a large crowd, leave your wallet at home, in your hotel, or hidden under the carpet in your car boot. Put the cash you need in your trouser pocket (not the back one!) and to make the fortress impregnable, how about keeping your hand in your pocket as you walk around?</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
While the lowlife element of Spain’s impoverished Moroccan and Romanian communities is thought to be behind the majority of bag-snatches, I suspect the perpetrators come from more diverse roots. What one does have to concede is that these <i>ladrones</i>, however much reviled, have a remarkable skill.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
One person I know had her purse stolen from the handbag on her shoulder as she browsed her way around a crowded department store. The thief not only unzipped the bag and removed the purse without anyone noticing – but also zipped the bag up again!</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
It was the best part of half an hour before my friend realised she’d been robbed. And the way it was done suggests that the perpetrator could make a decent living as a stage magician or in a circus.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
But then, theatre audiences are not quite so generous to the sleight-of-hand merchants as the mugs they feed off every day…</div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-33649878046867210622015-11-10T11:46:00.003+00:002015-11-10T11:46:52.972+00:00A terminal problem at Alicante Airport<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">I
have a terminal illness. It's called Alicante Airport's No.1 runway-
and last week it flew to the top of my most embarrassing moments. By
a distance.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">I
made a public exhibition of myself in front of half the population
of Spain. Or to be more accurate, the weekly Fun Quiz at Monte's Bar
in Los Montesinos.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">The
British expat community here in the Costas, particularly those of us
growing longer in the tooth (if we have any left) are quite partial
to quiz evenings. It's good fun, the partaking is more important than
the winning (she lied) and for anyone who has a semblance of a brain,
the nearest we'll ever get to a Mastermind audition.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpoVALIZOPxk8WA5u0n6sxJaEO5SPEm75CoyqEEyOoHu9VGnfaRXcXVXp5BLCXhmlXUUNztjwtRE91xKqHscu0CQBRJRfIbgIImiJ8kidryUQiegN-f-hLDzNkFkEXHNYykRfyfbC3k2I/s1600/alicanterunway.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpoVALIZOPxk8WA5u0n6sxJaEO5SPEm75CoyqEEyOoHu9VGnfaRXcXVXp5BLCXhmlXUUNztjwtRE91xKqHscu0CQBRJRfIbgIImiJ8kidryUQiegN-f-hLDzNkFkEXHNYykRfyfbC3k2I/s400/alicanterunway.jpg" width="298" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">It
is also living proof that nostalgia really is what it used to
be...and one of the few benefits of being a Golden Girl.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="western">
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">Last
week's cliffhanger at Monte's ended in two-way deadlock, so our team
of Marjory, Ian, the two Pats and yours truly found ourselves facing
a tie-breaker question. My lips broke into a quiet smirk as my
disintegrating memory flashed back to the previous occasion two teams
finished all square. We weren't involved, so my guess was irrelevant
– but when I hit the exact figure for the capacity of Lord's
cricket ground (28,000) our gang were gobsmacked.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">This
time it was another numbers game. How long, in metres, is the main
runway at Alicante Airport? Cue suggestions from the team of 3,000
and 4,000. ''It's much more than that, insisted Mrs Knowall,
“Something like 9,000 I reckon.''</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">'Sum
thing' had clearly snapped as I tried to figure out the difference
between metres and yards because in my mind it seemed to make sense.
To have Darren standing over us waiting for an answer merely added to
my confusion.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">Amazingly
my stubbornness prevailed, despite everyone else's enormous doubts. I
got my way and we lost by a distance. </span></span>
</div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">I
paid for it big time, too. The repeated peals of laughter that
accompanied our normally sedate drive back to El Raso were all at my
expense.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13pt;">And
if you are ever confronted by an imaginary runway stretching from
Alicante Airport through El Altet and out cross the Mediterranean,
you know where it came from.</span></span></div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
<br />
<div class="western">
</div>
<br />
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-18944703618015953912015-11-06T21:55:00.002+00:002015-11-12T01:23:05.665+00:00Benidorm, booze, brollies and bowlers: What Spaniards REALLY think of Brits<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br data-cke-eol="1">
Jose Monllor Perez is small, dark, law-abiding and enjoys nothing more than relaxing with his pals, a cerveza and a cigarette. A stereotypical <a data-cke-saved-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_people" data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_people" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_people" rel="wikipedia" title="Spanish people">Spaniard</a>, you might say.<br>
<br>
We all have our own views on what constitutes an archetypal native of this particular Iberian nation. But how do the Spanish see the thousands, nay millions, of British holidaymakers who swarm around their country seeking the sunshine that invariably shuns our own grid-locked island?<br>
<br>
For the past 16 years Perez has been teaching Spanish to students of all nationalities (myself included) on the <a data-cke-saved-href="http://www.lonelyplanet.com/spain/valencia-and-murcia/costa-blanca" data-mce-href="http://www.lonelyplanet.com/spain/valencia-and-murcia/costa-blanca" href="http://www.lonelyplanet.com/spain/valencia-and-murcia/costa-blanca" rel="lonelyplanet" title="Costa Blanca">Costa Blanca</a> – the majority of them English. Teaching runs in Jose's family and after seeing 5,000 pupils pass through Berlingua’s doors, he’s a pretty good judge of character. The Alicante-born <em>profesora</em> is also a dab hand at another trait that runs in the family - art. And he paints a hilarious tongue-in-cheek assessment of the stereotypical Brit.<br>
<br>
Spainly speaking, it seems we are an apologetic, dog-crazy, dirty, unfit, drunken bunch of tattooed hooligans. And those are our good points! The bad guys apparently all wear bowler hats and carry umbrellas.<br>
<br>
Here’s the lowdown on how Spaniards see us – as interpreted by assessor Perez.<br>
<br>
<strong>BRIT STEREOTYPE 1:</strong><em> ‘‘They are always saying ‘sorry’ and ‘thank you’. Sometimes I think that if you stamped on an Englishman he would apologise. And they say ‘thank </em><br>
</div><a href="http://donnagee.blogspot.com/2015/11/benidorm-booze-brollies-and-bowlers.html#more">Read more »</a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-42155322187796719962015-10-27T10:37:00.000+00:002015-11-12T01:44:54.835+00:00 The new Andy Murray: He's 15, blond, superfit and his name is Nicola Kuhn<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZqgAMF7KvzDrEDmpmYhMignOnH6LnGwsgf8zuABQn7gnNt3jUnLXwtxE2buYInIYq53_IIBMHK0KRU1lPkWdJnsWYMNODDclh-X1FF63K4duVfdK23Tw6BbicpgICcJuhUmLtoT24xS8/s1600/kuhn+v+sugita+-+valencia+open+2015.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZqgAMF7KvzDrEDmpmYhMignOnH6LnGwsgf8zuABQn7gnNt3jUnLXwtxE2buYInIYq53_IIBMHK0KRU1lPkWdJnsWYMNODDclh-X1FF63K4duVfdK23Tw6BbicpgICcJuhUmLtoT24xS8/s400/kuhn+v+sugita+-+valencia+open+2015.jpg" width="300" /></span></b></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;">Nicola Kuhn prepares to receive serve against Yuichi <br />Sugita on Valencia's 3000-seat Centre Court</span></b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">British tennis fans may have a long wait for a successor to root for once Andy Murray passes his sell-by date.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So how about a blond 15-year-old superkid whose truly international pedigree adds instant irresistability to his image as the best young prospect in the game?</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Nicola Kuhn is also considerably better looking than misery-mouth Murray - and, unlike the sour-faced Scot, has also been known to smile when he wins.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">A multi-cultured European, young Nico is not so much on the ladder to international stardom. He is already halfway there - as the best player on the planet born in the 21st century. And while he will technically be a Junior until 2019, next year is likely to</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> see his big breakthrough.</span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Two weeks ago, the Austrian-born superkid led Germany to the grand final of the Junior Davis Cup, winning an unparallelled 11 successive singles matches in a competition involving 134 nations. In the final against Canada, he comfortably beat Felix Auger-Aliassime, whose rocketing success against senior professionals on the ATP circuit has been grabbing headlines all over the world - not least on Youtube.</span></div>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEha_fsginVRgHw-DKgOam_WPnhN2yRJMm34BGupONPZ3jzkmOBOQj9jumzhSsvpIYdvnRa7ZFQx-QE8rT2tAq-TupO0Y7FuaAaTSUNwm29ZfYx5Jq3C4iWLAgBpVehBv4l1Dot4g60oB2k/s1600/NICO+MVP+OF+JUNIOR+DAVIS+CUP+2015.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEha_fsginVRgHw-DKgOam_WPnhN2yRJMm34BGupONPZ3jzkmOBOQj9jumzhSsvpIYdvnRa7ZFQx-QE8rT2tAq-TupO0Y7FuaAaTSUNwm29ZfYx5Jq3C4iWLAgBpVehBv4l1Dot4g60oB2k/s400/NICO+MVP+OF+JUNIOR+DAVIS+CUP+2015.jpg" width="281" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;"><b><i>HIS NAME IS BLOND.....GAMES BLOND</i></b>,</span></td></tr>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Nico's reward for his achievements this year was a Wild Card entry to last weekend's qualifying competition at the Valencia Open, n ATP World Tour event won in 2014 by Andy Murray and this year featuring world No.7 David Ferrer and controversial Australian Nick Kyrgios among the</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> seeds.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">When he stepped on to the Centre Court for the first time on Saturday, Nico was just three matches from a head to head with Ferrer or Kyrgios in the main draw. The sting was that his opponent was world No.132 Yuichi Sugita, a </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Japanese Davis Cup veteran</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">and 12 years Nico's senior.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Ultimately, Sugita's subtle experience </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">brought him a 6-2, 6-3 victory that was considerably less comfortable than the scoreline suggests. In fact, he was almost lost for words when he was told after the match that Nico is 15 years old.. "Un-be-lievable,'' he gasped. "Never in my life have I seen a player so young who can play that good. He is a star in the making, for sure.''</span><br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-left: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCtDAW-22Yebjoo8DbMIa8MtcX7lpYMC-LMYlwbvVrT08j_5n3y1kN_wE9Y3KlnIQ1VsNcLhLi-a8J1W9Kd1N1lnwHgw4HnaKtzC5yG-DXAxYrNi4ap52T2YDAFxD13LAGp50e4id5atg/s1600/Nico++best.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCtDAW-22Yebjoo8DbMIa8MtcX7lpYMC-LMYlwbvVrT08j_5n3y1kN_wE9Y3KlnIQ1VsNcLhLi-a8J1W9Kd1N1lnwHgw4HnaKtzC5yG-DXAxYrNi4ap52T2YDAFxD13LAGp50e4id5atg/s400/Nico++best.gif" width="400" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">Nico's training and playing kit is as colourful as his tennis</span></b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">So who exactly is Nicola Kuhn and why am I touting him to become one of the game's biggest names? Well, let's just say he looks the complete Tennis Super-hero package, complemented by a squeeky clean image that is already endearing him to mums and dads as much </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">as to teenage</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> fans.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Nico's roots are fascinatingly complex. Born in Austria, his family moved to the Costa Blanca when he was three months old.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> His father, Alfred, is German, mum Rita (from whom he inherited his blond complexion) is</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> Russian and they live in a predominantly British urbanisation at Torrevieja. Nico speaks Spanish, German, English and Russian fluently...and if you push him regarding his nationality, he will concede quietly that he feels more Spanish than anything.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Which suggests that a major decision could be in the pipeline over his future tennis loyalties in team competitions like Davis Cup.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">By the time he was three, the Kuhn kid </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">was begging his parents for a tennis racket - and he's been besotted with the game ever since. He also demonstrated almost instantly at Torrevieja Tennis Club that he is a natural, winning local and regional events at every childhood level.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">By 2012, even the great Boris Becker was talking about him, describing the </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">12-year-old prodigy as "a better player than I was at his age.'' </span></div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgodZJ5axC6RuFvtVtbQYo9tkaMUafC8xeHThAskgpftgr1Icu_EBmvBVVjZGSQ11qrfI30OZr4K_050neb4p4Q-zMx8oq3Su7Kg1G8P2CTwcjVNkVpXt7DB2SKU92gTUzGh-KZhSjryhQ/s1600/NICOLA+KUHN+AND+JUAN+CARLOS+FERRERO.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><b><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgodZJ5axC6RuFvtVtbQYo9tkaMUafC8xeHThAskgpftgr1Icu_EBmvBVVjZGSQ11qrfI30OZr4K_050neb4p4Q-zMx8oq3Su7Kg1G8P2CTwcjVNkVpXt7DB2SKU92gTUzGh-KZhSjryhQ/s400/NICOLA+KUHN+AND+JUAN+CARLOS+FERRERO.jpg" width="400" /></span></b></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">Nico with his tennis mentor Juan Carlos Ferrero in 2013</span></b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">It was around that time that </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">another tennis legend, former World No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero, came into Nico's life. </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">For the past four years, the youngster has been commuting daily between his home in Torrevieja and Ferrero's prestigious Equilite Tennis Academy at Villena, near Valencia. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">The exhausting 208-kilometre round trip to combine tennis practice and academic studies would drain any normal human being. But Nico is a one-off - he supplements the travel torture with an intense training regime that burns off a cool 5,500 calories a day. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">His tennis advisers at the Equilite, headed by coach Fran Martinez, are determined to keep his feet on the ground, which is why they are not particularly partial to articles like this one eulogising their most valuable young asset.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I understand their logic, but I'm a professional journalist and this is a good story full of positive vibes. So, with apologies to those who want to keep his CV under wraps, I hereby introduce </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">the new 007 of teenage sport to you</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> answers to the name of Blond. Games Blond, that is.</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> You </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">could even try calling him Nico Teen but that's as near as he's ever likely to get to the vices of youth culture.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The last 12 months has seen Nicola rocket more than 1,000 places up the world junior (19 and under) rankings. By the end of this year.he will be in the top 40 - and one of the youngest as well.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">However, Nico has already thrown his hat in with the professionals, having won his first ATP ranking point in May this year, two months after his 15th birthday. To understand the significance of that statistic, Rafael Nadal was six months older when he achieved the same feat.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i><span style="text-align: left;">FACTS AND FIGURES: </span><a class="external text" href="http://www.itftennis.com/juniors/players/player/profile.aspx?playerid=100197348" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Nicola Kuhn</a> (born March 20, 2000) is a junior tennis player whose run of 11 successive singles victories helped Germany to reach the Final of the <a class="external text" href="http://www.itftennis.com/news/217439.aspx" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">2015 Junior Davis Cup</a>. He was subsequently voted the worldwide tournament's Most Valuable Player.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>Kuhn, who won his first ATP ranking point in a Futures tournament at the age of 15 years two months, was brought up in Torrevieja, Spain. His parents, German businessman Alfred Kuhn and his Russian-born wife, Rita, settled in the Costa Blanca when Nicola was three months old.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>Nicola showed a keen interest in tennis from the age of three, when he asked his parents to buy him a racket. "I dreamt of being a professional tennis player ever since I can remember,'' he says.</i></span><span style="text-align: left;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>At the age of 12, Nicola switched his tennis allegiance from Spain to Germany, whose tennis authorities offered to help with his equipment and travel expenses. He also joined the prestigious Equilite Tennis Academy at Villena, near Valencia, run by former world No.1 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Carlos_Ferrero" target="_blank" title="Juan Carlos Ferrero">Juan Carlos Ferrero</a>, where he was able to supplement his fledglng tennis career with his academic studies.</i></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="text-align: justify;">In February 2014, Kuhn emulated Rafael Nadal (2000) and Andy Murray (2001) by reaching the final of the prestigious </span><a class="external text" href="http://www.tennistopic.com/rod-laver-arena/noticias/nicola-kuhn-las-puertas-en-les-petit/" rel="nofollow" style="text-align: justify;" target="_blank">Les Petit As</a><span style="text-align: justify;"> under-14 tournament in Tabres, France. He ended the year ranked No.4 on the </span><a class="external text" href="http://www.tenniseurope.org/file.aspx?id=599670&dl=1" rel="nofollow" style="text-align: justify;" target="_blank">Tennis Europe 14-and-under Junior Tour</a><span style="text-align: justify;"> rankings, despite playing in only seven tournaments. His individual successes during 2014 included the </span><a class="external text" href="http://www.equelite.com/index.php/es/actualidad/noticias/496-nicola-kuhn-se-proclama-campeon-del-masters-europeo-sub-14" rel="nofollow" style="text-align: justify;" target="_blank">European Masters title in Calabria, Italy</a><span style="text-align: justify;"> and the </span><a class="external text" href="http://te.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/draw.aspx?id=3A06C4BC-570A-4EB0-8D9E-BB4B8D2AC805&draw=1" rel="nofollow" style="text-align: justify;" target="_blank">Nike International Junior tournament</a><span style="text-align: justify;"> in Bolton, England, He was also a key member of </span><a class="external text" href="http://www.itftennis.com/media/187830/187830.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="text-align: justify;" target="_blank">Germany's ITF World Team Championship winning team</a><span style="text-align: justify;"> and their viictorious </span><a class="external text" href="http://www.tenniseurope.org/news_item.aspx?id=80508" rel="nofollow" style="text-align: justify;" target="_blank">Tennis Europe Winter Cup</a><span style="text-align: justify;"> trio. Feeling that Nicola would benefit from tougher opposition, Nicola's coach Fran Martinez and support team began to enter 14-year-p;d Nicola into ITF 18-and-under events. Competing against players up to three years older than himself, he won two lower-grade tournaments in Shenzhen, China before his 15th birthday, which he celebrated by reaching the last 16 of his first Grade 1 tournament in Umag, Croatia.</span></i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>Kuhn's first taste of senior competition saw him win his first ATP ranking point at Lleida in May, 2015, while at Junior level he continued to rack up ranking points and entered the world's Top 100 for the first time. In October, he qualified for his first US Junior Open, losing in the last 32 at Flushing Meadows. A few weeks earlier, he had inspired Germany into the Junior Davis Cup finals with an immaculate singles record in the European qualifying event at Le Touquet.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>Competing against the world's top 16 nations, Nicola again won all his individual games to lead his adopted country to the JDC Final in Madrid, where they lost 2-1 to Canada. Kuhn's consolation was that he was voted the tournament's Most Valuable Player and in beating the much-vaunted <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%A9lix_Auger-Aliassime" target="_blank" title="Félix Auger-Aliassime">Félix Auger-Aliassime</a> in straight sets, staked a justifiable claim to be the world's best player born in the 21st century.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>In late October, Kuhn reached the quarter-final of the prestigious Osaka Mayor's Cup event in Japan, and achievement which lifted him to No 70 in the ITF Junior rankings,</i></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB5jbe5UvL3R0InQjBZzs46OGqaVymOPGGrpH9t8xskeIG6zg1zl1HOPmEr-CXQ-pGoiEBFMLY5A674quTlnXxdF9D0Dey2fOo3rDEWjzPg4cVYtiAzkG_xWqzHFrT7QfvWfSCOk3IlFA/s1600/nico+kuhn+with+donna.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB5jbe5UvL3R0InQjBZzs46OGqaVymOPGGrpH9t8xskeIG6zg1zl1HOPmEr-CXQ-pGoiEBFMLY5A674quTlnXxdF9D0Dey2fOo3rDEWjzPg4cVYtiAzkG_xWqzHFrT7QfvWfSCOk3IlFA/s640/nico+kuhn+with+donna.jpg" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">And finally, Nico meets the woman of his dreams...ME</span></b></td></tr>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-78702064119167672202015-10-18T12:45:00.002+01:002015-10-18T12:45:54.175+01:00For Fawkes sake, Britain's good Guys must blow up this American Halloween plot<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I BLAME it on the <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://www.history.com/topics/states" href="http://www.history.com/topics/states" rel="historycom" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="The States">Americans</a>. In fact, I blame everything on the Americans - they are big enough to take it. Even the ones who weigh less than 20 stone (or 280 pounds in the Land of the Rising Gun).</div>
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I’m talking about the over-the-top <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://www.history.com/topics/halloween" href="http://www.history.com/topics/halloween" rel="historycom" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="Halloween">Halloween</a> hoo-ha that has whooped its way into Britain...and all but killed off one of the nation’s most treasured occasions.</div>
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When I was a child, <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Fawkes_Night" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Fawkes_Night" rel="wikipedia" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="Guy Fawkes Night">Guy Fawkes Night</a> was one of the biggest days of the year. A tradition marking the 1605 <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunpowder_Plot" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunpowder_Plot" rel="wikipedia" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="Gunpowder Plot">Gunpowder Plot</a>, it commemorated a failed assassination attempt against <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_I_of_England" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_I_of_England" rel="wikipedia" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="James I of England">King James I</a> by a group of provincial <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_in_England_and_Wales" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_in_England_and_Wales" rel="wikipedia" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="Catholic Church in England and Wales">English Catholics</a>.</div>
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The plan was to blow up the <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=51.4988055556,-0.124861111111&spn=0.005,0.005&q=51.4988055556,-0.124861111111 (House%20of%20Lords)&t=h" href="http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=51.4988055556,-0.124861111111&spn=0.005,0.005&q=51.4988055556,-0.124861111111%20(House%20of%20Lords)&t=h" rel="geolocation" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="House of Lords">House of Lords</a> during the <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Opening_of_Parliament" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Opening_of_Parliament" rel="wikipedia" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="State Opening of Parliament">State Opening of Parliament</a> - something I doubt many British 10-year-olds these days know anything about.</div>
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Kids in the UK today are more concerned with Halloween, where they are free to frighten the lives out of old ladies by donning horrific masks and demanding sweets with menaces.<a data-mce-href="http://grumpyoldgran.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/guy-fawkes-effigy2.jpg" href="http://grumpyoldgran.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/guy-fawkes-effigy2.jpg" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-1098" data-mce-src="http://grumpyoldgran.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/guy-fawkes-effigy2.jpg?w=191" height="300" src="http://grumpyoldgran.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/guy-fawkes-effigy2.jpg?w=191" style="border: 1px solid rgb(221, 221, 221); color: #222222; display: inline; float: right; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: auto; line-height: 1.7; margin: 0.5em 0px 1.625em 1.225em; max-width: 100%; padding: 6px;" title="guy-fawkes-effigy2" width="191" /></a></div>
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I wonder what you get if you ask for a ‘trick’ rather than a ‘treat’? Does one of the little demons remove his mask and turn out to be <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://www.pauldaniels.co.uk" href="http://www.pauldaniels.co.uk/" rel="homepage" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="Paul Daniels">Paul Daniels</a>?</div>
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To me, the <a class="zem_slink" data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Fawkes" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Fawkes" rel="wikipedia" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;" title="Guy Fawkes">Guy Fawkes</a> culture of my youth was so much more embracing.</div>
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For days, even weeks before the event, we’d go from door to door with makeshift effigies of Fawkes and implore householders to give us ‘a penny for the Guy’.</div>
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Then, as darkness fell on November 5th, the neighbourhood would gather for a fireworks spectacular in which Guys galore would go up in smoke on top of a massive communal bonfire.</div>
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How that delightful tradition came to be usurped by the hideous ‘trick or treat’ culture, I do not know.</div>
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I believe Halloween has Celtic origins and was originally a pagan holiday in honour of the dead.</div>
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But I honestly cannot remember anyone celebrating it when I was young.</div>
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We may have started it - but as with everything else, the world has pinged it back in our faces with interest.</div>
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But I yearn for my grandchildren to enjoy the atmosphere of Guy Fawkes Night as I did more than half a century ago.</div>
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November 5th has a special place in my heart. <span style="line-height: 23.8px;">And nobody will convince me that the Halloween takeover was not a devious plot by those over-the-top, razzamatazz Americans. A fat lot of good they've done to our heritage.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 23.8px;">But what do you expect from a nation that dresses rugby players up as Bouncy Castles?</span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-821956997954811022015-10-18T00:23:00.000+01:002015-10-18T00:23:19.419+01:00Wales, the All Blacks and Howard Kendall - a whole new bawl game<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">MY beloved Wales may be out of
the Rugby World Cup, but I reckon we won almost as many new friends
as did the nippy little dazzlers from Japan.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">Warren Gatland’s injury-ravaged squad were
on a hiding to nothing after losing key backs Lee Halfpenny and Rhys
Webb in their final warm-up game against Italy. By the time they faced South Africa
in Saturday’s quarter-final, they had been reduced to taking the
field with two fourth-choice backs in centre Tyler Morgan and fullback Gareth Anscombe. Not to mention a
brilliant fly-half in Dan Biggar whose goalkicking preparations
include a passable impression of the symptoms which led to my being
diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease. </span>
</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho9LwsOEhm2YDE6cb7afzz8gDp8gQadYfaZxmzgSYebopcGMNgol-9ajZ8OlejwECfbOgSsXXMaLAOZKS_E2MtBzCcSU6xK5P7YH99Ek20-TOPltSZhKOTlcfmMHmSl6R4QrG5d2ihk1c/s1600/zulu_2799128b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho9LwsOEhm2YDE6cb7afzz8gDp8gQadYfaZxmzgSYebopcGMNgol-9ajZ8OlejwECfbOgSsXXMaLAOZKS_E2MtBzCcSU6xK5P7YH99Ek20-TOPltSZhKOTlcfmMHmSl6R4QrG5d2ihk1c/s320/zulu_2799128b.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>A hwyl new bawl game: Michael Caine in Zulu</b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">That we beat England at
Twickenham and ran Australia and the Springboks so close is testimony
to the never-say-Dai spirit known in Wales as ‘hwyl’. If you
don’t know what hwyl is, try nipping over to South Africa and
asking a few descendants of the Zulu warriors who overran our
(Rorke’s) Drift defence. Not that we managed to beat the South Africans in 1879,
either. Must be down to having Englishman Michael Caine as our
commanding officer - but not a lot of people know that.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">For all Wales’s courage, at
least we went out of the 2015 Rugby World Cup with our honour intact.
That is more than can be said for the French, who found themselves
suffocated by a black New Zealand cloud in Saturday’s second
quarter-final. The 62-13 scoreline suggests that South Africa will
also be blown away next weekend and that Richie McCaw’s champions
will become the first nation ever to win two World Cups in
succession.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: medium;">Football has had its great
international teams like Brazil and Germany, cricket had the era of
West Indian invincibility and, more recently Australian dominance.
But only in rugby union has a single nation dominated the world game
throughout my lifetime. A tiny nation with a similar three-million
population to Wales, not to mention around 80 million sheep. </span>
</div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilr6C48BCPzapO0Qqi_IxZ_5TmV1jr9I-8L9zinDTVNT4X1XmhDgT6HqwDu27HcR5-aS68T6O1vE0Hn4gjIiYTuzaScsZRjYwKcp9CVydZPHOko3YJ8L8cfHaCs63dqTvaQcBhJlns_Kc/s1600/howard-kendall-4x3195-2747631_478x359.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilr6C48BCPzapO0Qqi_IxZ_5TmV1jr9I-8L9zinDTVNT4X1XmhDgT6HqwDu27HcR5-aS68T6O1vE0Hn4gjIiYTuzaScsZRjYwKcp9CVydZPHOko3YJ8L8cfHaCs63dqTvaQcBhJlns_Kc/s320/howard-kendall-4x3195-2747631_478x359.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Howard Kendall during his Blackburn Rovers days</b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-size: medium;">HOWARD KENDALL achieved a lot in football. In fact, he was a legend. At 17, he became the youngest ever FA Cup finalist, later captained Everton to the Football league title in 1970, and for good measure went on to become the Toffees’ most successful manager ever. He also liked a drink, which became more and more apparent in his increasingly flushed visage at Goodison Park press conferences as the years rolled by.</span></div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-size: medium;">I don't think he'd had a tipple the day he laid into me at Ewood Park. But I have never forgotten the rudeness of the Blackburn Rovers player-manager at that impromptu after-match press conference in the early 1980s. It was during the early days of hand-held tape recorders and this particular inquest was held in a corridor near the changing rooms with perhaps a dozen reporters milling around.</span></div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-size: medium;">I was armed with notebook, pen and an untested tape machine. Fearing that the new gadget might not work, I quickly pressed the record button, placed my notebook on top of it, and stood jotting down Howard’s words with my other hand. I made no attempt to hide the machine, which Kendall spotted immediately.</span></div>
<div class="western">
“<span style="font-size: medium;">If you’re going to use one of those things, at least have the decency not to try to hide it,’’ he rapped, clearly irritated and pointing to my notebook sandwich. It would have been bad enough had the innuendo been correct. But this was positively embarrassing.</span></div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-size: medium;">I’ve spent the last 30 years wanting to put the record straight so if you are listening up there in God’s-Own Park, Howard, now that you know the truth, I accept your apology. However, it’s too late for you to climb up there alongside turnip head Graham Taylor and West Ham’s genial John Lyall as the most polite and approachable managers I came across during two decades of covering League football for the British tabloids. There were also bosses and players some of my colleagues preferred to avoid. Keep reading this blog and I may just tell you about them....</span></div>
<div class="western">
<span style="font-size: medium;">As for Howard Kendall, he and I did have one thing in common. My other half and I called our two daughters Hayley and Lisa – and so did Howard and his wife.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="western">
<br />
</div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-8854198705149731482015-10-10T14:36:00.001+01:002015-10-10T14:36:35.994+01:00It's my birthday. Welcome to the zimmer season in Guardamar<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
I USED to love birthdays. Particularly those big ones with a zero on the end. The ones when your boss would send you home early to have a quiet family celebration…only for all hell to let loose when you opened the front door.<br />
One moment, silence and slight concern that nobody was in. Then, as you peered into the deserted hall, an explosion of noise as doors flew open, laughing faces appeared from nowhere, the kids rushed into your arms - and 100 voices burst into a chorus of you know what.<br />
The party would go on forever as you ate, drank (too much) and caught up with the lives of surprise visitors from out of town and friends you’d all but lost touch with. Your boss and the colleagues who had masterminded the show would turn up after work and the party would go on through the night.<br />
Yes, life was fun at 40…and blowing the candles out was a piece of cake.<br />
How times change. Birthdays used to take forever to come round, yet I swear I’ve had four of them this year.<br />
And the only good thing about the damned things is that if they keep coming, you know you are still alive.<br />
I’d better amend that, because I don’t want my friends and to think I'm not going to enjoy our little celebration this weekend. Around 15 of us are taking our zimmer frames, hearing aids and skin tucks for a bit of a bash in Guardamar. It isn’t going to be a night at the Hilton, but the Portico Mar is considerably more salubrious than one or two of my previous birthday bashes,<br />
Like when I opted for the bustle and boom of Vicente Jaen’s chaotic restaurant, where plates of freebie food fly at you from all angles before you even give your order – and then you are submerged by enough food to fill a herd of starving elephants.<br />
There’s no written bill and the only till is the wad of notes tucked away in Vicente’s pocket. It’s all a bit of a shambles, really…but as irresistible as the march of time. Not the Ritz, more of the Pits, really - but the chaos is pure magic.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgo0ePLUS0QiuvxKGrAsFH2ACIol_0B6hntiCBM8qma_J5CRfo2CLBvM4MhJ6lDltXk7_ORuTYEtcuFs8WwlcQ2iC39nKCgQ7JlaAYdWpzINZGFstQ-ebluk4HyhqCfdlCUK_4IVyuM478/s1600/big-birthday-cake-with-candles.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="118" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgo0ePLUS0QiuvxKGrAsFH2ACIol_0B6hntiCBM8qma_J5CRfo2CLBvM4MhJ6lDltXk7_ORuTYEtcuFs8WwlcQ2iC39nKCgQ7JlaAYdWpzINZGFstQ-ebluk4HyhqCfdlCUK_4IVyuM478/s320/big-birthday-cake-with-candles.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
In the chaos at Vicente's, my plan for a table for 20 was redrawn as a 12 and an eight and I spent the evening sitting with my back to most of my guests. The experience confirmed my mathematical theory that the volume of noise generated by a boozing Brit is directly proportional to the amount of alcohol consumed. The longer we celebrated, the louder some of us got (not me, of course) - and the more disgusted looks headed like daggers in our direction.<br />
It was all good fun and great to have so much support in the absence of my family, who are all in the UK.<br />
One thing I did notice in the haze of alcohol (two gin and tonics - I can’t even get drunk these days) was that there were no candles on the cake.<br />
Perhaps Restaurant Jaen is a no-blow zone, I thought. Because I could definitely have seen off all those little sticks of flaming wax. Well, three or four anyway. I can only eat a few in one sitting.<br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-22726135063254396492015-10-10T01:22:00.003+01:002015-10-10T01:22:49.303+01:00The FIFA File: Why did it take so long to Blatter seedy sexist Sepp? <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #356894; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><strong style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON CHRISTMAS DAY 2010, A FEW MONTHS AFTER THE WORLD CUP IN SOUTH AFRICA. THE QUESTION IS, WHY DID IT TAKE SO LONG FOR THE AUTHORITIES TO BLATTER SEEDY SEPP AND HIS CORRUPT REGIME?</strong></span><br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
During Spain's march to glory in last summer’s World Cup, I wrote a magazine article in which I described Sepp Blatter, the most powerful administrator in world football, as ”an ageing plonker”. I now accept that at the FIFA chairman is not ageing. He’s decrepit.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV-vDl0_Ml7u_S-CIeOKWIEv4yjDUx0Oe_dsG2vtNnh1khzxEt8ptn_Rx6Ae913PObxTN0aLhZvHlhUhI6szkf44xCghzngUIoPM2BMgG73BG29wCKMhYgCsJhoRnXdqtpa_u15Zb_ZMI/s1600/sepp+blatter.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV-vDl0_Ml7u_S-CIeOKWIEv4yjDUx0Oe_dsG2vtNnh1khzxEt8ptn_Rx6Ae913PObxTN0aLhZvHlhUhI6szkf44xCghzngUIoPM2BMgG73BG29wCKMhYgCsJhoRnXdqtpa_u15Zb_ZMI/s320/sepp+blatter.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Sepp Blatter...decrepit and sexist</b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Indeed, he is so far past his sell-by date that I suggest his native Switzerland considers putting him out of his misery. Euthanasia is perfectly legal there, after all.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Now I love football but, like just about every fan in the world, I think its administrators are in another world when it comes to moving into the 21st century.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
<div style="text-align: right;">
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<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Even if those decisions are patently wrong and unfair, as they often are.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Take England’s disallowed goal against Germany, for instance. Frank Lampard’s rocket shot bounced down off the crossbar at least a yard over the line and then came out of the goal – and the referee and linesman were seemingly the only two people in the stadium who failed to spot it.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
The German goalkeeper knew it was a goal, of course. But since honesty is the last thing one expects from professional footballers (we won’t mention being faithful to their wives), there was no way he was going to tell the referee. Let’s face it, England would have done exactly the same had it been the Germans who scored, so dishonours even there.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
However, had the referee merely been allowed to consult a video replay, as are officials in other major sports, justice would have prevailed. As it was, nobody knows what might have happened had England been level at 2-2 at halftime rather than 2-1 behind. Why, they might even have won. (well, in my dreams).</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
I don’t think I’ve ever heard a player or manager speak AGAINST the use of video playbacks to confirm or over-rule controversial refereeing decisions. And the argument that the delay would detract from the game has long since been shot down by the evidence of other sports. In rugby and cricket, for example, the anxious wait for decisions like ‘not out’ or ‘no try’ to appear on the screen invariably ADD to the excitement rather than detracts from it.</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA4walMB5k1F03qs-RY3xRYgjZnjIvsgDKnu1xcud5yIBicHnh7VMecqE16nbwZPSvvWO3BPJWtNa-liaVnwygWVg_Qa1jnSzqoN4V3kdWciDpQuiuH1PmHu8FhZ54JTz2LTH_HiIyWA0/s1600/lampard+goal.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><b><img border="0" height="424" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA4walMB5k1F03qs-RY3xRYgjZnjIvsgDKnu1xcud5yIBicHnh7VMecqE16nbwZPSvvWO3BPJWtNa-liaVnwygWVg_Qa1jnSzqoN4V3kdWciDpQuiuH1PmHu8FhZ54JTz2LTH_HiIyWA0/s640/lampard+goal.jpg" width="640" /></b></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Time you went to Specsavers, ref...Frank Lampard's blinding shot is a good yard over the line</b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Yet Blatter and his fellow FIFA duffers have consistently resisted calls for any sort of technology. And that has inevitably led to people like myself asking ‘Why?’</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
And in the absence of a logical reason, I can’t help pondering the recent corruption allegations over FIFA’s decision to award the 2018 World Cup to Russia.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Now I am well aware of the laws of libel, so I am not saying someone is bribing Sepp and his sidekicks NOT to say yes to the technology companies. But it makes you wonder, particularly as Blatter’s election in 1998 was later sullied by allegations that an African federation official had been offered a 100,000 dollar bribe to vote for him.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Certainly, Blatter’s logic seems to be at variance with the entire population of the world. Apart, perhaps, from his cronies in Geneva, all of whom are presumably blokes. And that brings me to another negative aspect of the man’s background.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Seedy Sepp does not seem to hold women very high in his esteem. Indeed, he seems to see us merely as sex objects. According to Wikipedia, in the early 1970s he was elected president of the World Society of Friends of Suspenders, an organisation which tried to stop women wearing tights instead of stockings and suspender belts.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Then, in 2004, he angered female footballers when he suggested that women should “wear tighter shorts and low cut shirts… to create a more female aesthetic” and attract more male fans.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
I’ve got news for Mr Blatter. If he spent more time sorting out football’s injustices and less on ogling the girls, then it might start living up to its billing as ‘the beautiful game’.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
He could start by introducing a law that works wonderfully well in rugby and ensures that cheats who illegally prevent a certain score don’t prosper. In such circumstances, referees can award a ‘‘penalty try’’ – yet in football, the worst a team can suffer is a red card for the offender and a penalty kick for the cheated side.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
When a Uruguay player prevented Ghana winning their World Cup tie by deliberately stopping a goalbound shot with his hand, the correct decision should have been ‘goal’ – even though the ball did not cross the goal line. The incident happened at the very end of extra time, so the red card did not help Ghana in any way.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
And when they missed the resultant penalty kick, any advantage was completely wiped out.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Uruguay celebrated their reprieve by winning the penalty shootout that followed and Africa’s last representatives in the tournament were on their way home when in the eyes of every fair-minded person they were really the victors. But the concept of introducing a ‘penalty goal’ award to foil the cheats has probably never crossed Mr Blatter’s mind.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
Ghana did not get justice, they were robbed because the laws are an ass. It’s the sort of thing that makes football appear even more stupid than the heads-in-the-sand brigade who run (or should that be ruin?) the game.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;">
So how is football ever going to be dragged into the 21st century? Maybe we should offer sleazy Sepp an inducement to hand the whole caboodle over to us girls. Then we could sort it all out in no time and let him concentrate on whatever else he does for kicks.<strong style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /></strong></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-31539806174456246302015-10-02T00:21:00.000+01:002015-10-02T00:21:13.941+01:00England v Australia: From rugby zeros to conquering heroes in 80 minutes<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLq3KeBlPTch1wXdzwazLT8FC4kuQTfXeGhEGb5HQNZtbKQFj9On_gH332BfqB4tJWoC7D4-Ga2iqNGXzB7o7juLlPLwz9cJ5PoWm8ahZD8R-H8PA1yMwzKuu9Xz_W8QYWpu9h1x071tE/s1600/Chris-Robshaw.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLq3KeBlPTch1wXdzwazLT8FC4kuQTfXeGhEGb5HQNZtbKQFj9On_gH332BfqB4tJWoC7D4-Ga2iqNGXzB7o7juLlPLwz9cJ5PoWm8ahZD8R-H8PA1yMwzKuu9Xz_W8QYWpu9h1x071tE/s400/Chris-Robshaw.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>UNDER FIRE: England captain Chris Robshaw and coach Stuart Lancaster</b></td></tr>
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<h4>
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A WEEK of
recriminations over England's humbling by Wales has done nothing to
ease the pressure on skipper Chris Robshaw and his beleaguered Rugby
World Cup troops.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The
Twickenham inquest has merely cranked up the pressure on the men the
media and the fans hold responsible for the sweet chariot crashing on
the final bend. And if they shoot themselves in the foot again
against Australia tomorrow (Saturday), Robshaw and coach Stuart
Lancaster could well find themselves travelling home with their
opponents. To Botany Bay.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If England's
fickle fans have not already gunned down the suffering sheriffs, that
is.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One of the
starkest after-match contrasts between St George and the conquering
Dragons was the reaction of the ostensibly 'British' media to Wales's
28-25 victory. In their overseas edition, the nation's top-selling
tabloid scarcely gave Sam Warburton's wounded heroes credit for their
unexpected second-half comeback. Instead, Welsh, Scottish and Irish
expat readers had to endure five pages in The Sun on England's
demise, two of which were devoted to former captain Will Carling
sticking the knife into Robshaw and Lancaster.<br /> </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Those looking
for a tribute to the injury-decimated Welsh's unlikely victory at
England HQ by had to settle for a few short paragraphs on their
mouting injury problems plus assistant coach Sean Edwards' revelation
of just how much the result meant to everyone in the Principality.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Edwards, once
a never-say-Dai English rugby league hero, said: “At Sunday mass,
the priest came out and put his hands in the air to celebrate. That's
when you know you are making a difference to the nation.''</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Carling's
condemnation of England's decision to go for a match-winning try
rather than salvage a point from a 28-28 draw is rich, coming as it
does from a man whose decisions, by his own confession, cost England
the 1990 Grand Slam.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Had Robshaw's
spurning of a three-point penalty produced the last-gasp victory he
and his team were aiming for, the media would have him up alongside
Martin Johnson today as an England all-time legend. And Lancaster
would be licking his lips at the prospect of emulating Sir Clive
Woodward, the coach who led the nation to the 2003 World Cup.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Beat
Australia, as Woodward and his captain Johnson did in the 2003 World
Cup Final, and last weekend's cock-up will in just 80 minutes be
completely forgiven, if not forgotten.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Regardless of
yesterday's Wales v Fiji result, England can still make it to the
knockout stages. But it will take a monumental effort to beat a
Wallabies team that beat the mighty All Blacks in a Bledisloe Cup
match in Sydney just a few weeks ago.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Until Wales
replaced them this week, the Wallabies were officially ranked No.2 in
the world behind the All Blacks. Michael Chieka's men will have just
one target at Twickenham tomorrow – and that is to achieve the
equivalent of what their cricketing countrymen failed to do this
summer.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">By putting
the boot into the ashes of English rugby.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></h4>
<h4>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Japan's rest-case scenario</span></span></h4>
<h4>
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">THE challenge
of peaking twice in just four days proved too much for rugby's
greatest giant-killers – much to the delight of a Scotland team who
caught poor Japan on the rebound at Gloucester last week.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It was
quickly apparent that a fresh Scottish side playing their first game
of the tournament would be too great an obstacle for the shock
conquerors of mighty South Africa.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Scotland's
45-10 victory also highlighted the unfairness of a system that gives
some teams up to three days more rest between games than others.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ironically,
England have had the best deal of all – with at least a week
between each of their three games so far.<br /> </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Their
conquerors Wales, on the other hand, were given just five days to
recover before facing the physical might of Fiji last night
(Thursday) with the longest list of injuries in the competition.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Japan
suffered more than any other nation, their 96-hour recovery period
after the Springboks match also involving a venue switch from
Brighton to Gloucester.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All of which
makes a powerful case for the organisers of the next Rugby World Cup
in Japan to balance the recovery time of all competing nations.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The hosts of
RWC 2019 certainly won't argue with that one.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></h4>
<br />
<div class="western">
</div>
<br />
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<br />
</div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-25977337023250925312015-09-26T13:24:00.000+01:002015-09-26T13:24:47.457+01:00Moving to Spain: A pleasure or a penance?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Life in Spain is fun for some...but it's hard work for others</b></td></tr>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
In the misery of a cold, wet Manchester day, my daughter Lisa left a depressing message on Facebook.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
''What are we doing in this bloody miserable country?'' she asked despairingly. ''Can someone give me reasons not to move abroad, please.''</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Family, friends and making a living were the most popular responses received by Lisa and when you have two sons still at school, that is a BIG, BIG consideration.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
My local community here in Spain recently said a tearful farewell to an English family as they headed back to the UK after seven happy years on the Costa Blanca.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The main reason they returned to their roots is that their 15-year-old daughter had been pining for an English education and had understandably found it difficult to build a social life in the ageing expat community.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Yet even though Mum and Dad struggled to make a living while they were here, they loved the Spanish lifestyle so much that I reckon they'll be back once junior has passed her A-levels - and leave her to her own devices at university.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
When it comes down to choosing theoretically between living in Britain or Spain, I reckon most Brits would choose the sunshine option. Until they consider the thorny question of employment, that is.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
To me, Spain wins on virtually every front - but unless you have your own means or a decent pension, then my advice is to tread very carefully because there's precious little work available in these crisis-wrecked times. Even for Spanish people.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As for missing family and friends, no problem there. They can always come out to visit. After all, it probably takes longer to drive from north London to Birmingham than to fly from Gatwick to Alicante or Malaga.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Personally I reckon the best thing about modern-day Britain is that it's 1,500 miles away. But that comes from someone who is fortunate enough to have sufficient savings to keep going without having to work.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So where does Spain have the edge on Britain as a place to live - and vice versa? There are, of course, two sides to every story. Or in some cases any number of sides, as I discovered when I asked other exiles for their thoughts via forum comments.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
To my surprise, the UK won 'Britain is best' votes in areas like the job market, midsummer weather (in other words, Spain is too hot in July and August), home healthcare, keeping homes warm in winter, tap-water quality, utility company choice and service, natural scenery, faster legal processes, broadband speed, TV, Sunday opening. And of course shopping.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Britain also scored for reliability, particularly when it comes to things like power cuts, which are part of Spanish life. I'm still cursing the electricity company for costing me a freezer-load of food back in 2008, when my kitchen was flooded following a power cut while I was away.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Not to mention the time they cut me off without warning because my bank was not holding sufficient funds to pay my direct debit to them. But that's another story (<em>which you will find elsewhere on this blog if you dig deep enough!</em>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I can also confirm from personal experience that the service in UK banks and stores is vastly superior to the couldn't-care-less attitude of many clerks and shop assistants out here.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As one person put it: ''I hate waiting in a queue for an hour at a bank because the cashier is chatting to every Pablo, Pedro and Jose about their *abuelos/hermanos/gato/perro etc. Then it gets to your turn and. . . SIESTA TIME. Cashier is now shut!''</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Whereas British business outlets invariably put the customer first, prepare for a long wait in Spain if the clerk or shop assistant's mobile rings while you're being served. Because the chances of the caller being told curtly ''I'll ring you back'' is virtually nil.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
My local vet is a lovely young man who is unusually good at multi-tasking but suffers from acute 'mobile attached to the ear' syndrome. When I took one of my cats to his surgery for a checkover, his phone rang just as he called me into the treatment room.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
''Un momento,'' he said, taking the call from a pal. During the next 15 minutes, chatting throughout to his mate, he checked the cat, treated her, put her back into the cat box, ushered me out into the reception area and then signed some papers for a delivery man who walked in as I waited to discuss the bill. Ultimately, seeing my face growing increasingly crimson, he mouthed the words ''14 euros'', took my 20 euro note, rang it up on the till, gave me change and whispered a swift ''hasta luego''.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As I closed the door of the surgery behind me, Julien was ushering in the next patient and its owner…still talking on the mobile that may one day need removing surgically from his ear. Because not everyone is going to be as patient as I was.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Having said that, I have walked out of a Spanish shop more than once because a staff member has put a phone call or private chat of serving me. Unbelievably, it is often the boss who snubs you - the person with most to gain or lose. Such economic suicide is rare in the UK but so typical of the 'mañana mañana' Spanish mentality.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Having said all that - and factored in the menace of the myriad mosquitoes of midsummer - Spain scores highly on so many fronts that it really is no contest which country has the most going for it. Particularly if you are looking to retire out here and able to live off your pension and savings.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Obviously the sunshine and healthy air tops the lot. But then there are other aspects like the quality of life, cheap eating out (if you avoid the tourist rip-off joints), inexpensive housing, the third lowest crime rate in Europe (though you could fool me with all the handbag snatching and pickpocketing that goes on in the Costas), the fiestas, the family-orientated culture, the gentler pace of life and the golden beaches.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Oh, and I almost forgot the pharmacies, which sell prescription drugs without a prescription - something I have personally found very useful. (And no, I am not a junkie!)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Spain also got the thumbs-up for superior public transport and less-congested roads. But sadly there was no mention whatsoever of motorbikes.</div>
<div>
Why motorbikes? Well, my Lisa's fella Rob is a motorcycle training instructor and if they ever did come out here with the kids (I wish!), he'd be looking to open a training centre wherever they decided to settle.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Much as I would love to see them on my doorstep, I haven't the faintest idea how he'd do that. Come to think of it, I don't even know the Spanish word for motorcycle. </div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-53058006142692746642015-09-25T12:35:00.003+01:002015-09-25T19:04:34.232+01:00Football beware! Rugby's rising sons have sparked a sporting revolution<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">IT
is arguably the biggest giant-killing act in sporting history – but
Japan's Rugby's World Cup slaying of mighty South Africa was more
than that. It was the ultimate game-changer, a result that introduced
the public to global sport's Brand of the Rising Sons.</span></span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">While
football remains the most popular ball game on the planet, the
emergence of Japan as a major rugby union force signals a huge
breakthrough for the oval-ball code. </span>
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;"></span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Yes, the Beautiful Game is being threatened by Beauty and the East.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Forget
the 45-10 hammering the Oriental upstarts took from Scotland in
Gloucester on Wednesday. The bigger, fresher Tartan troops were
always favourites against a team weary from their history-making
exertions four days earlier. </span>
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAIb2QXf1YRCwXd5N16e7Q8QphYO09I3hf7wbbn-ahCShGIXQeDETTtT_K527qMkDuLZpjG5CxzHpzXxvYwXz-bHEKMNyuarrFPVFrny8CMw0K23MA8kmC-uLulE8YM5JkZENJbNacJ5U/s1600/Japan-rugby-union-world-cup-minnows-.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAIb2QXf1YRCwXd5N16e7Q8QphYO09I3hf7wbbn-ahCShGIXQeDETTtT_K527qMkDuLZpjG5CxzHpzXxvYwXz-bHEKMNyuarrFPVFrny8CMw0K23MA8kmC-uLulE8YM5JkZENJbNacJ5U/s640/Japan-rugby-union-world-cup-minnows-.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Full of Eastern Promisee: Japan's Rugby World Cup heroes celebrate victory against South Africa</b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">It
was the South Africa result that put down the marker for the future
of the game at world level.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">In
the words of Japan coach Eddie Jones, the man who steered Australia
to the 2003 World Cup Final, <span style="color: #333333;">“With
an Asian team beating a top-tier country, that really makes it a
global sport.”</span></span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Football
remains No.1 with the public thanks largely to a complex coaching net
that has elevated the top 50 or so nations to a level where their
international teams are all capable of beating each other. The scene
is changing, however, amid the chaos of Sepp Blatter's corrupt crew
and FIFA's continuing refusal to adopt new technology that rugby,
tennis and cricket have been utilising for a decade.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Rugby
has long held the moral high ground when it comes to respect for
officialdom and use of technology to ensure that try-scoring and
disciplinary decisions are always correct. Professional leagues
thrive in all the major rugby nations, with sponsors queuing up and
the lure of big money attracting the world's best players. And
crowds at top rugby Premiership games in England attract crowds of
Manchester United and Arsenal proportions.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Until
last weekend, the main thing holding a genuine popularity challenge
to football back was the absence of a meaningful rugby presence
beyond the traditional hotbeds of the British Isles, France,
Australasia, South Africa, Argentina and, to a lesser degree,
Italy. </span>
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The
qualification process for RWC 2015 involved no fewer than 83 nations,
the majority of them rugby's equivalent to European football's
newest whipping boys, Gibraltar. </span>
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Gibraltar
beating England in the World Cup finals? Pure fantasy, of course. Yet
that is what Japan effectively achieved by beating the Boks with a
bit-part team made up of physical midgets and journeymen pros from
overseas who qualify for Empire status on residential grounds.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">In
fairness, Japan's rugby minnows weren't exactly devoid of
professional assistance. The game has long been hugely popular in the
Land of the Rising Sun, and a coaching team led by former Wallabies
chief Jones and ex-England captain Steve Borthwick knew exactly what
was required to make the team genuinely competitive.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Way
back at RWC 1991, I remember Japan's charismatic manager Shiggy Kono
lamenting after a World Cup defeat at Murrayfield at the physical
limitations of his players. “Our backs are as good and as quick as
any other nation,'' said the man who claimed to be his country's only
failed kamikaze pilot. “The problem is finding Japanese players
who are physically as big and tall as those in the leading rugby
nations.'' </span>
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">London-educated
Kono, who died in 2007, reckoned he was such a bad pilot that his
wartime kamikaze unit bosses refused to send him on a mission. A
mission where survival would have been as likely as the Japanese
rugby team beating the 1995 and 2007 world champions.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Even
with the absorption of foreign-born forwards, Japan's tallest player
at the World Cup is a mere 6ft 4in – that's four or five inches
shorter than the average Bok, Kiwi or English second-row giant.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Japan
can still qualify for the quarter-finals for the first time despite
the defeat by Scotland - but even if they miss out, no-one can take
from them the fact they achieved the unachievable.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">The
little big men have also lifted the game of rugby into a new era of
global competition.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">PS
to England as they prepare for Saturday's Twickenham showdown with
2011 semi-finalists Wales. Beware of wounded Dragons...they are
likely to catch fire and reduce you to cinders.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">St
George is still recovering from the burns inflicted by Wales in the
2013 Six Nations championship. In case anyone has forgotten, the
written-off Taffs thrashed England by a record 30-3 margin and went
on to lift the European crown for the fourth time in eight years.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Saturday's
confrontation has a familiar look about it. England start hot
favourites with Wales decimated by injuries to key playmakers Lee
Halfpenny, Rhys Webb and long-term casualty Jonathan Davies.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">The
game will be a doddle for Stuart Lancaster's sweet chariot, predict
the fans in the white shirts and rose-coloured spectacles. </span>
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Bu
will it – particularly following the loss of England's midfield
try machine Jonathan Joseph?</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Wales,
for all their injuries, feel they can exploit a juggled English back
line which includes relatively untried rugby league convert Sam
Burgess replacing Joseph. With Lancaster also handing George Ford's
No.10 jersey to Owen Farrell, the Welsh will feel they can exploit
what they see as England's soft midfield under-belly.</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div class="western" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;">Have
Farrell, Burgess and St George<i> gut</i> what it takes to slay the
Dragon? Tune in to ITV at 9pm Spanish time on Saturday to find out.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="western">
<br /></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-6821718464620194652015-09-24T12:28:00.000+01:002015-09-24T12:28:34.579+01:00Going great shakes: The wheel deal that put my Parkinson's pain to flight<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXhYhC2mueTmG04xWs6Rf4sOFxNx5FfEC9B7VEyKIkkTW3QARXYH_Av_CxV54Jj_hjU2g-bHFfFbsEWVRDBhfKQKkmVnHfVTYFMEAv5tF9xh137uNk9jKzUW6yGhPkTyt9ZW44QS2y08U/s1600/wheelchairassistancealicante.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXhYhC2mueTmG04xWs6Rf4sOFxNx5FfEC9B7VEyKIkkTW3QARXYH_Av_CxV54Jj_hjU2g-bHFfFbsEWVRDBhfKQKkmVnHfVTYFMEAv5tF9xh137uNk9jKzUW6yGhPkTyt9ZW44QS2y08U/s320/wheelchairassistancealicante.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
THE girl at the Easyjet bag-drop desk was anything but helpful.<br />
My boarding pass stated specifically that I should go there to organise the ‘special requirements’ I had requested online when I booked my flight from Alicante to Manchester. But the bag-drop girl was having none of it. “You are in the wrong place,’’ she insisted, pointing to an office window where several people were busy haranguing the lone occupant.<br />
I duly joined the queue and waited a few minutes, during which time the line reduced by a whole person.<br />
Becoming increasingly anxious, I looked at my boarding pass again. It clearly stated I should go to the bag drop, so I wandered back to the Easyjet desk and joined the queue of people waiting to check in. By now I was becoming a little agitated. Here I was, in an extremely embarrassing position, seeking wheelchair assistance for the first time in my life. I felt so guilty, but equally relieved that I did not have to join the logjam of passengers funnelling through the crowded security checks.<br />
It was a busy Friday evening and it crossed my mind that I should forget the wheelchair and make my way to security with my hand luggage as I had always done during the five years or so I had been living in Spain.<br />
Then I recalled all the hassle of having to unzip my bag and remove my ancient laptop for separate checking, Not to mention shuffling and shaking along the line as young, chicos and chicas tut-tutted at this old dear with Parkinson’s Disease who blocked their rush to the duty-free shops.<br />
The bag-drop girl I had spoken to earlier spotted me in the check-in queue. Shaking her head at my defiance of her instructions, she left her desk and strode over. “Madam, you cannot get special assistance here. This is the bag-drop queue. I told you must go to the office I pointed out to you earlier.’’<br />
I could feel myself falling apart and the girl sensed it too. Suddenly I felt her mood change from irritation to sympathy and realised she was not the impatient misery I had first taken her for.<br />
She ushered me back towards the wheelchair office where, as luck would have it, the queue had vanished.<br />
The next 10 minutes were an emotional time as I came to terms with old age. My frailty in such a trivial situation confirmed to me that senility and ill-health really were catching up with me and that my independence was under threat.<br />
Over the previous few months I had been finding it increasingly difficult to handle the rigours of air travel. I didn't actually FEEL old at 69, but even without the limitations of Parkinson’s and angina, I was finding it a real struggle to carry hand luggage onto a plane - and certainly could not lift it into overhead racks. The problem increased dramatically when one threw in the limitations of a dicky heart and hands that shook like a 9.7 scale earthquake.<br />
My ever-weakening emotions welled over into tears as I realised that the problems would only increase as I wing my way towards the final horizon.<br />
Most of my flights these days are to visit my family in Manchester, where I had been finding the long walk to passport control impossible without resorting to my emergency angina-relief spray. Now, for the first time, I could forget about becoming a damsel in distress.<br />
Ten minutes later I was being wheeled through a quiet area of the security department to the department gate, feeling cool and relaxed for the first time in a generation.<br />
It didn't bother me that I was destined to be the last person off the plane in Manchester.<br />
It is nearly two years since that dramatic day I first took advantage of what I now call the the 'squeals on wheels service' I've flown from Spain to the UK at least a dozen times since then and found every airline equally friendly and helpful when it comes to doddery old codgers like me.<br />
With my increasing health problems, stress is the last thing I want. I'd like to shake the hand of every airport assistant and cabin crew member who has helped me - but my Parkinson's has now reached the stage where I'd probably miss!<br />
Well, at least I've still got my sense of humour. Even if it does invariably mean being the very last passenger off the plane.<br />
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7947463818279010533.post-89347287721693275632015-09-19T07:41:00.000+01:002015-09-19T07:41:01.557+01:00Over to you, Big G: The world's only solution to terror<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #7a7a7a; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I got into conversation with a couple of uninvited callers the other day…about the end of the world.</span></div>
<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #7a7a7a; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Yes, they were Jehovah's Witnesses and no, I didn't send them packing. Although I am not a Christian, I have never been one of those ‘We are not interested – clear off’ types.<br />Indeed, I have the greatest admiration for these invariably humble, gentle people, whose courage is remarkable in the face of unnecessary antagonism from so many people who resent their intrusion.</span></div>
<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #7a7a7a; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It’s all very well to turn them away politely but firmly, but verbal aggression and rudeness is totally out of order.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I’d also like to clear up one or two misconceptions about Jehovah’s Witnesses. First of all, they are neither crazy nor any more deluded than followers of any other religious order. Indeed, to me their message rings truer than most.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The mess that mankind has got the world into needs sorting urgently, and no-one on Earth seems capable of resolving the conflict with the crazed extremists who use Muslim fundamentalism as a licence to terrorise the West. How ironic that our very existence is in danger of being</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> wiped out by deluded lunatics in the name of religion. Deluded lunatics who form part of the only life form capable of premeditated evil.</span></div>
<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #7a7a7a; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So who better to handle it than the Great Redeemer...</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Big G himself? And the sooner the better.</span></div>
<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #7a7a7a; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I would never have the courage or dedication to become a Jehovah Witness. But I do wish I could truly BELIEVE because the certainty of redemption immediately takes all the fear out of dying<br />‘‘I bet you get a lot more abuse than friendliness when you knock on doors,’’ I said to my visitors. ‘‘You are so brave to carry on despite all the resentment.’’<br />‘‘The strength to go on doesn’t come from us but from Jehovah,’’ they replied.<br />I come from Jewish roots, but as a lifelong agnostic, I have spent my entire life wondering what existence is all about.<br />There has to be more to it than eating, drinking and making a nuisance of ourselves.<br />Jehovah Witness literature often portrays their idea of the Paradise awaiting believers.<br />We see images of Mum, Dad and smiling kids strolling and playing in a sunny Garden of Eden, their pets – including lions and tigers – sitting obediently at their feet.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My personal consolation is that I am already living in that Paradise here on Earth. Every day is a holiday as</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> I sit in my sunny garden here on the Costa Blanca, full of glorious floral colour, with one purring moggy on my lap and another at my side.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In this life, that’s as good as it gets. Please God I've got more of it to come in the next world without the threat of terror. - or the scourge of Parkinson's Disease, angina and</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> chronic arthritis.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Yes, I've got a life to die for. As for the future happiness of my children and grandchildren, over to you, BIg G.</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00990137444898701625noreply@blogger.com