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Man City star Raheem Sterling is fast becoming a national treasure after latest acts
RAHEEM STERLING may have missed out on the PFA player of the season award but there is no doubt he is football’s man of the season.
Sterling will be at the funeral of Damary Dawkins today, a funeral he paid for out of his own pocket to ensure the Crystal Palace youth player, who died of leukaemia last month, received a fitting send-off.
What with his ongoing work in the fight against racism in football and wider society, Sterling is, at 24, fast becoming a natural treasure.
If it were boxing or UFC the pre-London Marathon spat between Mo Farah and Haile Gebrselassie could have just been dismissed as a cynical promotional ploy.
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As it is, the claim and counter-claims of the two athletics greats, have provided what has to be the most bizarre build-up to Sunday’s event in its history.
If Farah, who is running this weekend, thought he had shown Gebrselassie his spikes with a zero star review of the Ethopian’s Yaya Village resort, claiming that a watch, two phones and £2,600 had been stolen from his hotel room during a training camp, the retired champion has not taken it lying down.
Gebrselassie’s response that there had been multiple reports of “disgraceful conduct” surrounding Farah during his stay, centring on an accusation that the benighted Briton had attacked a married couple at the hotel gym after an argument, was, as responses go, unexpected.
The duo’s lawyers are now involved in a dirty race which may yet have a fair distance to run.
There are many moving parts to this cross-continental farce but one small one jumps out – the unwitting revelation from Farah that he signed his initial complaint to Gebrselassie: “Sir Mo”.
There’s nothing like wearing your greatness lightly.
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Ronnie O’Sullivan’s first round exit from the World Snooker Championship to Blackpool amateur James Cahill provided a dramatic storyline. It was accompanied by the sound of an event deflating.
It is hard to think of a sport so reliant on one individual to breathe life into it than snooker is to O’Sullivan and without him to carry it, this championship could end up being as flat as the tables at The Crucible.
There will still be a champion crowned a week on Monday but there will also be markedly fewer eyeballs watching.