Supershorts: 1 April

Mumbai 5-ohhhh ...
Tomorrow's Cricket World Cup final should be a boilover, with security concerns top of the heap. Thankfully, the local police are addressing the key issues.

Mumbai's police commissioner has said only good-looking police officers will be working the beat for the final.

Arup Patnaik said he wants only "tall, well-built and slim policemen" to be on duty. And chewing tobacco is out.

"The commissioner has asked all deputy commissioners to choose tall, well-built and slim policemen for the bandobast [organised] duty. They should look healthy and be seen as competent," a senior policeman said. "There is a tendency among our policemen to behave rudely at times."

Patnaik reportedly banned overweight officers or those who chew tobacco from being selected.

A hard one
Shall SuperShorts be the one to tell some of the rugby commentators that the expression "bar up" doesn't mean what they think it does? They use it as a metaphor for extra effort, probably assuming the term derives from "raising the bar". But it's an Australian term describing - ahem - the male reaction to erotic stimulation. So if the Chiefs were "barred up" to play the Blues ... the mind boggles. But maybe we won't tell the on-air boys - why spoil the fun?

April Fools
Rather than boorishly make up some garbage April Fools' yarn (it's hard to top the one about an All Black midfielder booking in a boxing match just a couple of months before a World Cup), we thought we'd delve into the archives for a couple of the sporting world's best fibs.

Like this ...
Sports Illustrated pulled a good one with a 1985 feature story about Sidd Finch, the New York Mets' latest signing. A Tibetan monk, Finch could throw a 272km/h fastball, 104km/h faster than the previous record.

Finch had never even played baseball, preferring to master the "art of the pitch" in a Tibetan monastery, guided by the "great poet-saint Lama Milaraspa".

And this ...
Back in 1981, London's Daily Mail told the story of Japanese long-distance runner Kimo Nakajima who set off in the London Marathon but, following a translation mix-up, thought he had to run for 26 days, not 26 miles. Like the apocryphal soldier holed up on an atoll, Nakajima was still running through the English countryside, oblivious to the fact that the race was over.

"I translated the rules and sent them off to him," said translator Timothy Bryant. "But I have only been learning Japanese for two years, and I must have made a mistake. He seems to be taking this marathon to be something like the very long races they have over there."

And finally ...
Cycling magazine Velonews takes the bad-taste cake for a sperm-related April Fools' Day gag. A story claimed that US Olympians Davis Phinney and Connie Carpenter were launching a sperm and egg bank company called Olympic Genes. For a mere $250,000 buyers could get some of his or her reproductive goodies. A non-existent spokesman for the company, Felix Magowan, said: "It's literally a no-brainer for couples who want champion children."

Very superstitious
If the Indians are behaving oddly tomorrow night, then bear in mind that their solitary World Cup title thus far came with a superstitious twist. Former captain and opener Krish Srikkanth says during the 1983 final players were asked not to move from their positions on the sideline as Kapil Dev flayed Zimbabwe.

"The point was I was standing outside the dressing room on a cold, windy day, with a cup of coffee in my hand. And I didn't move for the next two hours or so! I wanted to go to the toilet, but Man Singh [the manager] said 'no'. "Believe me, it stayed that way till Kapil walked back with a triumphant 175 not out. Not just me but the entire team stood at the same spots."

Head over heels for politics
Democracy - and lunacy - in action in Colombia. Former national goalkeeper Rene Higuita, known variously as "The Scorpion" and "El Loco" depending on what you think of a chubby keeper who performs a somersault in order to clear the ball off his own line, is standing for political office.

He was one of the most colourful characters at the 1990 World Cup, but missed out on a place in the 1994 team when he was in jail for his involvement in a kidnapping case.

Now Higuita wants to be mayor in the Guarne municipality in the department of Antioquia.

"You only need around 4500 votes to become mayor," he says. "But I hope to get 10,000!"

Eats me how he did it
Great news, burger lovers. A couple of weeks ago we saluted the artery-defying efforts of Joe D'Amico, who ran the LA marathon after a month of eating nothing but McDonald's. In that time he ate 23 burgers, three Filet-o-fish sandwiches and 91 hotcakes. Happily, he set a personal best, covering the 26 miles (41.8km) in 2h 36m 13s.

They said it...

"When we win we are the best, when we lose we are s***. This is normal."

England coach Fabio Capello shows he understands how things work in the feverish limelight of the British press.

"I would love us to annihilate the Aussie and the New Zealand teams now and build a kind of fear factor into them. But it doesn't matter come World Cup time. I think we will be ready. We played against England last year, the same old conservative South African style of rugby, and it was good to watch. It worked for us. The guys knew and there was no confusion amongst players, and game after game you can play that
level of rugby."

Springbok coach Peter De Villiers fancies a bit of Super 15 success, but knows the big prize is further down
the line.

"Barca is not disposed to pay 43.9 million [$93 million] for Cesc Fabregas next summer. That is decided. It is impossible due to a simple reason. In football, prices are reduced each year and, if we offered Arsenal 35.1 million for Cesc last summer, 50 million is now impossible."

Barcelona president Sandro Rosell has a weird idea about inflation. So if prices are reduced each year, Lionel Messi is becoming cheaper? ...

"Chinese football is in the doldrums, and when some elements of Shaolin kung fu, particularly its spirit, are integrated into soccer, we hope it will help improve the training level."

Shi Yanlu, head coach at a shaolin temple in Henan province that has set up a soccer academy to improve the fortunes of Chinese soccer.

"It was weak. There was nothing sexual involved."

St Pauli striker Gerald Asamoah on the brawl that broke out at his flat when he took two women home, wrongly thinking his wife was out of town with the kids.

Good week

Inflatable sheep
Despite a ban on blow-up sheep, England fans snuck hundreds into the Millennium Stadium for last weekend's Euro 2012 qualifier against Wales. An FA insider said: "The trouble is you can put the inflatables in your pocket then blow them up inside the ground."

Bad week

David Ferrer
Annoyed by a baby's crying, the Spaniard popped a forehand lob in the kid's direction on his way to defeat in the quarters of the Sony Ericsson Open. Ferrer blamed his 7-5, 6-2 defeat to Mardy Fish on indigestion.

The number

$10m
The estimated value of players sitting injured on the sideline in the NRL. Manly coach Des Hasler's solution: Make the field wider. "There is more space to run into, so the hits are less. It's one to think about."