Angela's angle
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is threatening to miss the Euro soccer champs in Ukraine, as a protest against the state's treatment of ex-Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. It's a noble gesture from Merkel, but forehead-scratching sports oddity pages like this one could be denied the chance to delve into cheap humour. So bear with us as we get this one off our chest ...
Merkel arrives at passport control in Kiev ahead of Germany's first match. The guy at the immigration desk fires off the usual questions: "Name?" "Merkel," she replies. "Nationality?" "German." "Occupation?" "No, just here for the match."
Grooming I
Our source in the world of men's hairdressing tells us that one high-profile All Black has taken to using hair straighteners.
Grooming II
Which is nothing compared with the state of self-grooming in the Brazil soccer team. Striker Neymar says staying metrosexual takes a lot of effort.
"I'm not pretty like Beckham, but I do buy clothes, I do take care. I shave my legs with a little machine I have. I do it in team meetings."
Grooming III
Meanwhile, Neymar says his reputation for indulging in the occasional "model tryst" is unfair. "It's not just footballers who go to orgies. Yes I go, but I never join in."
He probably doesn't inhale either.
Grooming IV
Did anyone else see Ma'a Nonu grab Will Genia's arse last week as if they were old navy buddies? Did we imagine that?
Another snub
Counties have long been treated as an afterthought by the powers that be in New Zealand rugby. The red-black-and-white machine was shunted ungraciously between Super rugby franchises, all the while producing some of the defining stars of All Black rugby in the professional era - take a bow Mr Lomu and Mr Donald. And now, the ultimate indignity: The Chiefs name a weakened side to face the Lions in Pukekohe tomorrow. No Taumololo? No Nanai-Williams? For shame.
FREE STUFF!!!
We've got three copies of the excellent 2012 Rugby Almanack to give away. To go in the draw, send us an email. Put your name and postal address in the email and answer this question: How many players ran the All Blacks from first five-eighths during the 2011 World Cup? Send it to supersport@nzherald.co.nz. Include a sporting joke if you want to toady up to the judges.
Mourinho mimic
Jose Mourinho gets a lot of attention for his pitch-side antics. But former Steaua coach Sorin Cartu - who has twice been filmed attacking the perspex wall of the dugout (once kicking it out and then headbutting another one) - is claiming intellectual property and reckons the Special One needs "better pitch-side gestures". "Everything he does, he copies from me. Kneeling; that handcuffs gesture. If he starts attacking perspex, that will be it."
