You’ll Never Walk Alone

Dear children,

Today it is me,the one who once made you proud and happy.Today it is me, the one who taught you to always hold your head up high.Today it is me, who channeled your passion and made you see beyond the boundaries of religion, race and countries.

Today, I am falling. My trusted servants have been bruised and their confidence lies in tatters. Today I see my faithfuls pointing fingers at each other. Today, I see them abusing my most loyal supporter, the Spaniard who restored me to the height where i was two decades ago.
Yes, today i have fallen on my knees. Yet, it is not the bruised knees that hurt me. It is the sight that my trusted followers, my children of the yore and the fore doubt my abilities.

All i want to say is- Today is just a day….tomorrow will come….at the end of the storm,is a golden sky and the sweet silver song of the lark.
Remember Istanbul? It took me just 6 minutes to restore back the pride that had been severed in the entire decade?
Remember Olympiakos? It was me who didn’t let the greatest captain wake up in the UEFA cup.
Remember the five we scored when we munched on the Toffes in the oldest English cup?
Remember Shankly?
Remember Paisley?
Remember the Spice Boys?
Remember the Glory ?
Remember the Greatest Nights of Europe?
It was all me.
Who am i? Haven’t you guessed?
I am Red. I am Liverpool Football Club.
I have always held your hand.Today, i need you to hold mine. Don’t let it go.
I need you today.
~in the Rafa we trust~

[No idea about the source]

The Modern Ant and Grasshopper

I got this as a forwarded e-mail, long back, but still felt i ought to share it, although its mostly known to everyone

OLD VERSION: The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

MODERN VERSION: The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant’s a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

The World is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the ant’s house. Medha Patkar goes on a fast along with other grasshoppers demanding that grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter. Amnesty International and Kofi Annan criticizes the Indian Government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the grasshopper.

The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the grasshopper (many promising Heaven and Everlasting Peace for prompt support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance). Opposition MPs stage a walkout.

Left parties call for “Bharat Bandh” in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Inquiry. CPM in Kerala immediately passes a law preventing Ants from working hard in the heat so as to bring about equality of poverty among ants and grasshoppers.

Lalu Prasad allocates one free coach to Grasshoppers on all Indian Railway Trains, aptly named as the ‘Grasshopper Rath’.

Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act [POTAGA], with effect from the beginning of the winter.

Arjun Singh makes Special Reservation for Grass Hopper in educational Insititutions & in Govt Services.

The ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the Government and handed over to the grasshopper in a ceremony covered by NDTV.

Arundhati Roy calls it “a triumph of justice”. Lalu calls it ‘Socialistic Justice’. CPM calls it the ‘revolutionary resurgence of the downtrodden’ Kofi Annan invites the grasshopper to address the UN General Assembly.

Many years later…The ant has since migrated to the US and set up a multi billion dollar company in Silicon Valley. Hundreds of grasshoppers still die of starvation despite reservation somewhere in India.

The dog that “was” the MP4-24

“We are in deep shit”, commented one McLaren insider at the start of the season. How true that it could be. McLaren from being title contenders to back-markers in just 4 months. Sad. But true. Still I will not dwell on the past.
The present is that, even though Lewis Hamilton had a dismal Sunday in the Eiffel Mountains, there was some positivity around the McLaren camp. Finally. The car feels stable. Could this unlock the key to the MP4-24’s potential. Probably not. But it will surely save a lot of embarrassment for the team.
You see, the new upgraded MP4-24″B” is almost one second per lap faster than the old car. And that is a LOT. Lewis Hamilton managed to out qualify Heikki Kovalainen by 1.2 secs with a car just 10 kg lighter. While taking off 0.2 secs due to Lewis’ natural pace, or rather to round up the figure to 1 sec, that leaves with an astonishing increment of pace. Will all this remove the Achilles heel of the package, or is it bad thing all together. Only the future can tell this. But to all my fellow McFans, the next track the Hungaroring, is one with slow speed corners which will suit the MP4-24 to the tee. So this will be the first time that I will look forward to the Grand Prix. If Lewis keeps his nose clean at turn one – these days, I have started to trust Heikki in these matters – we could be in for a good result for both the drivers. But, all still depends on how the MP4-24 package responds to the track. A lot also depends on how much progress the other teams make. But that is beyond the scope of this.
All in all, the guys at Woking have done a fantastic job on getting the upgrades on the car. The upgrades could reach the track only on the day of the practice sessions. So that is how hard the are working at it. Lewis even commented on how one engineer worked 36 hours non stop to make it happen. Commendable job guys. Its no mean feat even with all the simulators, wind tunnels and CFD facilities available to get such an upgrade with no track testing. Because, computers can only get you so far. Finally the car is supposed to run on the track and that’s where its testing is supposed to be done. That is one of the reasons why I think the in season testing ban is useless. But that would be beyond the scope of this.
I will now relieve you of this boriong discusson. Heck, F1 discussions are always boring arent they. Adios. McLaren Forever

The chaos that is Bayern Munich

As i write this, Bayern Munich have a very uphill task of winning atleast a trophy this season. This from club which is the default winner of the double, Bundesliga and the DFB Cup, almost each year. May be its the almost bit, but you have to expect some serious commitment from the players and management alike.

Now lets start with the management: Firstly there has been a total lack of decisions. No new transfers, not a big enough bench, no stability in the coaching dept.For eg. Jurgen Klinssman was sacked just 9 months into his tenure. Now while a appreciate the need to win trophies and do it on a regular basis, this is just ridiculous. Every coach needs time at the helm, especially if he is new to the club. You cannot expect the defensive minded team of Ottomar Heizfeld to adapt instantly to the attacking football that Klinssman plays. On top of that, he wasn’t given any control over transfers, let alone control, he didn’t even have a say over the transfers. So all in all we had some defence minded players, who incidentally aren’t all that good in defence as this season has shown.

With all the sagas going on as to who the new coach is going to be, most people are unwilling to take up as they fear we are on course to becoming another Chelsea/Real. All this while, the great Franz Beckenbauer has been giving the media many anecdotes as to who will become the coach. This has rightfully not gone down well with Manager Uli Hoeness. Now that the new coach will take over, there will again be problems of players trying to adjust, management having the final say on transfers and so on. I really do hope that whoever becomes the new coach will get a decent run of 2 season atleast to prove his worth.

The other major worry is the lack of bench strength. We got an unfit Toni, unmotivated Podolski and with only Klose to do the attacking up front, that is a serious concern in Europe and it showed. Landon Donovan showed why “soccer” isn’t popular in the states.

On top of that, the only players n the mid field who have performed have been Bastian Schweinsteiger and Franck Ribery. apart from those two, all have been hits and misses, injured or in “Captain” Mark Van Bommel’s case, plain useless. The new signings have not been given enough time on the pitch to really prove themselves, namely Tim Borowski, so i will reserve my judgment on them.

Now on the defence part. Let me say this: apart from Phillip Lahm and to a certain extent Lucio, no one has performed, let alone to expectations. Lahm quite simply is the best wing back in the world, better than Sergio Ramos IMO. But the rest of the defence has been leaky. I can understand that Italians are generally god defenders, but taking a 32 year old wing back, who is 3rd choice for his club, which incident couldn’t make it to the UCL this year, is just showing where you consider yourselves to be. Massimo Oddo has been through just one purple patch, lasting no more than 6 matches if my memory serves me right. Also poor Willy Sangol retired with persistent injury problems. Another one bites the dust after Sebastian Diesler. Martin Demichelles is at best a holding mid fielder, and not a centre back, and unless he plays there, i don’t see him making much of an impact. Breno is just a kid who will be bullied by oppoents. The quicker Mats Hummels is brought back from his loan at Dortmund, the better. A promising centre back, German and young. Oh yes i forgot about Christian Lell, but why bother, the chap cant defend to save his life.

The goal keeping is another issue which needs to be sorted out. By no means is Micheal Rensing going to come anywhere close to Kahn. Its best to get a good goalie: Ustari, Neuer, etc before its too late.

So that’s about it. A poor poor season by any standards and we are languishing 2nd hte table, its just the magic of a few players: Schweinsteiger, Ribery, Lahm, Lucio, Klose, Ze Roberto and lately Sosa, that we are here.

So basically Bayern have been riding mostly on a wave of individual performances. Lets hope this will get sorted out next season and we can again dream of the trebles which the teams of hte late 90s and early 2000s gave us. Prost Bayern Munchen

Thanks to”: Oliver Tuur, Oliver Jilke, V2J, Lester Ervine, Prakash and all my friends in the Orkut Bayern Munich community for their insights, without which this wouldn’t have been possible

It will be a great REUNION – Shoe-me

After a much publicised insult by someone who is suspected to be his boyfriend, M Shoe-me has come forward with the olive branch saying that he holds no grudges against the man and that his relationship with Felipe Massa is fine.

For the uninformed, at the season ending party at Interlagos, Massa agreed with Rubens Barrichello’s view that M Shoe-me is gay. For the press though, that relationship is like: “mentor-protege” although the whole world, including a 12 yr old kid called Fernando Alonso knows the truth, having famously called Massa “Shoe-me’s bitch” at the end of the 2007 Nurgburgring race.

Shoe-me, who says he himself has been at many “end of the season parties”, advises felipe to go a bit easy on the drink, as a human in the drunken state cannot control his emotions and it may result in the unlocking of some really embarassing truths.

Finally as a parting shot, the False World Champs spokesperson told this reporter that “Michael will meet with Felipe at the Ferrari World Finals in Mugello”. How sweet I’d say. That’s called forgive and forget.

Nostalgia

Don’t you sometimes feel that you could and should be able to live those care free days all again. Those were the times when all one had to do was leave home, bunk college, hangout somewhere and then go back home: not a single concern or bother in the world..

Now there are so many responsibilities that I feel burdened to really take it all

*Sigh*

But is it all to life??

I mean can there be any time when we should get our hair down and behave like kids??

Just forget all responsibility and just let your heart rule the head.

And the answer is…..YES!!

Why not??

after all life cant be all that serious can it??

and then no one i going to survive it in any case…so lets enjoy the day to the fullest of our abilities.

When I walk past my old (very:175 years to be precise) Junior College, i get this feeling of nostalgia: the corridors where we used to hang out, the BCR:Boys Common Room which used to bring solace after an unlikely event of an attended lecture and the whole campus as a whole. In comparison professional college feels like a school, a prison if you want, there are no places to hang out, a bunked lecture needs a year to plan and not to mention those darned assignments which will obviously serve no purpose in life coz they are usually(always) copied. Which brings us to the point of the topic: Should one live half of his/her life in nostalgia or just go wherever life takes one??