Sunday, 8 July 2007

Just vybing.......

So we are well on our way to the first 100 days of the newly elected French President Nicolas Sarkozy at which point his performance will be reviewed and the French public and the EU to a great extent will learn what Sarkozy will deliver on his promises.
Personally, I always felt that of the two candidates that the French public had to chose from, Nicolas Sarkozy or Segolene Royal, the former was always the forward looking candidate. He promised to modernize the France economy. A mammoth of a task for any incoming president because in French politics the issue of jobs and reform business are met with resistance from all corners. Conversely, the issue of immigration and minorities is the third rail in politics; touch it and you die. But guess what Sarkozy hugged it with both hands.

Sarkozy has formally endorsed putting a prominent member of the Socialist Party opposition, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, in charge of the International Monetary Fund. This is not only a political master stroke in marginalizing and systematically annihilating the opposition socialist party, but is also creating a new brand of French politics.

"It represents another blow for the French Socialists, who have already seen Sarkozy cherry-pick other leading figures from among their ranks to help run his new, reformist administration..." reads an article in the IHT

Based on what I have observed thus far I look forward to looking back at his first 100 days in office.

In other developments, Roger Federer won his fifth
Wimbledon title beating Rafael Nadal in a 5 set match that was anything but a thriller. To be honest, I preferred watching the mixed doubles final which saw Jelena Jankovic and Jamie Murray beat Jonas Bjorkman of Sweden and Australia's Alicia Molik 6-4 3-6 6-1. This match was played in the highest of spirits and was very refreshing to watch. Jelena and Murray were all smiles and jubilant even when the points did not go their way and seemed set on just enjoying themselves. Well done!

Kimi Raikkonen managed to peep Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton to the checkered flag at Silverstone this weekend in what can be described as an awesome drive by Kimi. Silverstone is very much a strategy circuit meaning that the pit stops (normally two) do go a long way in determining who actually is a contender and who isn't.

Also impressive was the drive by Felipe Massa who started from the back of the grid (pit lane) because he stalled his Ferrari on the starting grid and managing to finish fifth. His stalling was the most bizarre of incidences seeing as his technical team did not have any data indicating a possible problem.


I think the F2007 is going to be very impressive from this stage of the season onwards and we are set for scrap for the drivers’ title.

3 comments:

Andrew Onyango said...

I couldn't disagree more about the tennis match. Most people on this side of the pond thought it was a thriller. If only for the fact that Roger finally had to play a 5th set to win a Wimbledon title.

Street - Legal said...

Did you watch it or are you reading the analysis by commentators? I watched the match and safe for the fact that Federer was not 100% on point the game was very lacklustre.

Yes he, Federer, won his fifth consecutive title but it does not necessarily equate to a brilliant game. Nadal was not the best opponent in that tournament and I am inclined to think that had Nadal's game against Djokovic played out in full then it would have been a different final. But that is neither here nor there and no point in speculating on what never was...

Do not misconstrue my opinion to mean that I do not rate Federer. I am probably one of his biggest fans. He is in my opinion the most complete player to ever play the men's game, but he had it relatively easy this Wimbledon having got a by to the quarter finals after Haas pulled out. This ofcourse is in contrast to Nadal's own tournament in which he played from Saturday last week to Sunday with too many disruptions due to rain.

Run what you brung

Andrew Onyango said...

Why is it always the case that you assume that when I give a contradicting opinion, it's not my own and it's an analyst's instead? And this happens with everything. They do broadcast things here in the US of A, you know.

For the record, I didn't say Roger's "fifth" title made the game brilliant. What was remarkable was that it's the first time he's been forced to play a fifth set in a Grand Slam Final. That it was a grass court and at his most dominant court, Wimbledon, makes it even more unbelievable. This was also a difficult match for him. This was visible and if one didn't think so, he even said it himself as did the interviewer at the end of the match.

If you think he had it easy, everyone is entitled to an opinion but that seemed hardly to be the case with the frustration he openly exhibited, the two tie-breakers he had to play and that 4th set in which it started to look like Nadal might get this.

Also, for someone who doesn't watch tennis(me), sitting down to watch the entire 4 hour thing qualifies it as entertaining because it means even someone without all the necessary reference points could see a great match unfold.