WELL done Andy Murray - a true BRITISH sporting icon. And well done the Daily Mail, for managing to print half a paper about his great win and fail to mention over 32 pages that this British winner was A SCOTSMAN.
Not that I am being a typical chip on my shoulder Scotsman, cringing in the face of English superiority. I happen to believe that in sports such as tennis, athletics, swimming, basketball and so forth at Olympic and World level, motor sport, or any sport where on the world stage, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland generally competes as one entity, whether the UK/British sportsman or woman is English, Northern Irish, Scottish or Welsh is immaterial - he or she is BRITISH, and representing GB or UKofGB&NI.
But, in failing to mention Murray's Scottishness, the Mail, the house journal of Middle England, was guilty of gross stupidity.
By the way, having devoted 32 pages to Murray's triumph, be ready for the Mail doing some kind of hatchet job on Murray some time soon. If he leaves them any sort of opening - they will have a go at him, because, this is this nastly little paper's way.
While I'm at it, Wee Eck Salmond seems to me to be losing his hitherto unrivalled touch, waving that saltire from the Royal Box at Wimbledon wasn't his greatest moment, far better had he used it to throttle that Old Etonian toff sitting in front of him.
Murray's win, btw, is a great advert for the "Better Together" campaign against Independence; but, I doubt that any one in the BT campaign has the nous to use the win positively and correctly. By this I mean, Andy Murray would never have done as well had he been purely Scottish working in a Scottish sporting system, and, if we do get independence after 2014, this is something our political leaders will have to deal with.
Just about the only sports in which Scotland is world class through a purely Scottish management system are bowling and curling. Nowhere else are we organised enough to make an impact on our own.
What lessons could poor old, beleagured Scottish football learn from the boy from Dunblane?
Well, hopefully, some day, from somewhere in Scotland, there will emerge a kid talented and dedicated enough to merit a place in the Barcelona Academy, because, certainly, had Murray not decamped to the Catalonian capital as a 14-year-old, but had remained in Scotland - he wouldn't be Wimbledon Champion today.
I have seen arguments to the effect that the killing work ethic which Murray has shown simply would not work in a team sport situation, more-particularly in football.
Rubbish.
If we accept that a football team is only as strong as its weakest player, imagine a Scottish team in which every member of the squad matched Murray's work ethic, and maybe we had two or three who could ally that hard work to Murray's technique, while the rest weren't too-far behind.
I reckon we'd be a shoo-in for World Cup and European Championship glory. But, for as long as Andy Murray puts in more work on his fitness, form and technique in two days than even the best current Scottish player puts in in a full week, our football will get nowhere near the level at which Murray operates.
It might help if we had a coach who had been there and done it at the highest level - haud oan, we tried that and look how that ended.
Ach well - anyone for tennis?A
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