In short, Bangladesh, with a population of approximately 169 million at the last count, is the most populous country never to have won an Olympic medal. Of course, Bangladesh did not declare independence from Pakistan until March, 1971, having previously been part of British India until August, 1947.
As an independent country, Bangladesh did not participate in the Summer Olympic Games in Munich in 1972, Montreal in 1976 or Moscow in 1980, having joined 64 other nations in boycotting the latter in protest against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December, 1979. However, Bangladesh has sent at least one athlete to every Summer Olympics since 1984 – albeit relying, largely, on Olympic wildcard places, rather than direct qualification – making a total of ten so far. Unsurprisingly, Bangladesh has never participated at the Winter Olympics.
All told, a total of 49 Bangladeshi athletes have competed in archery, athletics, golf, gymnastics, shooting and swimming but, on the whole, have underperformed at the games. That said, golfer Mohammad Siddikur Rahman qualified, by right, for the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, thereby becoming the first Bangladeshi to do so; he did, however, finish last but one of the 59 players to finish the Olympic tournament. At th 2020 Summer Olympics, archer Mohammad Ruman Shana did likewise, but was eliminated by Briton Tom Hall in the last 32 of the men’s individual event and, alongside partner Diya Siddique, and by the South Korean pair Kim Je-deok and An San – who went on to win the gold medal – in the mixed team event.
Jockey, or rather former jockey, Eddie Ahern was ‘warned off’ for ten years at the end of May, 2013. Following a hearing of the Disciplinary Panel of the British Horseracing Authority (BHA), Ahern was found guilty of (i) conspiring to commit a corrupt or fraudulent practice, (ii) intentionally failing to ensure a horse was ridden on its merits and (iii) of passing information for reward.
The charges related to the ‘laying’ of five horses between September, 2010 and February, 2011 – that is, betting against them to win – preventing his mount, Judgethemoment, from achieving the best possible placing in a two-mile handicap at Lingfield on January 21, 2011 and passing information to his co-defendant, former footballer-turned-owner Neil Clement. Clement, himself, was banned for 15 years.
At Lingfield, Judgethemoment led and soon spreadeagled the field but, having set unrealistic fractions, stopped to almost nothing with over half a mile to run and eventually trailed in last of the seven runners, beaten 35 lengths, and 15 lengths behind the sixth horse home. Ahern argued that, while ill-judged, his ride was not a deliberate attempt to lose and, with the support of the Professional Jockeys Association (PJA), appealed the decision accordingly.
The appeal was dismissed, leaving Ahern in a position where he could no longer ride, or enter premises, such as racecourses or training yards, licensed by the BHA or associate with jockeys, owners and trainers, among others, until May, 2023. Champion apprentice in Ireland in 1997, at the time of his ban, Ahern had ridden a total of 1,252 winners on either side of the Irish Sea.
The sport of American, or gridiron, football originated at universities in the United States and Canada in the late nineteenth century. Protective headgear, albeit rudimentary, and optional, in the early days, has been a feature of the sport more or less ever since.
The first ‘helmets’ were open-faced skull caps, made from a soft material, such as leather or moleskin and, consequently, offered little or no protection against facial injuries. In the Twenties and Thirties, hardened leather helmets with additional padding became on option but, even so, a face bar or face mask would not be introduced until decades later, long after the advent of plastic helmets.
The first plastic football helmet, complete with a suspension system designed to withstand repeated hits, was invented by John T. Riddel in 1939. The introduction of the plastic helmet was hampered (i) by the scarcity of raw materials during World War II and (ii) by a production fault that led them to be banned by the NFL. However, the latter problem was quickly rectified, such that, by the end of the Forties, strong, durable plastic helmets were a matter of course in the NFL.
The National Football League (NFL) was founded in 1920, as the American Professional Football Association, but helmets – which became compulsory in college football in 1939 – remained optional until 1943. However, the last player to play without a helmet was Chicago Bears’ running back Herbert ‘Dick’ Plasman; he did so in the 1940 NFL Championship Game against the Washington Redskins on December 8, 1940, which the Bears won 73-0. Apparently, Plasman felt more comfortable playing bare-headed, although he was later found to have a deep indentation in his left temple, caused by running into the outfield wall at Wrigley Field.
‘Korf’ is the Dutch word for ‘basket’, so it should come as no surprise to learn that Korfball is a team sport that originated in the Netherlands in the early years of the twentieth century. In fact, Korfball was the brainchild of Dordrecht-born schoolteacher Nicolaas Broekhuijsen, who drew his inspiration from an existing, but more involved, Swedish game known as ‘Ringboll’ or, in English, ‘Ring Ball’. His idea caught on; the International Korfball Federation (IKF) was founded in 1933, the first IKF World Korfball Championship was held in 1978 and, nowadays, Korfball is played in over 50 countries worldwide.
Korfball can be played indoors or outdoors and incorporates elements of basketball, handball and netball. Teams consist of eight players – four male and four female by definition – and are split into two zones, attack and defence, which switch back and forth after every two goals. Two male and two female players from each side take up positions in each zone, although players are not permitted to defend against someone of the opposite sex.
A Korfball court is typically rectangular, measuring 20 metres by 40 metres. The object of the game is to score a goal, or basket, by throwing a ball, akin to a regulation association football, through a bottomless basket, positioned at a height of 3.5 metres and a distance of approximately 6.6 metres from the back of each zone.
As in netball, players cannot dribble or otherwise travel with the ball in hand, but must rely on passing the ball to one another. A player catching the ball must keep his or her landing foot stationary, but can pivot around that foot in order to complete a pass to a team-mate. Granted the mixed-gender nature of Korfball, physical blocking, holding and tackling are not permitted.
Of course, Jürgen Klopp is best known as the manager of Liverpool Football Club. Since his appointment at Anfield on October 8, 2015, Klopp has won six major trophies, including the Champions League, in 2018/19, and the Premier League, in 2019/20, and has been described, more than once, as the ‘best manager in football’.
Born in Stuttgart on June 16, 1967, Klopp signed for Fußball- und Sportverein (FSV) Mainz 05 in the summer of 1990 and spent the remainder of his playing career at the Rheinland-Pfalz club, initially as a forward and later as a defender. In February, 2001, with Mainz 05 lying second bottom in 2. Bundesliga, the second division of the Germany football league, Klopp, 33, was appointed manager, succeeding Eckhard Krautzun. At that stage, Managing Director Michael Kammerer said that he hoped that Klopp would ‘bring life back into the team’.
Klopp did exactly that, winning six of the next seven games and finishing the season on 40 points, thereby escaping relegation with a match to spare. All told, Klopp managed Mainz 05 for seven years, coming agonisingly close to promotion to the Bundesliga in both 2000/01 and 2001/02, before achieving that goal – for the first time in the history of the club – in 2003/04. Two eleventh-placed finishes followed, in 2004/05 and 2005/06, but Mainz 05 were relegated back to 2. Bundesliga. Klopp remained as manager in 2007/08 but, having narrowly missed promotion once again, resigned at the end of the season. Nevertheless, having joined Borussia Dortmund in May, 2008, Klopp won the Bundesliga twice, in 2010/11 and 2011/12.