SUMMER SPORTS

Can anyone explain to me the point of cricket? The game (tests, series, one-dayers etc) gets an inordinate amount of media coverage but from where I'm standing there's hardly anyone there and attendances would shame Darlington on a Cup run.

There was a time when cricket served a purpose. In the days before the bars could stay open beyond 3pm when they fancied it, the cricket was a good place to go to sit in the sun-shine and get slowly juiced whilst some dafties dressed in white stood around waiting for a silly-mid on or a Duckworth Lewis method to kick in. Full of lager and good cheer you could smile indulgently at some old codger religiously writing facts down on some card neither he not any other human being would ever read again. And let's face it, cricket certainly kept someone like Dickie Bird out of an institution. A glorified day centre.

Now though? There are loads of decent boozers with perfectly agreeable beer gardens that will allow you to drink yourself comatose of a summer's afternoon. Cricket though? People with names like Trescothick play it and games get "rained off" and stopped for "bad light". What the fuck is all that about? This is England, shit like this happens. Nee wonder the Scots and Irish think we're wankers. Big Brother is bigger than Cricket.

Then of course there's tennis. Unlike cricket where we occasionally win some kind of trophy or pile of dust (?) we are without question, however way you look at it, absolutely shit at tennis. Case for the prosecution - Tim Henman. This kid can undoubtedly stand up straight, hold a bat and run around a bit but he's about as likely to win a major tournament as the Seaburn Casuals are to have a Karaoke night at The Adelphi to celebrate Sunderland winning the Champions League. But that will not stop the WI tendency from rolling up to Wimbledon and shouting "Come On Tim!" at inopportune moments will it? Or prevent Sally and Jane (who are carrying a stone too much but you still would) skiving off from the reception at Gloster, McIntyre and Fortesque Actuaries in W2 for the afternoon on "Henman Hill". The middle England loser hasn't got what it takes and will lose painfully to some good looking long haired-drug baron's son from Bolivia in the first round. Andy Murray? I've perked up to his bouts of radginess and his Mam does look like Richard Gough but I'm afraid he's a loser as well.

Basically, since tennis provided the football fraternity with a fine selction of footwear (Stan Smiths, Forest Hills, Illie Nastases, Bjorn Borgs et al) as well as some class FILA trackie tops, it has used up its usefulness. Well, part from the decent looking birds that play obviously. Apologies for going a bit LOADED on you by the way. Must be the heat.

Then of course there is Athletics. Who cares if some wannabe medallist isn't getting tax payers money to help them fulfil their dream of a bronze in power-walking at the next Commonwealth Games (now then, Commonwealth Games, what is the point - its a bit like the group stages of the UEFA Cup - utterly pointless). Who, other than the participants themselves and possibly their close family and loved ones is at all interested in shite like Javelin, The Hammer, Pole Vaulting, Archery, Long Jump, Small Bore shooting and a host of other eye-wateringly dull activities such as these? And this is what we're supposed to be pissing ourselves with excitement about for 2012 as every scrap of spare public money is siphoned off for the bollocks in East London which will have absolutely no benefit whatsoever for the North East. And Steve Cram (celebrity fan) likes Athletics. Need I fucking well say any more? Has anyone tumbled to the fact that the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics has to be so OTT and spectacular simply because the stuff in the middle is so completely uninteresting. Well, apart from the races when those lads so pumped full of drugs spend less than 30 seconds chasing each other around, like.

See you at the bowls. Now that's action.