More Snooker, more tension, and a little bit of University flavour

Hi again. It's been a while since my last post (nearly a week!!) and alot has happened since my last post. Let's get on with things then.

I think what I first wish to discuss this week are the two European club football competitions. That's right, this week, the participants in both finals (i.e. the Champions League, and the Europa League) were decided and so let's crack on with a little bit of chat about the semi-final second legs. We'll start with the CL and Bayern Munich. On Tuesday night, in Lyon, Bayern Munich spectacularly thrashed their hosts 3-0 to go through to the CL final on the 12th May, the first time they've made it there since 2000. The man they have to thank for what was a brilliant display harkening back to the glory days at the start of the last decade is Ivica Olic, a man who, single-handedly, scored a hat-trick in Southern France to put the German heavyweights back where many of their fans will tell you they belong. I'm sure when people saw the draw for the quarter-finals of this competition, they would've told you that Manchester United would cruise to the final on this side of the draw. The Germans upset those odds, and then the odds were against them when they came up against a brilliant Lyon side who look truly at home in the latter stages of Europe's premier club football tournament, but yet again they surprised us. I don't think Bayern will win in the final, but they've already proved to the mass media and the watching masses that they can overturn odds and produce something truly sensational at times so who knows? Onto the second semi-final then and one which the world was definitely watching. Inter Milan, under Jose Mourinho's excellent tutelage came up against the favourites to retain the crown they won so convincingly last year against Manchester United, Barcelona. The second leg was finely poised after Inter had stunned the holders 3-1 at the San Siro. This however, was a different prospect. As we all know, Barcelona are incredibly strong at the Nou Camp, even if they do sometimes have the odd wobble away from home. The result then looked certain but yet again, Mourinho and his charges stunned Europe, with Barcelona walking away 1-0 winners on the night, but 3-2 losers on aggregate, setting up a final between the Italian champions Inter, and the brilliant Germans at Bayern. As I said, I really can't see past Inter Milan, but after this season, I will never count Bayern out of the Champions League again.

Europa League now then, and a special evening for Fulham. Having managed to hold Hamburg 0-0 away from home last week, Fulham now faced a Hamburg side who had to win at Craven Cottage to get to the final at their own ground in Hamburg. They had enough incentive then? However, it was the Cottagers who, for the thrid time in a week, stunned European football coming from 1-0 down to conquer their German visitors 2-1 on what was an historic night at the Cottage. This may be the defining moment in Fulham's season, and again many people will say that Fulham simply can't win the Europa League, but look at who they've beaten in this competition already, holders Shakhtar Donetsk, Juventus, Wolfsburg and now Hamburg. They are a very good side in Europe this season, and I defy anyone to count them out of the final. So, who are their opponents for the final I hear you cry. It's not Liverpool. Unfortunately from them, they were dumped out by a former Manchester United striker in Deigo Forlan. That for them must be the worst pain imaginable and it's unfortunate that it won't be an all-English final in the first Europa League campaign. Atletico Madrid v Fulham. Many people will see that as an impossible task for Fulham, but they're like this seasons Bayern of the Europa League: never count them out.

So, World Championship Snooker. I'll spare you all the details, but this year's fairytale is over, after the Thunder From Down Under knocked out the Nugget Steve Davis 13-5. It was sad to see him go, but I guess we need the best players in the semi-finals. Having said that, Mr Ronnie O'Sullivan, who came through one of the matches of the tournament against Mark Williams, has been knocked out of the tournament by the Jester from Leicester, Mark Selby. Semi-finals then are Neil Robertson v Ali Carter and Mark Selby v Greame Dott. Obviously, I will discuss these matches more after their completion and the final will be heavily looked over, but for now its suffice enough to say that Robertson is leading Ali Carter 10-6 (with session 3 starting right now) and Greame Dott leading Mark Selby 10-6 so it's all fairly beautifully poised going into semi-final Saturday as I am dubbing it.

So you may be asking yourself, what is this "University flavour" you alluded to and the start of this post. Well, here we go. Wednesday saw the renewal of a bitter and storied rivalry as Swansea University took on Cardiff University in the annual Varisty day. Essentially, both Universities send all their sports team to the hosting Univeristy and we play each other in a points based tournament (each sport equals 1 point) to determine who is better. I myself went to watch the Mens 1st teams do battle on the football pitch. Cardiff were huge favourites before the game having finished 2nd in the league whilst Swansea had been relegated, but the home support got right behind the boys and the banter was tip-top as Swansea and Cardiff both chanted their hearts out. Against all the odds, Swansea came out as 5-1 winners. Cue a pitch invasion and scenes of mass hysteria as Swansea's students took to the pitch to celebrate with the boys and spray beer over the europhoric Swansea lads. This victory meant we couldn't be caught and that whatever happened, we would win the Varsity trophy. So, Liberty Stadium, Swansea Univerity Mens 1st Rugby team versus their Cardiff rivals. The atmosphere was fantastic as both Universities cheered their lads on hoping that they could roar their boys to victory. Only one University was ecstatic and the final whistle, and that was us jubilant Swansea University students, and despite the plea's of the stadium announcer, cue another pitch invasion by the amassed Swansea students with more chanting, singing and hugging in sheer delight. It was a wonderful day to be a Swansea University student, and having waited 3 years without a win, I was in absolute ecstasy at the final whistle, and am so proud of how our guys and girls got on. Well done to everybody who was involved, and to the supporters, for making it such an incredible day.

That unfortunately, brings another post to an end. I hope you enjoyed this one, and don't begrudge me for including details about Varisty, as for me, it was such an emotional and brilliant experience that I wanted to share it with all of you. Thanks for reading, see you all again either tomorrow or more than likely Sunday. Cheers

More of an uphill struggle than an easy run-in

As you can guess by the title, I will be discussing Swansea's new found ability to mess things up for themselves and put us fans through near unbearable tension at the same time. I also want to discuss what is fast becoming one of the most interesting and entertaining World Snooker Championships within living memory. May aswell also take a look at the goings on in the Premier League and Wayne Rooney's end of season injury nightmare that is not only bad for defending champions Manchester United, but also a huge dent to England's World Cup prospects. So with all that to look at, I guess I better just dive right in.

Swansea City. Where do I even begin with the tension?? Honestly, as a fan, I thought we'd turned the corner after the splendid home performance against Barnsley last week. That then is why I am so frustrated that we went to Brammel Lane today and capitulated against a Sheffield United side who's season was over and who had nothing to play for. The player's knew how big a game this was, and that United were never going to lay down and let us beat them, and so they should've really done better than a 2-0 loss, a result which, incidentally, leaves us a point behind Blackpool (who after their 1-0 victory away to already-relegated Peterborough leapfrogged us into the last play-off place today) and drops us out of the play-off positions where we have been since December. That comes as such a huge blow to each and every Swansea City fan as most of us live and die by the results of our team out there. It makes the game against Doncaster Rovers next Sunday (a game which I will be in attendance for) at the Liberty Stadium into a must-win game. We then have to rely on Bristol City beating or holding Blackpool JUST so that we get our (much-deserved) shot at being in the Premier League. Am I tense??? You better believe it. On another Championship note, a few congratulations are in order. Well done to Leicester City for securing their play-off berth and to Watford who, after a quite stunning 3-0 victory against an in-form team (Reading), can now look forward to at least another season of Championship Football. Norwich also confirmed their status as League One champions today so well done to them for that, whereas by biggest congratulations have to go to League Two Bournemouth who, despite all their financial struggles, gained promotion to the erm, "dizzying heights" of League One. That's the congratulations out of the way for the Football League.

Manchester United won 3-1 against Spurs today. That result blows the title race WIDE open and Chelsea must now be looking very anxiously at their remaining fixtures given that United gained that impressive result against a Spurs team who had beaten Arsenal AND Chelsea in recent weeks, WITHOUT Wayne Rooney. That is mightily impressive. Apparently, Rooney missed out today because of a groin injury suffered in training during the week, but it poses the question as to how prone to injury he is becoming towards the end of the season. Obviously, fatigue plays a part in these injuries, but Sir Alex Ferguson has said publicly that he doesn't think Rooney will play again for Manchester United this season and that poses the problem of how match-fit Rooney will be when England kick-off their World Cup campaign agaisnt the United States on June 12th. I think Fabio will be very worried about his star striker, but then again, Rooney has seemed, at times, superhuman this season so perhaps it won't be such a massive problem for Enlgand come June 12th. To the relegation battle in the Premier League and some congratulations are due to West Ham who have virtually confirmed their safety today after a 3-2 victory against Wigan. That particular result made me smile, which has been rare today, as Roberto Martinez got beaten. I know I should hold him in high esteem, but becasue of the way he left Swansea last summer, I have little respect for the man, no matter how much he advanced Swansea City.

So, the Snooker. A couple of 2nd round matches have been completed today, and the fairytale story of the Championships so far has to be Steve Davis' little run to the quarter finals. Having come through (narrowly) against Mark King in the first round earlier in the week, he faced a 2nd round match against a man who had been heavily backed to retain the title, John Higgins. Now, I LOVE an underdog, but even I couldn't have predicted that Steve would defy all the odds and beat John Higgins. In a performance where Steve seemed to roll back the years, Davis came through a tense 24th frame (out of a possible 25) as a 13-11 winner. Not even Steve himself could've predicted that, but it was fantastic. It captured the imagination of every Snooker fan and has really lit up these Championships. There was an unfortunate instance where, during Davis' post-match interview with John Parrott, a Fathers For Justice campaigner ran onto the set, only to be detained by the many security guards around the presenters and players. This is a sports blog, but I would just like to say that I think the campaigner is an idiot, and they really don't help themselves by pulling these idiotic stunts. Rather they heavily discredit themselves and what they stand for and I wonder how that man is feeling tonight. Pretty low I should've though. So Steve Davis, who is his quarter-final opponent I hear you ask?? Well that honour goes to the man they call the Thunder Down Under, Mr Neil Robertson, who fought back superbly from 11-5 down overnight to overcome Martin Gould, the former croupier who caused the upset I wrote about the other day, 13-12.

Match of the round also got underway today, but I think I'll wait until a little more than one session has been played before I ramble on about that. Suffice to say the match is between The Rocket Ronnie O'Sullivan, and The Welsh Wizard Mark Williams. Definitely could've been a final that one. Anyway, I've written a lot today, and I now feel I should go wallow in the dark for a bit/get blind drunk to make up for my teams inadequacies today. Fare-thee-well and as I always say, I hope you lot out there are still enjoying this blog, and keep reading. Thanks everyone

Apologies for the delay, but here we go again :)

As I've said in the title, there was a bit of delay between this post and my last post (9 days incase you're wondering) and so apologies for that, but let's get down to business shall we?

In this blog, I'm not only going to look at Football, but also the World Snooker Championships that got underway at the Crucible theatre in Sheffield on Saturday. Also on Saturday, I went to see the mighty, mighty Swans beat Barnsley (who looked off the pace for the entire match in all fairness) 3-1. That was a nice little day for me and I was very pleased with a performance that showed the rest of the Championship what we can do if we're put under pressure, as we were by Blackpool's 3-1 victory over Nottingham Forest. We're going to need to show that grit and determination against Sheffield United this Saturday and against Doncaster Rovers a week on Sunday if we want to book our place in the play-offs come the end of the season, especially considering the fact that Blackpool's last 2 opponents are already-relegated Peterborough United, and nothing-to-play-for Bristol City. It's going to be very, very scary the next 2 weeks. Staying in the Championship, I would like to congratulate Cardiff City (and yes, I know I should hate them, but you gotta give them credit) on booking their own place in the play-offs. After the heartbreak of the 1 goal difference last season, you have to say they well and truly deserve to be there this season and I applaud them. Let's just hope if they meet the Swans in the play-offs that we cruise past Cardiff :P

So, Saturday, 12:45 kick-off, an absolutely MASSIVE game for the Manchester rivals and one that neither team wanted to lose. This desire not to lose the game shone through in the first 91 minutes of the game as both teams cancelled each other out and it looked to everyone as though it would end in a 0-0 draw and a bad day at the office for both teams. However, no-one thought that the hero of the game would be the smallest man (and worst tackler) on the pitch. After 92 minutes, Patrice Evra pinged a beautiful cross into the Manchester City area and Paul Scholes met it with a beautiful header which flew past the despairing dive of City keeper Shay Given (a man I have said on numerous occassions is the best keeper in the Premier League) and that sent the red half of the stadium into absolute ecstasy knowing that they would be closing the gap on Chelsea, if only for a few hours. But that wasn't the end of the day. Chelsea faced Tottenham at White Hart Lane in the late kick-off, with Spurs knowing that Man City had dropped points and that they could go fourth with a win. And win they did. 2-1 to Tottenham Hotspur, not usually a result welcomed by United fans, or Arsenal fans, but by beating Chelsea, Spurs helped both of these Premier League giants get ever closer to Chelsea in what is a truly enthralling title race.

We then come to Sunday. Any advantage Arsenal had gained from Spurs' win over Chelsea was killed in the last 10 minutes at the DW Stadium as Wigan came from 2-0 down, to beat their opponents 3-2. Now I hate Wigan, but even I said that it was a superb performance from them. In my opinion, anyone who can score 3 goals against Arsenal, in such a short space of time, and with so much riding on it, deserves all the credit and all the plaudits given to them so well done to Wigan on that front.

Enough Football??? I think so, and also, I really want to write about the Snooker now because it didn't get enough coverage last time so it's getting more now :)

So far, we've only had 4 first-round matches that have been completed, but there's already been some belting results and a huge surprise so keep reading on for that one. The first match that was completed at this years Crucible was John Higgins' 10-6 victory over Barry Hawkins. To me, that's a very, very impressive result on the part of John Higgins as Hawkins is a very good player who is up and coming and in a few years could be something quite special. It shows that John has come into the tournament on some impressive form and with that sort of a first round victory, he gains the momentum which is always so important over the two weeks at the Crucible, so he will be one to watch over the coming few weeks. We've also had Mark Williams (10-5 over Marcus Campbell) and Ali Carter (10-4 over Jamie Cope) progress to the 2nd round of the tournament, and again, these are two extremely capable players, and although most bookies will have them both as massive outsiders to win the tournament, you'd have to suggest that these 2 would be worth a cheeky bet if you're looking to make a lot of money. Realistically, Mark is a former champion and so is always going to be dangerous as he knows how to go out and win this tournament, and Ali Carter has been to the final before and so his ability to get there shouldn't be doubted either and I doubt many players would be ecstatic about the chance to face either of these two men in the next round.

So, I promised you a BIG surprise as the last fully finished first-round match, and here it is. Most people who have been snooker fans for any prolonged amount of time will recognise the name of Marco Fu, the man who has led a wave of young Asian players into the game, and is seen as a genuine challenger in any tournament that he gets to. However, in his first-round match at the Crucible this year, he came up against a former Poker croupier who goes by the name of Martin Gould and I'm pretty sure you can guess the result. Yes, indeed Martin Gould knocked out the first top-16 player to leave the tournament this year with a fantastic fightback, eventually ending with the Englishman triumphing 10-9. Phenomenal performance, but I sincerely doubt this man will be competition to any of the big boys still in the tournament. I promise I will write more as I get the news, so there may be a blog everyday in the next couple of weeks, or there may just be a massive round-up one at the end, we'll see how it goes. As always it's been a pleasure and I hope you enjoy it, but for now, I'm gonna go outside in this beautiful weather and have a read of some notes for uni. Thanks guys :)

Swansea continued struggling, and other less important footballing matters

What a weekend it has been in the English League system and the FA Cup. There was something for everybody this weekend, and in this blog post, I am going to analyse some of the major going's on in British football this weekend.

I firstly would like to just touch on the remarkable Scottish Cup semi-final that took place at Hampden on Saturday between Scottish First Division side Ross County and one of the most decorated teams in Scottish football history, the giants of Celtic. In what was a stunning Cupset, Ross County took on their far wealthier opponents knowing that the odds were heavily, heavily stacked against them, however, they managed to overcome all the odds and come away with a 2-0 victory given the minnows their biggest ever domestic win, which was heartily celebrated by the 7,000 travelling fans. The question was asked after the match if this was good for Scottish football, and in my opinion, I believe the answer has to be yes everytime. The reson I would say this is that it shows a small team always has a chance and that they can close the gap to the top two (Celtic and Rangers). For a league system to work and for it to be truly enjoyable, one would feel that you need it to be competitive and for any team to get a result against any other team on any given weekend. This is why I believe the English league system is so successful because this is not only true of the Premier League, but also of the Championship, League One and League Two meaning that, although fans get put through the mill with their emotions on most weekends, it is difficult to predict and hence more enjoyable. After all, nobody wants their life or things in their life to be predictable do they?

Another thing I'd like to discuss in this particular blog was the astonishing achievement of Portsmouth FC as they took on Tottenham Hotspurs in an FA Cup semi-final at the new Wembley - a day after they had been relegated from the Premier League. Going into the game, everything pointed to a Spurs win. Indeed some critics were even hailing this as the semi-final that Spurs couldn't lose due to Pompey's ongoing financial crisis which has led to them not only having to sell players OUTSIDE the transfer window, but also the deliberate non-playing of players due to contractual obligations to pay them for further appearances for the club. However, Portsmouth managed to overcome all the odds after a battling display that saw them on the backfoot for most of the game against a wasteful Spurs side. It took Pompey until extra time to find the crucial opening goal though, Frederic Piquionne taking advantage of Michael Dawson's slip to tap home from a Portsmouth free-kick, sending the blue contingent inside Wembley into absolute delirium as they saw a possible FA Cup final looming. 2 minutes later, Spurs should have been back in the game after David James flapped at a Gareth Bale cross from the left and Peter Crouch tapped the ball into the back of the net. Portsmouth were only saved by the referee awarding a free-kick for a supposed foul on David James by Niko Kranjcar although the Croation looked to have done very little wrong. The game was then wrapped up by a Kevin Prince Boateng penalty in the second half of extra time with the player celebrating in front of the bank of madly celebrating Pompey fans who knew they would be back at Wembley in a little over a month's time for an FA Cup final against manager Avram Grant's former team Chelsea, who had beaten Aston Villa 3-0 on Saturday. It is a fantastic achievement, and I take my hat off to them personally for what was a brilliant performance of sheer grit and determination.

The main sporting feature for me this weekend though was the Severnside derby between Bristol City and my team Swansea City at Ashton Gate. For Bristol, it was a nothing game given the fact that they can be fairly confident of little else than a mid-table finish, for the Swans, it was a massive game that, having gotten the winning feeling back on Monday, they wanted to win to take a bit of form into the last 3 games of the season. It was Bristol who eventually ran-out as the winners at Ashton Gate though, thanks to a Nicky Maynard goal in the 86th minute that, as a Swans fan, was vey difficult to take. Swansea then, only maintained their top-six position thanks to a Newcastle victory over play-off rivals Blackpool who remain only 2 points behind the Swans (now in 6th) with 3 games left to play. Swansea and their manager Paulo Sousa will be hoping they can turn the tide of their current run (i.e. 1 win in the last 8 games) at the Liberty Stadium on Saturday against another team who look certain of a mid-table berth at the end of the season in Barnsley. For Swansea, they haven't won at Ashton Gate since 1993, which is another record the Swans would have liked to have broke this season having broken the clean sheet record on Monday against Scunthorpe United with Dorus De Vries' 22nd shutout of the season. Most Swansea fans will now be very nervous for a run-in that contains last season's play-off runner-ups (Sheffield United), and a team that were chasing the final play-off place until a few weeks ago (Doncaster Rovers) but will hopefully be comforted by the fact that two of those games are at home, and that Blackpool host Nottingham Forest on Saturday, possibly the first timem, as a Swansea fan that I will be cheering on Forest who have already beaten us twice this season, and could have another 2 cracks at us in the play-off's. If we get there

I should also just mention the fact that Hull City were beaten, comprehensively, by fellow strugglers Burnley on Saturday which adds a little bit of spice to the end of season relegation battle in the Premier League even though, as we already know, Portsmouth have been relegated to the Championship already. Newcastle and West Bromwich Albion have also been promoted to the Premier League already as a little side-note on the race for promotion TO the Premier League. Let's hope that come the end of the season, the "stuttering Swans" will be joining these two famous teams in the biggest and best league in the world.

Messi ain't messy

My last blog post was mainly about football and although there will be a fair amount of football in this one as well, I am going to look into the World Snooker Championships, which begins on the 17th April with some tantalising first round clashes.

Now, first things first, I think we should look at tonight's Champions League games and the semi-final that we know will be taking place. In the early kick-off at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow, CSKA faced off against Inter Milan hoping to overturn a 1-0 deficit established by Diego Milito at the San Siro last Wednesday. Somewhat predictably and in an overly drab game with little incident except for the singular Wesley Sneijder goal that gave Inter a 1-0 win on the night, and a 2-0 aggregate win over their Russian rivals, Inter progressed to the Champions League semi-final. I was quite disappointed by the match as I had heard murmurs over the past 4 or 5 years that CSKA were the Russian equivalent to Chelsea in the English Premier League. If these murmurs were related to the fact that neither of these team's look like they'll ever win the Champions League, then I will whole-heartedly agree with the claims, but that, for me, was the only comparison I could draw between the 2. CSKA were dreadful tonight, and believe me, as a Swansea fan, I have seen some dreadfully boring performances from my team this season, but CSKA's performance tonight was by far the worst performance I have ever seen from a team in Europe and to be honest, not just in Europe.

Then we come to the main showpiece of tonight. After the thrilling encounter at the Emirates last Wednesday, ending in a 2-2 draw between Arsenal and Barcelona, all eyes were on the Camp Nou to see if these 2 brilliant footballing sides could put on another fantastic feast of football, and for me especially, the match didn't disappoint. The end result? Barcelona 4-1 Arsenal. Or should that be Messi 4-1 Arsenal? Messi absolutely destroyed Arsenal today and despite all the injuries I don't think anyone would've said it was a terrible Arsenal side that Arsene Wenger put out. The pick of Messi's 4 goals was undoubtedly his 3rd, a cute, delicate little lob over the advancing Manuel Almunia having been put through from a Seydou Keita header. At 22, this man's potential clearly can't be measured. I personally was mightily impressed and would be scared if I was Jose Mourinho and was going to have to stop that man in a Champions League final. However, it is a very intruiging semi-final for many reasons, which I am going to go into here. Firstly, Mourinho is the first man to get to a Champions League semi-final with 3 different teams, those being FC Porto (who went on to win the tournament), Chelsea and now Inter Milan. For me, I think it's a very realistic possibility that Mourinho could take another heavily unfancied side to the final and win it with them, because after all, who predicted we'd see Inter Milan in the Champions League semi-finals? Certainly not me. Secondly, its a replay of the 2 group meetings earlier on this season. Thirdly, theres the returning players and the obvious receptions both will get (the players being Samuel Eto'o, the man who moved from Barcelona to Inter, and Zlatan Ibrahimovic, the man who moved in the opposite direction). Fourthly, a reason that is really making me smile at the moment, and that reason is the battle of the Milito brothers. Gabriel, is a defender who plays for Barcelona, while his brother Diego has scored against Chelsea and CSKA in the knockout stages already so far. Undoubtedly though, all eyes will once again be on Messi when the two teams meet and whether he can do anything better than what we have already seen.

With the World Cup coming up, England fans could also have their eyes on Messi, and probably will be hoping he comes a cropper before the World Cup starts. However, the eyes of all England fans will switch to Old Trafford tomorrow and whether the name of Wayne Rooney will be on Sir Alex Ferguson's teamsheet for the crucial 2nd leg visit of Bayern Munich, which United NEED to win if they want another chance at Barcelona in the Champions League final this year. Rumours are that the England and Manchester United striker, who supposedly injured ankle ligaments in the first leg defeat in Munich, has been training with the squad and could be included tomorrow night for United's must-win game. Here I wish to analyse the effects that playing Rooney could have on the rest of United's season and also on England's World Cup bid. If Rooney starts tomorrow, or plays and gets injured, what then?? So United will have a Champions League semi-final, but they will also be without a man who has scored 33 goals this season for what is bound to be a tough run-in as United vy to win the title yet again, but would it be worth it?? Without Rooney, United looked very ordinary against Chelsea on Saturday, and although Drogba's winning goal was clearly offside, I felt that it was a deserved result as United did nothing to warrant a point from the match and would have been very lucky to come away with a result. Many critics are looking to Rooney as a big player for England in this Summer's World Cup in South Africa and so it would be a huge loss for them to lose him to injury before or during the World Cup. For this reason I would start Berbatov tomorrow night against Munich at Old Trafford, but obviously this is Sir Alex's decision and who am I to question him if he decides to play Rooney. I'm not the one with countless winner's medals.

Briefly, I'd like to say that I believe, despite the away goal conceded last week, that Fulham will beat Wolfsburg in the Europa League quarter final and progress to a semi in this European competition. I also believe Liverpool can overturn the 2-1 deficit conceded in Benfica last week to make it 2 British teams into the Europa League semi-finals on Thursday.

Now, as I said, I'd like to talk a little at the end of this particular blog post examining the first-round draw for the World Snooker Championships starting on the 17th April. I never realised before that if you're outside the top 16 in the official rankings, you have to qualify to be in the tounrament's first round. I was particularly keen on the qualifying rounds this year as 2 of the top players from when I was a bit younger were vying to get into the tournament via this route, John Parrot and Jimmy White. Both however, were victims of brillaint comebacks by youngsters in their respective qualifying round matches and hence neither made it to the first round, which is particularly sad seeing as how John Parrot is now considering retiring from the game altogether as he doesn't want to be embarassed like this again. Jimmy was a little bit more optimistic, but my heart goes out to JP who was always such a professional at the table and a lovely guy to all his opponents and eveyrone he met within the game. I know that sounds like an obituary but it kind of is when you consider that this man's fantastic career could now be over with the qualifying round defeat this year.

Now onto the actual first-round draw which has thrown up some inredibly interesting match-ups such as Mark King v Steve Davis. Anyone who has ever seen a Snooker match will know who Steve Davis is, and people a little bit older than me will remember the epic Davis v Dennis Taylor final of 1985 in which Taylor triumphed 18-17 on the final black. Lesser known maybe is Mark King, but he has been a consistently good player since he came onto the professional tour and has spent most of his professional career being a top 16 player so it's a very mouth-watering clash that one. Then there is a 2006 final rematch between Peter Ebdon and Greame Dott which is another intruiging first round match. When you consider the fact that that final was only 4 years ago, both player's are very talented and are very capable of runs very deep into the tournament so that's another one I will be watching very keenly. Whichever man wins it, will have huge momentum for the rest of the tournament and so it is a very big first round match. Stephen Maguire v Stephen Lee is the battle of the Stephen's in the first round and another battle between two players who have certainly excelled since being on the professional circuit and players who have consistently been at the top of the game season after season. As with the Ebdon v Dott match, you feel that both players could go far in the tournament and whichever player wins could again gain momentum and go on to win this tournament. Match of the round for me and many commentators though will be world number one Ronnie O'Sullivan's battle with the young Chinese star Liang Wenbo, who has shown he has genuine talent and is a rising star within the game, as with most of the Chinese players that will be at the Crucible this year. This is a hugely tough opener for O'Sullivan, but many feel that if he can get past this he will win the tournament, but, as is so often the case with Ronnie, his temprament will be under the spotlight much as it has been all season and the ease with which he can cope with the pressure of his first-round match against Liang, will undoubtedly impact upon his chances at winning the World title.

First taste of journalism

On the 27th March 2010, at the age of 20 years 351 days, I finally found the job that I know I want to do for the rest of my life. No-one who was in the room (all professionals in this field) looked particularly rich or glamourous and the fact that I used to think this was important was completely ridiculous as I now realise. The event that took place was me going to do press coverage for the University's radio station for the football match between Swansea City FC (my own team who I love until my eventual death) and Ipswich Town at the Liberty Stadium. When I first got there I did what every true fan does and queued up outside the players entrance to meet my idols and get a few autographs. It was brilliant and having did this, it was lovely to go into the press room with all the professionals to find them watching the early match between Cardiff City and Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park. I loved the fact that even though these guys watched football and lived football every day of their lives, they were still so interested in the sport itself and showed a genuine love for the game. I've always loved football and wanted to do something in relation to it and being a Sports Journalist just about seems perfect. Then lunch was served and I sat next to the Sky Sports team chatting away and they told me all their brilliant stories from the years that they had been doing the job. The stories only made me even more sure this was for me. Having done all the preliminary stuff, I went upto my seat in the Press box and watched what was a game with little incident, although for me it was enjoyable to see my team play for free. It was also nice to take notes on the game although not a lot happened as I alluded to earlier. I then got to go into the Press conferences with Roy Keane and Paulo Sousa and it was interesting to see first hand what each manager thought of the game and thought of the other team and although I didn't ask Mr Keane a question, when Paulo took his seat and had done his talking, I stuck my hand up to ask a question. Now, I didn't honestly think I'd get a chance to ask a question of Paulo given the fact that there were actual professional journalists sat in the room with me, but amazingly, and even though Paulo must have known I was a rookie, he gave me a chance to ask a question of him. Having put my question to Paulo, I sat back and watched him confidently answer my question whilst all the time giving me his attention and I felt that this was something lovely of him to do because he honestly didnt need to give a rookie journalist the chance to ask a question which could've ruined the press conference. I then left with a sense of finally having found my calling and I now hope to make this my profession in the future. To get paid to have this amazing experience every week, well theres not a lot else I can really say about that now is there