Posts Tagged ‘australia’

Jenson Button: Celebrates his victory in Australia

McLaren Team Principal Martin Whitmarsh is confident Jenson Button has a realistic shot at this year’s F1 world title after winning in Australia.

THE ONLY PLACE TO BE

Sky Sports F1 HD is THE only place to watch the 2012 Formula One season in full. We will have live and exclusive coverage of the Malaysian Grand Prix starting with P1 on Friday.FRIDAY – P1 from 1.45am. P2 from 5.45amSATURDAY – P3 from 4.45am. Q from 7amSUNDAY – Race from 7.30amTo find out all the different ways to watch the action, click here

Button produced a stunning drive to claim his 13th career victory in Sunday’s Australian Grand Prix – the third time in the last four years he has triumphed around Melbourne’s Albert Park.

After passing team-mate Lewis Hamilton on the run down to the first corner, Button proceeded to dominate for 57 of the 58 laps with seemingly effortless ease.

There is an obvious danger of getting too carried away after just one race, but as far as Whitmarsh is concerned the early signs are promising.

“He has just got stronger and stronger,” said Whitmarsh. “He has such a mature, laid-back, easy manner that belies the underlying hunger to win he possesses.

“He must now believe he’s in with a good chance of a proper title run this year, and I think he is.

“Providing we can continue to improve the car, not make mistakes and be reliable, there’s no reason why we cannot recapture that.”

“Jenson must now believe he’s in with a good chance of a proper title run this year, and I think he is.”Martin Whitmarsh Quotes of the week

Given McLaren are renowned for their rate of development, there is the obvious hope that after starting the season strongly they can continue in such a vein.

Formidable

Often in the past McLaren have been forced to play catch up, but on this occasion Whitmarsh said: “We are starting from the right place.

“We know we have to improve the car on a race-by-race basis, but we’ve some formidable competitors in Red Bull, Ferrari, Mercedes, and Lotus look strong as well.

“It is pretty tight, as it should be. This is F1. It should be difficult to win, and it is.

“But we’re already looking forward to this weekend (in Malaysia). We do fancy our chances there, but who knows. Let’s see how we go.”

Whitmarsh was left feeling that after starting one-two on the grid, albeit with Hamilton on pole ahead of Button, then they should also have been one-two in the race.

That would likely have been the case but for a safety car on lap 37 that cost Hamilton and played into the hands of Sebastian Vettel who grabbed second ahead of the 27-year-old Briton.

Hamilton left Albert Park appearing somewhat disconsolate, which was akin to his dark days last year when things did not go his way.

Whitmarsh, however, could understand Hamilton being disgruntled, adding: “You can see in this team that whoever wins is delighted and whoever doesn’t win isn’t happy.

“Lewis wasn’t going to be happy being third, but when Lewis does starts getting happy with that, or beaten by a team-mate, he won’t be the Lewis we all love and admire.”

Phil Neville: Everton captain has no qualms with hectic March schedule

Everton captain Phil Neville insists David Moyes’ squad would much rather be playing games than training.

The fixtures are piling up in March after their FA Cup clash with Sunderland on Saturday ended in a 1-1 draw.

The Toffees now face four matches in 10 days, starting at home to Arsenal on Wednesday.

Games are easier

“It is great. The players absolutely love it,” Neville said on Everton’s 10 fixtures in March. “You ask any player, they would rather play than train.

“It is common knowledge the manager trains us hard – the games are actually easier.

“We are really looking forward to the next two weeks. I thought before the game on Saturday, ‘This is why I am in football – to play in games like this’.

“The atmosphere was incredible, the atmosphere on Wednesday night against Arsenal will be good.

“Then we go down to Swansea, then we have the replay, then West Brom. It is really mouth-watering. To say I am excited is an under-statement.”

Cahill praise

Neville also praised the work-ethic of midfielder Tim Cahill, who is enduring his worst run at the club in terms of goalscoring.

The Australia international was on target against the Black Cats for only his second for Everton since December 2010.

“Maybe he has been disappointed with his goals tally this season but he is not one to shirk responsibility and I think the fans appreciate that,” he continued.

“That is why he is a legend at the club. For me he was the best player on the field and we will need that effort and determination in the (replay).

“It was great to see him; he was like a man possessed at times.

“Even when balls were falling on other players’ heads he really wanted to win. That is what he is all about. There is no hiding place when you are out there on the pitch.”

Wales will tackle New Zealand in Cardiff on November 24

RBS Six Nations champions Wales have confirmed a four-Test autumn schedule later this year highlighted by a Millennium Stadium showdown with World Cup holders New Zealand.

The All Blacks will face Wales on November 24, providing coach Warren Gatland’s team with another opportunity to record their first victory over New Zealand since 1953.

Australia, conquerors of Wales in the World Cup bronze medal match last October, will conclude the autumn series on December 1.

Samoa, who Wales edged out in a key World Cup pool game six months ago, are also on the November programme, together with Argentina.

“I am delighted we are able to announce such an excellent series of games for this autumn,” Welsh Rugby Union group chief executive Roger Lewis said.

“Warren Gatland has always said we will only get better by playing the best, and this autumn we have certainly met his challenge and lived up to his expectations.”

Wales’ 2012 autumn Tests:November 10, Argentina (2.30pm)November 16, Samoa (7.30pm)November 24, New Zealand (5.15pm)December 1, Australia (2.30pm).

Warren Gatland: stock on the rise after overseeing another Grand Slam campaign for Wales

Related links
Teams
Also see

Warren Gatland looks set to be confirmed next month as head coach of the 2013 British and Irish Lions.

Wales’ double Grand Slam and RBS Six Nations title-winning mastermind will be interviewed for the post along with Ireland boss Declan Kidney and Scotland’s Andy Robinson.

But it is thought that New Zealander Gatland’s appointment is viewed as a formality for the three-Test trip to Australia.

If Gatland, who was a key member of the Lions coaching staff in South Africa three years ago under Sir Ian McGeechan, lands the job, it is understood that current Wales assistant Rob Howley will take charge of next season’s Six Nations campaign.

WRU backing

That would allow Gatland to run the rule over tour squad candidates, free from Wales commitments, with the Welsh Rugby Union’s full backing.

Gatland, 48, confirmed his status as the red hot Lions favourite by adding another impressive entry to his career coaching portfolio with Wales’ latest Grand Slam triumph.

During four years at the helm, he has won two Six Nations titles, Grand Slams and Triple Crowns with Wales, in addition to a World Cup semi-final

appearance last autumn – Wales’ best performance on a global stage since 1987.

It would be a huge surprise if he does not land the Lions job for a tour highlighted by three Tests against Australia and one that starts in Hong Kong against the Barbarians.

And among those who could realistically expect coaching support roles would be Wales defence specialist Shaun Edwards and England forwards guru Graham Rowntree.

Gatland, meanwhile, was due to be back on public duty on Monday as celebrations continued in Cardiff following the Six Nations triumph.

Reception

The Welsh Government staged a reception for Wales’ Grand Slam heroes at the Senedd in Cardiff Bay, when children from local schools were involved in a Six Nations trophy presentation ceremony to First Minister Carwyn Jones, who formally handed it to the squad.

The Wales players will head back to their regions this week before reassembling for Test duty in late May ahead of facing the Barbarians in Cardiff on June 2.

Gatland’s squad then head Down Under to tackle Australia in Brisbane a week later, followed by further Tests in Melbourne and Sydney. They also meet the Brumbies in Canberra on June 12.

Wales have not beaten the Wallabies in Australia since 1969, when a team captained by lock Brian Price triumphed 19-16.

Massa: Spin in Friday practice set the tone

Stefano Domenicali says Ferrari will help Felipe Massa overcome the problems he experienced with the F2012 in Australia so that the under-pressure Brazilian can purely focus on his driving.

THE ONLY PLACE TO BE

Sky Sports F1 HD is THE only place to watch the 2012 Formula One season in full. We will have live and exclusive coverage of the Malaysian Grand Prix starting with P1 on Friday.FRIDAY – P1 from 1.45am. P2 from 5.45amSATURDAY – P3 from 4.45am. Q from 7amSUNDAY – Race from 7.30amTo find out all the different ways to watch the action, click here

While Ferrari have fallen a long way short of their pre-season targets, and struggled for qualifying pace in Melbourne in particular, Massa experienced a particularly torrid weekend.

The 11-time race winner spun in first practice, slumped to 16th place in qualifying and then struggled badly with tyre wear in the race, before eventually retiring following a collision with Williams’ Bruno Senna.

The Brazilian’s race fortunes were in stark contrast to team-mate Fernando Alonso’s who overcame his own qualifying setback – which saw him spin out of Q2 – to hustle the Ferrari to fifth place, the Spaniard at times having been lapping several seconds quicker than the struggling sister car.

Both driver and team acknowledged prior to the season that this was an important year for him to rediscover his best form yet Massa’s disastrous Melbourne weekend has already served to increase speculation over his future at the team given his contract runs out in nine months’ time.

Domenicali, Ferrari’s Team Principal, says a lack of balance in his car badly hindered Massa in both qualifying and the race and that the team’s engineers would now go and analyse exactly what went wrong before this weekend’s Malaysian GP.

“I think that the point was starting from yesterday [in qualifying] – Felipe didn’t feel to have a great balance on the car. So it has affected the performance of the qualifying and also the race,” Domenicali explained.

“So now what is important is to realise analyse everything in order to make sure there is nothing strange, because that is a fundamental thing that we need to do in order to help Felipe to make sure he is performing without any extra pressure.

“I know that he has [pressure on him] but he needs to be focused really on his driving and we need to help him on that.”

Nonetheless, with Alonso’s strong drive from 12th on the grid to fifth having lifted some of the gloom at Ferrari, Domenicali says the race proved useful in helping the team get to the bottom of the issues with their complex car.

He was pleased with the pace through the first two stints, but says the team need to investigate why things became more difficult for Alonso following the appearance of the safety car when he came under threat from Pastor Maldonado’s Williams.

“I think that we learned for sure a couple of things [in the race],” the Italian said.

“First of all, that the performance of today was not what the performance that we saw yesterday. Overall the performance of the first two stints of the race was not too bad considering really the situation.

“Then after the safety car something happened so we need to understand what was the real problem because we saw a different race pace if you compare the first two [stints] and the last one. So this is the analysis that we have to do.”

Early rain in Kingstown meant the match had to be reduced to 40 overs-per-side

Paceman Kemar Roach claimed two wickets to help restrict Australia to 154-9

Related links
Teams
Also see

West Indies levelled the one-day series against Australia with a five-wicket win in the second match at Arnos Vale in St Vincent.

In a match reduced to 40 overs-a-side because of rain, the hosts successfully chased down a Duckworth-Lewis revised target of 158 with 10 balls to spare.

Kieron Pollard stayed cool under pressure to steer his home with an unbeaten 47 after Sunil Narine had earlier claimed 4-27 to restrict the tourists to 154-9.

The victory is West Indies’ first over Australia in an ODI since October 2006, since when they have lost 13 on the spin. The next encounter in the five-match series takes place at the same venue on Tuesday.

Double blow

After a delayed start, Kemar Roach struck a double blow by dismissing the dangerous David Warner for just 13 and then, four balls later, getting Peter Forrest to edge to Darren Sammy at second slip.

Shane Watson contributed 25 but when he departed Australia were struggling at 46-3.

Narine claimed his first wicket by deceiving Michael Hussey (24) with a quicker ball which the left-hander flicked behind to wicket-keeper Carlton Baugh.

Dwayne Bravo removed George Bailey on 21, before Daniel Christian was run out for six following a mix-up with David Hussey.

Narine sent Matthew Wade on his way for just three and then ended David Hussey’s resistance on 37 when he got a ball to cut back on to the stumps.

Clint McKay was the last of Narine’s victims for six, and although Brett Lee did manage a six in the final over, Australia’s bowlers were left with not a lot to play with.

Still, they got off to the best possible start when Kieran Powell was trapped leg before offering no stroke at the first ball of West Indies’ reply.

Settled

Johnson Charles and Marlon Samuels settled any early nerves before the latter was bowled between bat and pad by Australia skipper Watson on 20, while Charles followed a short time later, carelessly run out on 26.

Darren Bravo contributed just 16 but brother Dwayne and Pollard came together to get the home side’s chase back on course, the duo putting on a pivotal stand of 64 for the fourth wicket.

A run out ended Dwayne Bravo’s knock on 30 but Pollard stood firm as the finishing line approached, with his 61-ball stint in the middle including four maximums.

Carlton Baugh also cleared the ropes during his knock of 18 not out, a swept six off the spin of Xavier Doherty finally breaking West Indies’ miserable run.

The drivers have their say…

Toro Rosso’s Daniel Ricciardo: “I don’t really know how that happened on the last lap. I saw blue flags and a lot of cars in front and I was sure I could make up at least one place because it was chaos. I was a bit lucky to be the last one in that group because I could have a clear picture of the other cars going off in front. Then I had a chance to attack Jean-Eric. He defended into Turn 13 and I thought I could make the switch back and I did, which put me in P9. The last few laps were crazy and I was pushing like hell.

“At the start, I got caught up in the accident and at the moment I don’t understand how it happened or who was to blame. I made a decent start, I moved to the outside but there were too many of us there. I hit the left front quite hard against a Williams and had to come in to change the nose. I had to race with a bit of damage after that. It’s good to finish ninth, but I think I could have done better because the car was very strong, given how fast it was even with the damage I had to carry through the whole race, with the car pulling to one side. It was not easy to come back, but I never gave up, pushing all the time. I’m extremely happy and it’s great to score my first F1 points here at home in Australia, where the crowd has been just fantastic all weekend long.”

Toro Rosso’s Jean-Eric Vergne: “I got a super start and I had moved up a few places, but then Webber touched my right rear and I went straight on, losing a lot of time. After that, it was complicated as I was stuck behind cars I could not pass, even if they were considerable slower than me. Then, when trying to pass Di Resta, I made a small mistake, braking a tiny bit too late and went into the gravel. Even on dirty tyres, I was doing some very quick times. It’s just a shame that at the end I tried too hard and lost too much ground. That’s racing, I learned a lot on my first Formula 1 weekend and there are still nineteen races in which I can score points. The car seems to be working well and we were competitive all weekend, so I’m looking forward to getting back on track in Malaysia in a few days.”

Force India’s Paul di Resta: “It’s always nice to start the season with a point, but it was not looking too promising until the last few laps when my engineer told me that I was catching the cars ahead of me. Fortunately I had saved quite a bit of KERS for the last corner, which helped me get a good run on Vergne and beat him to the line for tenth. So it was a pretty exciting final lap. It’s a good way to start the season, but it’s clear we have a lot of work to do because we were struggling for pace at the start of each stint, which hurt my overall race pace. Even so, considering where I started and the weekend we’ve had, I don’t think I can be disappointed to have come away with a point.”

Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg: “I don’t seem to have much luck at Albert Park. My first race here in 2010 was less than a lap and today was a repeat of that. I’m still not really sure what happened, but I got hit when I turned into the first corner on lap one. It’s such a shame because I had made a great start, moved up a couple of positions and then I just felt somebody tap me from behind. There was a puncture and the suspension was damaged so my race was over and I had to park up. These things happen when 22 cars are battling going into a tight first corner, but it’s really frustrating to miss out after such a good qualifying session. The good thing is that I will be back in the car in five days’ time, which is the best way to bounce back and get over the disappointment.”

Caterham’s Heikki Kovalainen: “Both Vitaly and I had to avoid the problems in turn one at the start and then I lost a bit of time behind Glock, but got past him quickly and then started to show good pace, enough the close the gap to the cars ahead. I lost DRS until about lap six, and had to switch off KERS right at the start, so the sort of times we were doing were clearly competitive. Both stops went well but then I felt the car starting to pull left under braking so we brought the car in to take a look and it seems like a front left suspension problem was causing the handling imbalance I’d felt for a few laps before we had to retire. I’m sure we can fix both problems for next week and we have shown today what a step forward we’ve taken, so it’s not bad news, it’s just one of those days.”

Caterham’s Vitaly Petrov: “I was having a fantastic race and it’s such a shame we had to retire the car. Until that point everything was going exactly to plan. The team did a great to job to help me pass Heikki in the first stop, I was catching Senna and Massa ahead and the car felt really well balanced. I was managing the tyres well and we definitely showed the sort of pace that can bring rewards this season, so while it’s obviously not how we wanted the first race with my new team to go we can take a lot of positives from this and move on to Malaysia where we know we can put in a strong performance.”

Warren Gatland: Delighted after Wales seal historic win

These guys have been a real credit to themselves, Wales and Welsh rugby in how they have prepared themselves.

Warren GatlandQuotes of the week

Related links
Teams
Also see

Warren Gatland heaped praise on his Welsh players’ honesty and hard work after their RBS 6 Nations Grand Slam win.

Wales completed a third clean sweep in eight seasons with a 16-9 Millennium Stadium win over France, emulating the feat of the legendary Welsh sides of the 1970s.

Head coach Gatland was quick to praise the professionalism of his young squad, having clinched the slam with a starting XV containing nine players aged 25 and under.

When asked to sum up his side’s key virtues, the New Zealander said: “Honesty and hard work.

“These guys have been a real credit to themselves, Wales and Welsh rugby in how they have prepared themselves.

“They are excellent professionals and they make our job as coaches easy as they do more than what we expect and what is required, and when you have players doing that and looking after themselves and doing all the extras it goes a long way to making us coaches look good.”

Fitting tribute

Wales’ win marked a fitting tribute to 1976 Grand Slam-winning skipper Mervyn Davies, who died on Thursday after a battle with cancer.

While Gatland thought it was impossible to compare the current crop with the likes of Davies, Gareth Edwards and Barry John, he predicted a great future may await this squad.

He said: “It’s different time, different eras, professionalism versus the amateur era.

“It’s hard. It would be interesting to see the teams of the 70s if they were playing South Africa, Australia and New Zealand every year.

“We are not at that level yet, but our big aim is to be consistent in beating the southern hemisphere sides and we have a young enough side that over the next few years hopefully we can do that.

“We have been down in games during this tournament and we have learnt how to win ugly and in the past that may not have happened.

“We have accepted the tag of favourites which has not always sat well on our shoulders. For a young side they have coped incredibly well and I think it can be good for us as a team over the next two or three years.”

Lions speculation

The Grand Slam, Gatland’s second since arriving in the principality in 2008, makes him the outstanding candidate to lead the British and Irish Lions Down Under in the summer of 2013.

The Lions want their coach for that venture to have a clear 12-month window to prepare for the tour, meaning if Gatland were to take the role one of his backroom staff, possibly attack coach Rob Howley, would take the reins for next season.

But Gatland would not discuss the post, and even joked that the Lions may not be able to meet his financial demands.

“Perhaps I can think about that tomorrow. I know I am in the frame and the union have given me support for that,” he said.

“If the offer came along I have said it would be a huge honour, but there are a lot of things to put in place before that and we don’t know what their requirements are and I’m not sure whether they can afford me either.”