What an up and down weekend on the sporting scene. Football was an absolute disaster for England who were unable to score against Portugal in the 120 mins of normal (and extra time) play in their World Cup quarter final. The penalty shoot out looked like it was going to be close until England missed a couple in a row. Final score, Portugal wins 3-1 on penalties and a nation retires to the pub to drown its collective sorrow. Cricket was just as dismal for England, but an excellent result for Sri Lanka who sealed a 5-0 series whitewash with some excellent batting from Sanath Jayasuriya and Upul Tharanga. Set a challenging total of 322 to win by England, with Marcus Trescothick returning to form by contributing a century to this total, Sanath and Upul set off with gusto. Within 10 overs Sri Lanka had surpassed 130 runs and from there it became a simple stroll to victory, which was achieved despite losing both openers around the 280 mark. English cricketers and fans will be asking a lot of questions about their ability to rebuild before meeting Pakistan next week, and more crucially before defending the Ashes against the Aussies and taking part in the World Cup next year. The only silver lining in British sport this weekend was Andy Murray's straight sets victory over Andy Roddick. An excellent performance but it remains to be seen if the young Scotsman will be able to progress to the final stages of the tournament.
I came across a very entertaining and informative article about the state of Sri Lankan politics by Namini Wijedasa today. Apparently MPs in Sri Lanka are about to vote themselves a pay hike, which in itself is pretty normal procedure in any parlimentary democracy. However, what is unusual in Sri Lanka is the higher than normal level of ineptitude our parlimentarians display at running the country. A recent call to observe a minute of silence in the house to remember those who died in a bus bombing in the north of the island descended into an all-out brawl that resulted in the session being suspended because one group of MPs felt that similar respect should be paid to all those who have died in Sri Lanka's ongoing troubles. Thankfully the MPs cooled off enough to change the motion to be one that observed a minute of silence to all the dead and things could move on. This is just one example of the type of behaviour that Sri Lankan tax payers are subsidising, and will be asked to pay even more towards in the near future. You can read Namini Wijedasa's full article at www.theacademic.org.
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