Pakis Pinpoint Pom Pressure Points 

So the progress of the England Test team throughout its summer program is not, after all, a series of glorified practice matches to play all of its members into form ahead of the Ashes series in Australia. The erratic Pakistanis have tossed in a reminder that the English are far from the crack outfit their press and supporters make them out to be, and are actually a team with multiple vulnerabilities - that if probed, as Pakistan has, could regain the Ashes for Australia. (That's if Australia's own vulnerabilities aren't counter-probed to a greater extent.) First, the English batting is suspect, with regular collapses engineered by the Pakistan bowlers, headed by the über-impressive Mohammad Amir. At the top of the order, England lost its top six for 98 in the second innings at Trent Bridge, and the top seven for 94 in the first innings at The Oval. At the other end, England has lost six for 17 at Trent Bridge, seven for 46 at Edgbaston and seven for 28 at The Oval. From 354 in the first dig at Trent Bridge, England's innings totals have subsequently been 262 for 9, 251, 233 and 222 - a trend I like a lot. Opener Alastair Cook was widely considered to be one failure away from the chop before a timely century at The Oval. Eoin Morgan is struggling for runs, as is Kevin Pietersen - and that's a state we definitely want to continue. The big question is, have we got as good an attack as Pakistan has displayed in this series? Can we deploy anything like the devastating late movement that Amir, Mohammad Asif, Umar Gul and Wahab Riaz have been able to command, and which has exposed England's top order so? If it survived that test, England's batting has been all at sea against Saeed Ajmal's DH Lawrence of a doosra - as in, unreadable. I am greatly heartened by the chinks that our Pakistani allies have opened - but can we emulate them? We have a left-arm quick, too, but that is about the only similarity he shares with the deadly accurate, always-dangerous Amir. We have a spinner, too, but I'm not sure that any of his deliveries could be classed as unreadable. The point is that Pakistan has showed very clearly that England is a soft batting line-up, not the immovable accumulators we made them out to be in 2009. Over to you, Troy Cooley and Co. 

Burt deserted by his trusty boot 

You had to feel sorry for Parramatta's Luke Burt when he missed a penalty goal attempt with just seconds on the clock yesterday. Kicking the goal would have sent the Eels' game against the Tigers to extra-time and given the home side a chance to win and keep its finals hopes alive. But from just 25 metres out almost dead in front, the NRL's most accurate kicker (strike rate of 85 per cent) missed the goal. The image of Burt watching his kick's progress, then slumping into his own private hell, was one of the more memorable of the weekend. I don't like the way that in AFL, last-minute mistakes in close games come under the microscope so much, because the game could just as easily have been decided by mistakes in the first three minutes, or at any stage. But the fact that in the rugby codes the kicker is the man, the specialist, the person that trains for this eventuality made Burt's trauma so much more individual. Indeed, the lame way that Parramatta had played to get to 6-20 down means that its loss was certainly a collective effort, but Burt's mistake was the one that everyone remembers. You had to feel sorry for him. 

Momentum deserts Dockers, Dogs 

If there is such a thing in physics as negative momentum, the Western Bulldogs and Fremantle have it heading into the AFL Finals. Fremantle's decision to rest seven key players for the trip to Launceston at the weekend incensed commentators and punters alike: now the club has to deal with the thrashing that it copped and try to get back on track. If the club loses at home to Carlton this week and misses out on a home final, the match committee's decision will have been potentially disastrous. But those outside the club do not know the extent of the "soreness" epidemic that has swept the Dockers: nor do we know how the sore seven will respond to the week off. Besides, Mark Harvey can argue that the club expected all of the inclusions to have been champing at the bit to grasp the opportunity and ensure that they played finals. Fremantle stands accused of flirting with its form and momentum, and it can only really prove that charge wrong by beating Carlton at home and then winning a final (or two). Then, Harvey would be called a genius and people would be saying that had set a new standard in late-season list management. As for the Dogs, there is a horrible feeling of doom impending doom setting in, an air of luck having deserted them at a crucial time: a double-edged sword for the playing group, because it would make any success taste even sweeter. But the task seems to get harder every week at the moment. The last-round fixture with the Artist Formerly Known as the Bombers looms as a critical date for the Dogs - they have to get back on to the winners' list, without losing any more personnel. 

No pressure, Nate 

It's just two weeks out from the opening of the 2010 US college football season, and I for one can't wait. I am a Navy fan: I love the way the Midshipmen, despite the hindrance of the Naval Academy's academic standards and five-year service requirement, keep punching above their weight year after year, as do their counterparts at Air Force (the less said about Army, the better.) As a Navy fan I qualify as someone that detests Notre Dame, and who has loved the way the legendary "Fighting Irish" have fallen on hard times in recent years. (It was bemusing, to say the least, that Notre Dame was the organisation - under its former coach, the unlamented Charlie Weis - to which the AFL last year sent Nathan Buckley and an entourage to see the coaching profession supposedly at its zenith, a proposition that any US college football fan could have told them was like going to Haiti to study political administration). But something is developing at Notre Dame this year that is worth watching: the situation at quarterback. After Jimmy Clausen gave up his senior (fourth) year of college football to enter the NFL draft, his back-up, Dayne Crist, looks likely to have the starting job when Notre Dame opens its season at home against Purdue on September 4. But Crist's back-up is the really interesting story: it is 20-year-old Nate Montana - the son of former Notre Dame and NFL legend Joe. The suffocating tradition of Notre Dame, and its fan base's anger at its fall from grace, makes new coach Brian Kelly's job the hardest in US sport: and puts Crist on a hiding to nothing, too. (Think Collingwood and multiply by 50.) But the prospect of another Montana calling the signals at Notre Dame makes their situations look pressure-free. To add his father's deeds to what is expected of a Notre Dame quarterback would make for the kind of fairytale story that US sport loves so much: it would be great to see young Montana succeed. Just not against Navy on October 23. 

Polite Parliament Pinned on Pacquaio 

The "new paradigm" of a Parliament that is more civil in its deliberations - which is one of the effects widely considered to flow from the fact that independents hold the balance of power in the new Australian parliament - put me in mind of a similar effect that has been noticed in the Philippines, since its election in May. The election of one Emmanuel Dapidran Pacquiao - better known as "Manny" to his friends, family and millions of boxing fans - as a member of the House of Representatives has brought a new politeness to Philippine politics. Indeed, not even Pacquiao's desertion of the party under whose banner he was elected for another, just prior to taking the parliamentary oath in June, caused any insults or name-calling, formerly something for which the Philippine parliament was well-known, to be directed his way. When not attending debates in the House, Pacquiao - the first boxer to win world titles in seven different weight divisions - uses the parliamentary gym and grounds for training: by all reports, emptying the public gallery at those times.