Headlines

Drug cheats beware as there’s a new enemy in town! No doubt Dwain Chambers et al are quaking in their boots because a new test hailed as the sports saviour is on its way. And it will help weed out the worst offenders, the test used to identify rapists and other dodgy characters through hair-sampling techniques will be used by British scientific boffins to catch wayward sports cheats. 

Sounds simple enough but the liquid chromatography technique will test for anabolic steroids and will totally do away with urine testing which only detects illegal substances from 2 - 5 days after they have been ingested.

In fact the back catalogue of drug use can be tracked back as far as one year, depending …

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The unfeasibly stimulating GUKPT continues to turn heads as it builds to its grand final in London in November. May saw the 5th of the 9 legs take place in Newcastle and it followed the tour’s history by providing an epic climax.

The heads-up contest between Doctor Ganesh Rao and rookie online qualifier Ian Farell lasted over two hours and featured plenty of swings. It also offered two highly contrasting styles: typically, Ian would be the aggressor, raising a lot pre-flop and capturing a lot of blinds but he was matched by Ganesh’s more patient style – often the aggressive bully was trapped in a pot and leaked chips.

The end eventually came at 1am when they were both showing signs of …

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Okey dokey folks, it is time for our Tournament Tips column.

You may recall that when we first began, we mentioned that success in tournaments can be boiled down to time management: you have to cope with a ticking bomb with the panache of James Bond.

Well, if you have found yourself at the final table, the first thing is to congratulate yourself on your Bond-like temperament. Your ability to let the others players adopt a devil-may-care attitude has left you a guaranteed juicy award and the chance to raid Fort Knox.

Think of the final table as the point where Bond reaches the villain’s lair – you have faced some almighty challenges but the toughest is yet to come. Everyone else at …

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Why the WPT decided not to televise their recent event, the Spanish Championship, which ended on Tuesday at the Casino Barcelona, remains a mystery.  It was a high class tournament – 253 entrants paying €5000 and contributing to a prize pool of $1,993,071 – in one of the world’s most attractive cities but it didn’t warrant a TV crew.

We can only think that the guys that operate mics and cameras couldn’t be bothered to haul their arses over the Atlantic and experience some culture. Either that or we are underestimating the amount of detailed preparation it takes before they are ready to film the audience at the Bellagio Cup IV in July.

For those who have been deprived of the tele-genic …

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They say that there’s a book in all of us, that a mighty tome that can emanate from us at any time. And you only have to look at the shelves of WH Smiths to see that all and sundry are lifting pens to write their biogs - in the style of the WAG and glamour girl who fight for domination!

Note we deliberately avoid the term autobiography, since the closest most of those fashion-lovin’, crotch-flashin’ WAGs come to a pen(is) is when it’s attached to a bloke!

Nay, the ghost writer sweats it for sure. WAGs aside what about those fabulous sporting biographies then? Where the legends tell all about their battles in and out of their dedicated sport? Some are …

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Did you now that former Polish Pope John Paul II used to drink a pint of lager for his breakfast every morning? I once read he used to be a handy goalkeeper as well, he might even have inspired a young Artur Boruc to pull on the gloves in his jumpers for goalposts days.

A well as being a formidable keeper the strapping Celtic custodian is something of a jack the lad who derives enormous pleasure from winding up opposing football supporters.

He is alleged to have almost provoked a terrace full of peace-loving Rangers fans into a full scale riot for crossing himself in front of them. Sensitive souls those Rangers chaps who have a rabid hatred of all things Roman …

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So it could finally happen then? Reports have been flooding in to the Bodog office, in fact the blower’s been going crazy we’ll have you know. But Hollywood’s golden couple - Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are tying the knot. Our rather excited sources couldn’t wait to tell us that it could be happening "within the next couple of weeks."

The couple who are expecting twins (yes shock horror and no one even knew she was pregnant!) are thought to be having a low key affair somewhere in France before Ange drops her load in August. The source said:

"Brad and Angelina are planning a small wedding to be held within the next couple of weeks and that means having it in …

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It’s taken less than a week but Sharon Stone has now made a not quite grovelling apology to China. The 50-year-old Basic Instinct minx suggested in Cannes last week that the earthquake in China could have been the result of bad karma over the government’s treatment of Tibet.  

"I’m not happy about the way the Chinese are treating the Tibetans because I don’t think anyone should be unkind to anyone else," Stone said last Thursday during a Cannes Film Festival red-carpet interview with Hong Kong’s Cable Entertainment News. "And then this earthquake and all this stuff happened, and then I thought, is that karma? When you’re not nice that the bad things happen to you?"

In that case what the hell …

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