27/06 The Sports Pages

The Sports Pages

It’s one of the busiest sports weekends of the year and the papers are spoilt for choice when it comes to their leading stories.

Under a headline of “Tired Ireland run out of steam”, the Sunday Times analyses the final game of an unsuccessful rugby tour which saw defeats to New Zealand, New Zealand Maori and, on Saturday, to Australia.

Surprisingly, on a day which sees England face Germany in the last 16 of the World Cup, the Sunday Independent leads with a story about Diego Maradona, who leads his Argentina side into action against Mexico tonight.

“Maradona feels the hand of history on his shoulders” reads the headline above a piece culled from Maradona’s press conference in Pretoria on Saturday. Endearingly, El Diego is never one to avoid a sweeping statement and that was again the case this weekend. “This is where history begins,” he said.

In a front-page sidebar, the Sunday Independent also carries a report into the demise of Mayo’s much-maligned footballers. Beaten finalists in Division 1 of the National Football League two months ago, Mayo bowed out of the Connacht championship to Sligo last month and were put out of their misery by little Longford in the first round of the qualifiers on Saturday evening.

Their manager, John O’Mahony, also stepped down at the end of the game. Nevertheless, O’Mahony is convinced that Mayo have the players to deliver glory to their county in time: “I do think those lads will have their day in the sun. It’s not an easy thing to say after losing to a perceived weaker county, but I’m absolutely convinced of that.”

With Germany-England in mind, the Sunday Times have a piece written by Everton manager David Moyes on the way to win in penalty shoot-outs. Moyes admits he may not be a penalty guru – he took just one during his playing career, and missed it, but his Everton side overcame Manchester United in the FA Cup semi-finals a year ago and he has had a bit to say about penalty preparation.

If all players know exactly what type of penalty they’re going to take, and have practised it rigorously, then the pressure of the shoot-out situation is eased, he says. “When your players walk up to the spot, they – and, more importantly, you – have decided exactly what they’re going to do … I feel you take pressure away from individuals that way. If it doesn’t go in, then fine. We score together, we miss together when we take penalties.”

You can follow all the action from Germany v England LIVE with JOE’s tracker Conor Hogan from 3pm. That will be over at the World Cup 2010 section. We’ll be leaving no stone unturned this afternoon – over at our GAA section, Shane Breslin will be in the chair for the clash of Dublin v Meath in the Leinster SFC semi-finals at Croke Park.

One story that will be of interest to sports fans but which doesn’t appear in the sports supplements is the story of Dublin and Aussie Rules legend, Jim Stynes.

The 43-year-old, Ireland’s greatest export to the Australian game, tells the Star Sunday of his battle against incurable cancer, which has seen him undergo surgery to remove 16 tumours from his back, lungs and brain over the past 12 months.

“I’ve had this for 13 months and I’ve done very well to survive as long as I have,” says Stynes, who adds, “There’s no point worrying about the future. Life is there to be grabbed and I’ll do everything I can to stay around as long as I can.”