Richard Hannon relies on Nysaean successful in a minor race at Chepstow
Posted in General on 18. Oct, 2010
Richard Hannon relies on Nysaean, successful in a minor race at Chepstow. But not even the weakest links will leave with nothing; the prize money schedule runs down to tenth and there are nine runners. The winner will receive £460,000, the last home £8,000.High Chaparral, whose sire Sadler’s Wells is responsible for three of the last four winners, will have his ideal conditions this afternoon and it will be a shock if he does not confirm himself the best middle-distance colt of his generation. And then, the hardened older campaigners, like Godolphin’s Royal Ascot revelation Grandera, his Arc-winning stablemate Sakhee and Longchamp runner-up Aquarelliste, who turns out in this afternoon’s Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud, will be waiting.. Dateline: Athens
Dateline: Athens
During his helter-skelter stewardship of the Sports Ministry there were some (this column excluded) who suggested that Tony Banks had lost his marbles. So it is pleasing to note that the abrasive-as-ever MP for Newham is now doing his bit to see that the Greeks regain theirs.
Banks is leading the campaign to have the Parthenon Sculptures, otherwise known as the Elgin Marbles, restored to their rightful ownership before the Olympic Games in 2004. “There is no legal or moral reason why we should hang on to them,” argues Banks, currently chairman of the parliamentary arts committee. He is back on the sporting beat, too, as chairman of the Council of Europe sports committee, a position which gives him even more clout internationally than Richard Caborn. More than 120 MPs have now signed a motion that the Marbles, currently housed in the British Museum, should be returned forthwith. “We will try to convince Tony Blair that giving them back to Greece would raise his stock on the international stage,” says Banks Well, that might do the trick.
If it doesn’t then maybe Blair will accept the suggestion made to British MPs by Greece’s engaging poet-politician Telemachos Hytiris, the minster co-ordinating the 2004 Games, that as a goodwill gesture, the Marbles could be put on temporary display at the new Acropolis Museum in Athens up to and during the Olympics. Banks, 59, who describes himself as “a romantic philhellene” also believes the Games themselves should be returned permanently to their birthplace as a “sporting Vatican”, and says he is thinking of retiring to his favourite island, Symi, when he quits politics, still with his marbles.Top Athens beat for ex-British bobbyBudgets cuts imposed by the Greek government, who face an awkward election just three months before the Games begin in August 2004, mean fewer Olympic frills in Athens. Such as one new hockey field instead of two, temporary rather than permanent stands and sand instead of grass at some venues. But the Games diva Gianna Angelopoulos assures me one area where there will be no scrimping is security “It remains our top priority,” she says. This is good news for the only Briton likely to be involved in running an Olympics in the foreseeable future.
Peter Ryan once a London bobby and now one of the world’s top cops, is the security chief for the Games, as he was in Sydney. Ryan, an anti-terrorism expert who was formerly head of police training in the UK, was also security consultant for the incident-free Winter Games in Salt Lake City, where the $310m bill was half that budgeted by Athens. Here he will co-ordinate a 50,000-strong security force with experts from various intelligence organisations, including the CIA, Mossad and his old stamping ground, Scotland Yard. Quite unexpectedly there has been a touch of the Wembleys about one of the principal venues for the Games. A dispute over refurbishment costs between the government and the owners of the Karaiskaki Stadium, which houses Olympiakos, for now leaves Athens without a home for the Olympic football final. The only viable alternative, AEK’s Nikos Goumas Stadium, is similarly in need of expensive overhaul but the IOC are resisting moves to stage the final outside the capital.