The Circus

Hand it to Henry
There's nothing like a good war to stir the blood of the English tabloids. Take the newly-declared conflict between Ireland and France over the dodgy result of the World Cup playoff in France. Thierry Henry's handy assist for William Gallas' extra-time equaliser has seen England line up firmly behind the Irish, which is not something that can be said too often.

Of course it is a chance for the English tabloids to have a few pot-shots over the Channel at the French. They might not be the number-one target – that's the Germans, as in the infamous football chant, "Two world wars and one World Cup, doo dah, doo dah" – but those cheese-eating surrender monkeys will do in a pinch.

That's why it has all been so bitterly disappointing.

"Posh: I love having sex with Becks", screamed The Sun … sorry ... wrong page. "Le Hand of God. Cheat Thierry does a Maradona", screamed The Sun, which clearly didn't have its top punning sub-editors on duty.

The News of the World also disappointed: "Henry handball dumps sad Irish out" was all it could come up with, although "300 orgasm woman meets man" seemed to have promise. If only that man had been Thierry Henry.

The Daily Mail trotted out nincompoop ex-referee Graham Poll – he of three yellow cards for Croatia's Josip Simunic against Australia at the last World Cup finals – to slag off Henry, but not, we must note, the visually-impaired officials. At least the Mail did better with this.

So, it seems that the tabloids generally were in poor form.  Hooray then for The Independent, which came up with the excellent "Hand Gaul! Ireland furious as Henry snatches victory".

And bless the nuffies on the Interwebs with nothing better to do than to come up with things such as these.

The hair apparent
Lionel Messi is by all measures a pretty decent footballer, but according to a bunch of Argentine fans he is missing one thing – a Maradona perm. So they have begun a Facebook campaign to ensure that the Barcelona playmaker can replicate for country what he has for club. It's in Spanish, but we're sure that because you are on the SBS website you are polylingual ... oh, all right then.

Maradona's curly-topped exploits in the successful World Cup tilt of 1986 – which incidentally included the original Hand of God goal – were the spur, although the proponents of the change point to various eminently plausible scientific reasons relating to balance, streamlining and such.

Given that the great insane man himself is steering Argentina's national side towards the World Cup, when not suspended for below-the-belt remarks, we'd have thought one Maradona was sufficient, even in lookalike form.

Baby you can drive my car
It's been quite a week for new teammates in the wonderful world of Formula 1. World champs Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton are now bosom buddies at McLaren, while Felipe Massa and new Ferrari teammate have been unveiled to the adoring masses.



That's Ferrari chairman Luca di Montezemolo proving to be the second-worst driver of the marque in history behind Luca Badoer.

The swap shop
Manchester City striker Craig Bellamy has shattered his manager's heart by suggesting that he may have only two seasons left in the big time. His Mr Ten Percent has bought a nice 45-room manor house in Surrey and put his kids through Eton on the strength of Bellamy's string of transfers – eight in 12 seasons at last count.

Still, two more years means four more transfer windows. The possibilities are endless.

The numbers game
10 – seconds reduction in disabled athlete Oscar Pistorius' 400m time thanks to his J-shaped artificial legs, a US study has found
30 – percentage by which Pistorius' running speed may be enhanced, according to the study
2012 – Olympics for which South African Pistorius hopes to be selected as an able-bodied athlete
760 – Sri Lanka's score, for seven wickets, in the first innings of the first test against India at Ahmedabad

Quote of the day
"They're all probably clapping hands, (UEFA president Michel) Platini sitting up there on the phone to (FIFA president) Sepp Blatter, probably texting each other, delighted with the result."
- Gracious-in-defeat Irish striker Robbie Keane takes up the football-suits-want-the-big-teams-in-the-World-Cup theme, but forgets to mention Twitter.

Headline we'd like to read
Argentines shocked by Messi hair


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