England win at football, rugby and in F1 in Abu Dhabi

FOOTBALL – In front of 87,189 fans, skipper Frank Lampard’s 49th minute six-inch header, after Darren Bent’s effort had struck a post, gave England victory over reigning European and World Champions Spain, who dominated the first-half without having a decent effort on goal.

Centre-back Joleon Lescott and ‘Man of the Match’ Scott Parker, whose late interception denied the visitors a draw, were outstanding.

David Villa struck an upright and Ces Fabregas missed a sitter as Spain searched for a draw.

Victory was a bonus for coach Fabio Capello who missed his son’s wedding in Milan to be at Wembley.

England played, and hopefully beat, Sweden on Tuesday!

Unless they’ve lost the return clash 5-0, the Republic of Ireland will be in Euro 2012 after their 4-0 first leg play-off victory in Estonia. Robbie Keane scored twice to take his international goal-tally to 55.  Also going through, I feel, will be Portugal, the Czech Republic and Croatia.

Elsewhere, Wales beat Norway 4-1 and Scotland defeated Cyprus 2-1 in friendlies.

Upsets in last weekend’s FA Cup first round included saw Fleetwood beat Wycombe and Luton oust Northampton while Stourbridge drew at Plymouth and AFC Totton walloped Bradford 8-1 – the biggest score by a non-League club at this stage in the competition for 66 years.  And there were 14 sendings-off in the 32 ties – a record.

Japan’s Masaaki Toma – the first overseas official to referee a club game in the UK – took charge of Brentford’s 1-0 Cup win over Basingstoke

CRICKETSouth Africa beat Australia in the first Test in Cape Town. All out for 286 in their first innings, the Aussies then bowled out their hosts for 96 but second time round, the tourists were dismissed for 47, their lowest total for 109 years. At one point Australia, at 21-9, were on the brink of recording the lowest Test score ever, 26 by New Zealand v England in 1955. South African, 236-2, with Smith (101) and Amla (112) hitting centuries, won by 8 wickets.

Somerset’s 1980s captain Peter Roebuck, 55, has committed suicide in South Africa. He played with Ian Botham and Viv Richards and scored over 1,000 runs nine times. 

F1 – Lewis Hamilton won the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix after Sebastian Vettel, on pole for a record equalling 14th time (the same as Nigel Mansell in 1992), failed to finish a race for the first time this season. The Grand Prix season ends in Brazil in eleven days time.

TENNIS – On his way to French Masters glory, Roger Federer recorded his 800th career match victory. Jimmy Connors’ holds the all-time record of 1,225 wins. Tomas Berdych ended Andy Murray’s 17-match unbeaten run in the quarter-finals.

RUGBY – The Heineken Cup began last weekend; holders Leinster drew 16-16 in Montpellier while Munster beat Northampton 23-21 with Ronan O’Gara’s late dropped goal.

Mike Tindall has been fined £25,000 and axed from England’s squad after his night club antics at the RU World Cup.

England beat World champions New Zealand 28-6 and will face Australia in this weekend’s RL Four Nations Cup final.

SPORT SHORTS

* GB will host the 2012 Olympics, the 2014 Commonwealth Games, the 2015 Rugby World Cup and the 2017 World Athletics championships.

* Greg Chalmers held off Tiger Woods to win his second Australia Open title.

* Manny Pasquiao has retained his World light-featherweight crown and England’s Tyson Fury is still the Commonwealth heavyweight champion.

* In Motorsport, the Wales Rally GB was won by Jari-Matti Latvala after World Champion Sebastian Loeb retired after crashing into a spectator’s car between the 18th and 19th stages.

DID YOU KNOW?
Before Tuesday’s game with Sweden, England had scored 1,999 goals in full internationals… and last Saturday’s win over Spain was their first against reigning World champions since beating Argentina 3-1 in 1980.

Contact: tel: 950 069 220 or Tony_matthews@live.co.uk

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