Shorter games are just not the same

Shame on you Francesca Schiavone and Svetlana Kuznetsova.

How dare you put us through us through almost five hours of tennis at the Australian Open.

Don't you know that is the not the way sport is played nowadays.

Tense struggles that put athletes through an almost superhuman test of their physical, and mental, powers just isn't the go anymore.

If the administrators of the games we follow continue with current trends those enthralling battles of will and strength will be confined to the archives along with the black-and-white film footage of a bloke called Don Bradman.

Almost every sport around the world is looking for an abridged version of their code.

Fans the losers in private ownership

Tony Sage is the epitome of the passionate sports supporter.

Not only does Sage have an emotional investment in his beloved Perth Glory but he has made a financial one as well. A big one. We're talking huge bucks here. The kind of cash that is made through digging minerals from the WA dirt.

But while Sage has forked out an estimated $6 million to prop up WA's A-League team over the past three years, his side haven't been able to turn that support into success on the pitch.

Sage is an astute deal maker. He has negotiated with some of the shrewdest mining executives here and in Asia. He knows a bum offer when he sees one.

And what happens to WA's premier soccer team when Sage decides enough is enough? That day might be closer than you think, especially if the Glory can't rebound.

Social media becomes athletes' weapon

Socks, mouthguard, protector, shirt, towel and hat.

Now, the mobile phone has to be in the modern athlete’s kit bag.

The first batch of items is needed to play on the pitch, grass, court or oval. And the phone is crucial to playing a whole new ball game in post-match time.

Social media is the new plaything in world sport. But sportspeople aren’t just using Twitter and Facebook to send nice messages to friends. They’ve become a virtual world soapbox on which athletes are making a stand.

The past few days have highlighted the influence of Twitter and how athletes are using it to make a point to the world or push their own brand – or both. It has become a weapon for athletes because they don’t have to go through a middle man to get their point across – just type in 140 characters, point the phone and shoot.

Take Melbourne Tigers NBL player Corey “Homicide” Williams. Last week he and officials from the Perth Wildcats conducted a slanging match through Twitter.

Williams defaced a picture of a Wildcats player at Challenge Stadium following a practice session. Normally, such an issue would have been dealt with through the proper channels – or at least that would have been the sportspeak that clubs love to use when they make public a complaint without having to actually declare their rage.

Not this time.

Winds of cricket change could be draft

There is a strange sense of anguish about present-day Australian cricket

Defeat is tough. Losses against the team we hate more than any other in world sport are excruciating.

And considering we haven't lost an Ashes series at home since 1986-87 there are a lot of avid Australian cricket fans that don't know what it is like to watch first-hand their side cop it from the Poms. Enter a strange new world.

But it is from that generation that Australia wi ll draw on talent to turnaround their flagging fortunes.

Unfortunately, the cupboard is a little bare at the moment. Indeed, the Australian team has been playing on rations, too often from NSW, for too long. And the combination looks like a mishmash of leftovers.

The gumleaf mafia have put a price on the Test captain's head and the person set to fill his concrete shoes doesn't quite have the blessing of all the cricket mob. Other candidates are reluctant to come forward. One of the openers should be batting lower in the order, the No.6 batsman is a bowler and the nation's best spinner, whoever that may be this week, doesn't play at all.

So how can we fix Australian cricket? There needs  to be some winds of change and it could a draft.