Supersport's Good Week / Bad Week: Botha cleared

Good week for...

Botha cleared
If you ever need a good lawyer, have a word with Bakkies Botha's man. The Bokke lock sent a roundhouse open-hand smash into poor wee Ryan Kankowski's gob. No intent? What was it? An accident? We think not.

Poor Brawn

Ah, the high life. Big-spending Formula One teams love a bit of the champagne life - except Brawn that is. After winning the Spanish Grand Prix, the championship leading team - including Ross Brawn - partied hard at, er, Barcelona Airport. Cans of Estrella (weasel-pee gassy Spanish beer) and sandwiches were de rigeur. And no first class for these boys. The team flew back to Britain on cheapo airline EasyJet. All while Ferrari threaten to walk out over the suggestion that they'll have to reduce their spending to meet a proposed budget cap.

Datsun's bridge vault
SuperShorts is a fan of the Datsuns - the band; not the car (it's all Corollas around here). In fact, SS was there in the studio back in 2002 when the Datsuns played a Peel Session. So imagine our glee to hear that World Squash Day is to be celebrated in this town by Phil Datsun, the Tron's beloved long-haired rhythm guitarist, bungy jumping off the Auckland Harbour Bridge. Phil, of course, is a former A-grade squash player. Rock legend has it that the lanky twanger was once the world's 212th-ranked player. Rock'n' roll!

'Fingers' tips
Great men are often misunderstood, thankfully John "Fingers" Hopoate has the chance to set his sporting legacy straight this weekend. Once the NRL's pre-eminent amateur proctologist, he meets former world heavyweight boxing champion Oliver McCall on Sunday in Las Vegas. Hopoate was clear on his prospects: "He still looks pretty mean, but he looks a bit old to me, so I'm very confident."

Vick returns
Free at last! Free at last! Good news dog(fight) lovers: Michael Vick is out of jail and angling for a return to the NFL.

Bad week for...

Sharkswatch
As their finances go tits up, their season goes down the gurgler and their coach goes bonkers, the Cronulla Sharks have garnered more bad press across the Ditch. Local sex shop owner Con Ange is a big Sharks fan. Con took to sharing the perks of his trade with the players after games. He once arrived in the changing room with a scantily clad lass under each arm and introduced them to the blokes as "Bitch One and Bitch Two". "It was pretty clear what was on offer," says a club source. "And it wasn't Con."

Marketing stripped
Outraged of Grey Lynn writes: "What the hell was going on with the NZ 'away' strips in the Super 14? Was it the idea of the same chump who came up with the grey AB alternate strip at the last RWC?

"Surely things have gone seriously haywire when the Canes play in heinous grey versus the Reds, when their proper jerseys wouldn't have clashed in the slightest. A change strip is needed for Blues v Stormers, and Canes v Chiefs. But most of the others it's simply a jersey maker's marketing ploy, isn't it?"

Pity for an Aussie
Spare a thought for Shaun Tait. Around the time cricketers were signing up for truckloads of cash in the Indian slap-and-giggle league, Cricket Australia asked the Aussie quick to take some time out instead. "Rest up, pal," the message went, "we'll need top bowlers in peak shape for the Ashes tour."

The poor fella took them at their word, missed out on a cheeky couple of hundred grand and now finds himself out of the Ashes squad and without a CA central contract.

Bad excuse
Bulls boofhead PJ Nel misses out on the semifinals after arguing strongly that his hit on Stefan Terblanche wasn't a dangerous tackle. Fair enough, we thought: it wasn't a tackle at all - more of a swinging-arm king-hit, flush to the jaw.

Hole in one
It pays not to use the Lord's name in vain when your six-iron shots go awry. A golfer in Denmark was killed by a lightning strike last week.