Boards
These entrapment / revelatory sporting stories
Max Moseley. The Terry & Bridge affair. Pakistan's cricketers. The FA Executive in charge England's World Cup bid.
Is it a bit odd that all of them have coincided with the start of a major tournament, bidding process or period when England seem to be getting good at something?
The cynic in me says that Murdoch is a bitter Aussie who wants to see British sport fail as much as is humanly possible - why else have all these events happened on the eve of a bit British sporting moment? Or else, at the least he is a cynical businessman who knows that English failure and controversy will sell far more papers than anything of noteworthy value and times these story releases for maximum exposure, which rather disappointingly we all lap up as hoped.
Some of the things the media are saying today about the cricket and claiming Pakistan might have thrown are ludicrous. The odd no ball or failure to take a review I can accept, but engineering dropped catches on certain balls an throwing whole innings? They're not actually good enough to do that, are they? And relegating the Pakistan floods to third in the news over it? Insane...
So in short, I'm blathering. But this cricketing one is (I guess) the most shocking of these type of tales, but they ALL leave a rather unsavoury taste in my mouth for more than just the reasons they're intended to.