Sligo Rovers came back from a late equalising goal against UCD in the Showgrounds to snatch all three points with a goal in injury time from Padraig Amond, last night (13/7/2010).
It was Amond’s second goal of the night, having put the home side ahead in the 29th minute. Up to that point a Sligo goal looked inevitable and the chances raining down on the UCD goal felt as ominous as the theme music from “Jaws”.
The Students came to Sligo just a point behind the Bit O’Red in the Airtricity League Premier Division Table, but Sligo’s recent form suggested they would be able to dismiss the visitors with ease.
Certainly on the first half performance, Rovers deserved to be two or three goals to the good at the break.
As early as the second minute John Dillon had a strike on goals deflected, and with John Russell, Joseph Ndo and winger Eoin Doyle all playing superb football against an often-overwhelmed UCD back line, it was amazing the ball stayed out of the net as long as it did.
Doyle and Ndo twice spurned good chances to put Sligo ahead, but UCD failed to tighten their line and just before the half hour mark Russell and Dillon linked up to send the ball into the path of Doyle, but the winger passed square for Amond to chip the keeper with a delicate lob bouncing in off the underside of the crossbar.
Fans hoping for the floodgates to open were disappointed when Sligo failed to capitalise on their dominant possession, although Russell was unlucky to see his stinging strike rattle the UCD crossbar a minute from the break.
After the interval, UCD boss Martin Russell introduced lofty midfielder Robbie Creevy into the game and with him bullying the Sligo back line and Richie Ryan in particular, UCD looked more potent.
Keith Ward, another danger for UCD, brought the best out of Sligo netminder Richard Brush with a 35 yard lob in the 53rd minute. The visitor’s chances were still few, but when Ciaran Kilduff came close to scoring five minutes from the end, the tension in the Showgrounds was palpable.
In the 88th minute UCD got their equaliser. For a moment the Sligo defence looked undecided on whether to intercept the run of Kilduff, but the striker’s shot from inside the box deflected off Jim Lauchlan and over the head of Richard Brush, who was a few metres off his line.
It was an agonising sight for Sligo fans, but with three minutes of injury time still to play, Sligo pushed forward and earned a free to the right of the penalty area in the 91st minute.
Joseph Ndo sent the dead ball into the UCD six-yard box where Padraig Amond rose highest to head beyond Gerard Barron. In the end Sligo deserved the three points, but boy did they have to work hard to get them!
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Italian culture
Since as far back as I can remember I’ve always had an affinity with Italy. I like its culture, its language (even if I can’t speak it) and most definitely its automobiles.
Most of all I admire its names. There is nothing as romantic as an Italian name. Now I’m all for promoting Irish culture, but most of our anglicised names, when translated back into Irish, sound like you have a frog in your throat.
Take my name for example. In English it’s Robert Cullen. As Gaeilge it’s Roibeard Ó Chuilleain. In Italian It would probably be Roberto Culliano. Which sounds better? No contest is there.
It’s the same for Italian place names. An Italian named Romano Artioli relaunched French car maker Bugatti in Italy in the early 90s and brought it to a place in the North of the country called Campogalliano. That sounds like a place where fast cars should be made.
Although the project was short-lived, the Bugatti factory was just a few miles down the road from a much more established name – Ferrari. The Prancing Horse, as the firm is known, is located in a place called Maranello, surrounded by twisting mountain roads and constantly echoing to the sound of the best engines in the world.
The chairman of Ferrari is a man called Luca di Montezemolo (pronounced Monty-zem-oh-low). How cool is that name.
Best of all, chances are in Italy you will not be surrounded by friends with the same surname, because Italy has the biggest collection of native surnames in the world, with over 350,000 Italian surnames recorded.
In fact the ten most common surnames only cover one percent of the population. Put that in your pipe Messrs Murphy, Kelly, Walsh, O’Sullivan and Ryan.
Frankly, I’d rather be in the top ten of Italian surnames anyway. They include Rossi, Ferrari, Romano, Bianchi, Marino and Greco.
This whole love affair with Italy has been ignited recently by the excellent BBC programme “Francesco’s Mediterranean Voyage” in which Italian architect and historian Francesco Da Mosto boards a Venetian ship called the Black Swan for a journey from Italy to Turkey, via countries Crete, Montenegro, Bosnia and Greece.
This programme followed on from “Francesco’s Italy” in which the same presenter gave an amazing insight into areas of Italy which are very familiar and many which I’ve never heard of before.
Ah, the romance, the history, the sunshine. No doubt I’ll end up in Italy some time and I’ll revel in the accents and the culture. Until then, just call me Roberto.
Most of all I admire its names. There is nothing as romantic as an Italian name. Now I’m all for promoting Irish culture, but most of our anglicised names, when translated back into Irish, sound like you have a frog in your throat.
Take my name for example. In English it’s Robert Cullen. As Gaeilge it’s Roibeard Ó Chuilleain. In Italian It would probably be Roberto Culliano. Which sounds better? No contest is there.
It’s the same for Italian place names. An Italian named Romano Artioli relaunched French car maker Bugatti in Italy in the early 90s and brought it to a place in the North of the country called Campogalliano. That sounds like a place where fast cars should be made.
Although the project was short-lived, the Bugatti factory was just a few miles down the road from a much more established name – Ferrari. The Prancing Horse, as the firm is known, is located in a place called Maranello, surrounded by twisting mountain roads and constantly echoing to the sound of the best engines in the world.
The chairman of Ferrari is a man called Luca di Montezemolo (pronounced Monty-zem-oh-low). How cool is that name.
Best of all, chances are in Italy you will not be surrounded by friends with the same surname, because Italy has the biggest collection of native surnames in the world, with over 350,000 Italian surnames recorded.
In fact the ten most common surnames only cover one percent of the population. Put that in your pipe Messrs Murphy, Kelly, Walsh, O’Sullivan and Ryan.
Frankly, I’d rather be in the top ten of Italian surnames anyway. They include Rossi, Ferrari, Romano, Bianchi, Marino and Greco.
This whole love affair with Italy has been ignited recently by the excellent BBC programme “Francesco’s Mediterranean Voyage” in which Italian architect and historian Francesco Da Mosto boards a Venetian ship called the Black Swan for a journey from Italy to Turkey, via countries Crete, Montenegro, Bosnia and Greece.
This programme followed on from “Francesco’s Italy” in which the same presenter gave an amazing insight into areas of Italy which are very familiar and many which I’ve never heard of before.
Ah, the romance, the history, the sunshine. No doubt I’ll end up in Italy some time and I’ll revel in the accents and the culture. Until then, just call me Roberto.
Slow driver campaign needed post haste
Speed Kills! Kills! How many of these signs have you seen around Ireland? We motorists are told the worst thing we can do, after drink-driving, is speeding in our cars.
Now there is some merit to this obviously. Mr BMW driver in his Teutonic tank tearing down the inside lane of the dual carriageway at three figure speeds is just the kind of person you want to see pulled over and handed a ticket.
However, let’s face the first reality of modern motoring. Almost all of us speed at some time. We might creep a few miles north of 100kph or we might set our cruise control at 112kph in the hope that we are going faster than some traffic but not fast enough to attract the attention of the authorities.
The margins in urban driving are much, much slimmer. It might seem acceptable to blast through an estate or along a deserted back street at 80kph, but it is not big or clever and nine times out of then if an accident does happen it will not be you in danger, but a pedestrian.
This is a very simplistic argument, of course, but simple messages are most effective when it comes to dealing with serial speeders.
Why is there nothing done about serial slow-coaches?
You travel on a road in Ireland for two hours or more and, chances are, you will have to overtake slower drivers at some stage. There seems to be a driver ‘type’ who, for reasons fathomable only to themselves, insist on travelling 20kph, or more, less than the posted speed limit.
The Road Safety Authority has a campaign in place with signs that say “100kph is a limit, not a target.” I don’t agree. I think it should be a target. Motorists should be encouraged to stick to the speed limit and help create a more efficient road network, with fewer hold-ups.
And this is not just the ranting of some speed merchant. On a recent trip to Galway I met a string of about 15 cars which was being held up by one motorist who decided to travel at less than 80kph on a 100kph national primary road.
The tail back was compacting and expanding like an accordion behind this vehicle. Brake lights were being flashed every few seconds as motorists got too close to the car in front and had to hit the brakes. At one stage it looked like an elaborate light show.
I increased the gap between my car and the one in front to around two seconds (the recommended safe distance). No sooner had I done this than a car overtook three cars and slotted in to the space in front of mine.
Was I at fault for leaving a large space in front of my car? Was the motorists who overtook me at fault for his impatience? Or was the driver at the front of the queue who insisted on travelling almost 30kph slower than the speed limit on a road with ample hard-shoulder space in perfect driving conditions the root cause of all this annoyance.
A few weeks ago I wrote a firmly tongue-in-cheek column about how some road rage was good for you. In instances like these road rage is the enemy and it is perpetuated by drivers who decide to impose their own speed limits.
If this particular motorist was on his driving test and had been travelling that far under the speed limit, chances are he would have failed or been marked down severely.
Part of being a good driver, a competent driver, is your ability to make progress efficiently – to keep up with traffic. It is what every learner driver is told by their instructor.
The authorities hands are tied on this issue because there is no specific legislation for going slower than the speed limit.
However, the Road Safety Authority are spending taxpayers cash in an effort to improve our driving habits and they have never addressed the issue of slow drivers. Maybe now is the time to start.
Now there is some merit to this obviously. Mr BMW driver in his Teutonic tank tearing down the inside lane of the dual carriageway at three figure speeds is just the kind of person you want to see pulled over and handed a ticket.
However, let’s face the first reality of modern motoring. Almost all of us speed at some time. We might creep a few miles north of 100kph or we might set our cruise control at 112kph in the hope that we are going faster than some traffic but not fast enough to attract the attention of the authorities.
The margins in urban driving are much, much slimmer. It might seem acceptable to blast through an estate or along a deserted back street at 80kph, but it is not big or clever and nine times out of then if an accident does happen it will not be you in danger, but a pedestrian.
This is a very simplistic argument, of course, but simple messages are most effective when it comes to dealing with serial speeders.
Why is there nothing done about serial slow-coaches?
You travel on a road in Ireland for two hours or more and, chances are, you will have to overtake slower drivers at some stage. There seems to be a driver ‘type’ who, for reasons fathomable only to themselves, insist on travelling 20kph, or more, less than the posted speed limit.
The Road Safety Authority has a campaign in place with signs that say “100kph is a limit, not a target.” I don’t agree. I think it should be a target. Motorists should be encouraged to stick to the speed limit and help create a more efficient road network, with fewer hold-ups.
And this is not just the ranting of some speed merchant. On a recent trip to Galway I met a string of about 15 cars which was being held up by one motorist who decided to travel at less than 80kph on a 100kph national primary road.
The tail back was compacting and expanding like an accordion behind this vehicle. Brake lights were being flashed every few seconds as motorists got too close to the car in front and had to hit the brakes. At one stage it looked like an elaborate light show.
I increased the gap between my car and the one in front to around two seconds (the recommended safe distance). No sooner had I done this than a car overtook three cars and slotted in to the space in front of mine.
Was I at fault for leaving a large space in front of my car? Was the motorists who overtook me at fault for his impatience? Or was the driver at the front of the queue who insisted on travelling almost 30kph slower than the speed limit on a road with ample hard-shoulder space in perfect driving conditions the root cause of all this annoyance.
A few weeks ago I wrote a firmly tongue-in-cheek column about how some road rage was good for you. In instances like these road rage is the enemy and it is perpetuated by drivers who decide to impose their own speed limits.
If this particular motorist was on his driving test and had been travelling that far under the speed limit, chances are he would have failed or been marked down severely.
Part of being a good driver, a competent driver, is your ability to make progress efficiently – to keep up with traffic. It is what every learner driver is told by their instructor.
The authorities hands are tied on this issue because there is no specific legislation for going slower than the speed limit.
However, the Road Safety Authority are spending taxpayers cash in an effort to improve our driving habits and they have never addressed the issue of slow drivers. Maybe now is the time to start.
The fast-moving world of technology
I was pondering the other day with a mate, what we did before the advent of digital cameras and mobile phones (or indeed mobile phones with digital cameras).
They are now ubiquitous, but even five years ago, if you had a mobile phone with a built in digital camera, you were the envy of your friends.
Nowadays, they are on the verge of being given away in packets of cereal such is their availability and affordability.
Nerds out there will often make reference to Moore’s Law of Computing which basically says that new computers will either double in capacity or halve in size every 18 months (if you’re a nerd and you disagree with my summation, tough).
The same rule can be applied to more areas of technology too, such as mobile phones, digital cameras, digital music players and the like.
My first mobile phone was one of the most popular Nokia models, the 5110, which provided a basic grey screen, some dodgy ringtones and the ability to buy multi-coloured covers.
Scroll forward and today my phone of choice is a Sony Ericsson W810i which, even though it has an mp3 player, a digital camera, bluetooth, a built in radio, a colour screen and a voice recorder, is still considered antiquated because it’s approaching its second birthday.
The digital camera I have has under 5 megapixels which makes it the equivalent of caveman paintings compared to the squillion pixel cameras currently on the market.
At least my iPod Nano is up to date, but the screen is bust so all I can use it for is music and not photographs, games, videos or podcasts.
Casting my mind back, I can remember getting my first walkman cassette player in 1989 after collecting NCF (now Connacht Gold) tokens. Music cassettes look and feel so antiquated now. Even CDs are considered old-hat these days.
My first twin deck cassette player was another milestone which seems hilariously out-of-date these days.
Ironically, it is now the older technology which has become more expensive. Walk into your local electrical retailer and you can pick up a DVD player for as little as E30. However, a Video Cassette Recorder costs more, because it is viewed by the home entertainment industry as a dying form.
The only format which seems to be bucking the trend is, ironically, the oldest still in use – Vinyl.
Vinyl long players from bands like Radiohead, Coldplay or Duffy are available by special order or from discerning stores. You never know. In ten years time, movie studios might release new films on VHS format, just for old time’s sake.
I was pondering the other day with a mate, what we did before the advent of digital cameras and mobile phones (or indeed mobile phones with digital cameras).
They are now ubiquitous, but even five years ago, if you had a mobile phone with a built in digital camera, you were the envy of your friends.
Nowadays, they are on the verge of being given away in packets of cereal such is their availability and affordability.
Nerds out there will often make reference to Moore’s Law of Computing which basically says that new computers will either double in capacity or halve in size every 18 months (if you’re a nerd and you disagree with my summation, tough).
The same rule can be applied to more areas of technology too, such as mobile phones, digital cameras, digital music players and the like.
My first mobile phone was one of the most popular Nokia models, the 5110, which provided a basic grey screen, some dodgy ringtones and the ability to buy multi-coloured covers.
Scroll forward and today my phone of choice is a Sony Ericsson W810i which, even though it has an mp3 player, a digital camera, bluetooth, a built in radio, a colour screen and a voice recorder, is still considered antiquated because it’s approaching its second birthday.
The digital camera I have has under 5 megapixels which makes it the equivalent of caveman paintings compared to the squillion pixel cameras currently on the market.
At least my iPod Nano is up to date, but the screen is bust so all I can use it for is music and not photographs, games, videos or podcasts.
Casting my mind back, I can remember getting my first walkman cassette player in 1989 after collecting NCF (now Connacht Gold) tokens. Music cassettes look and feel so antiquated now. Even CDs are considered old-hat these days.
My first twin deck cassette player was another milestone which seems hilariously out-of-date these days.
Ironically, it is now the older technology which has become more expensive. Walk into your local electrical retailer and you can pick up a DVD player for as little as E30. However, a Video Cassette Recorder costs more, because it is viewed by the home entertainment industry as a dying form.
The only format which seems to be bucking the trend is, ironically, the oldest still in use – Vinyl.
Vinyl long players from bands like Radiohead, Coldplay or Duffy are available by special order or from discerning stores. You never know. In ten years time, movie studios might release new films on VHS format, just for old time’s sake.
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