Flintoff for Sports personality of the year

[Rachael]

Originally Posted by Henners

henman has been so close so many times, yet he misses out on wimbledon and everything else.

Henman hasn't a Major to his name.. but he has the next best thing.. meaning a Master's series title. He's also got a stunning record of consistency: folk in this country are obsessed with the big events... but just as Colin Montgomery's 7 consecutive Orders of Merit mark him out as the greatest European player of his generation (irrelevent of Majors) Henman's record of reaching the last eight in all but one of the last nine Wimbledon Championships is pretty much unparalleled... and his sustained presence at the top of the rankings is pretty stunning.

In terms of big wins... you're also talking about the guy who won the 2003 Paris Masters with a series of wins that, to my mind, is pretty much unparallelled:

Paris Masters Hard 1 Nikolay Davydenko W 6-3, 6-4
                                  2  Sebastien Grosjean W   3-6, 6-4, 7-5
                                  3  Gustavo Kuerten    W   6-4, 6-2
                                 QF  Roger Federer      W   7-6, 6-1
                                 SF  Andy Roddick       W   7-6, 7-6
                                  F  Andrei Pavel       W   6-2, 7-6, 7-6

Grosjean, Kuerten, Federer and Roddick in successive rounds before beating Pavel in the final: must rank amongst the toughest draws in the history of the sport. Awesome performance at a tournament so huge that it is in effect an extra "Grand Slam".

[flanflinger]

I would love a Cricketer to win the Sports Personality award, and for me there is no bigger personality than Freddie. So as Cricket fans lets hope he wins.

[Paoli]

Rach, why would you want him to win the French more. I seriously cannot understand more. Wimbledon's the epitome of the grand slam, the traditional one and you'd prefer to see him win the French?

Have a look at the French Open champs. Gustavo Kuerten- chump on other surfaces, Albert Costa- Distinctly ordinary player but I must say, Nadal has the makings of a great player. Still, why do you want him to win the French? Wouldn't every Brit like to see him do well at Wimbledon. I'd much rather Hewitt win the Aussie Open than the French or the US.

As for Henman being a great; nosense. And better than Owen, Scholes, Gerrard and Ferdinand. Don't insult me. Henman's never won a grand slam? Can you be a great without a grand slam? No. Even if Phil Mickleson comes runner up at another ten grand slam over his career, he wouldn't be known as a great if he hadn't of one a single major. Put it this way- Scholes was heavily involved in Man U's 1999 treble. Gerrard was heavily involved in arguably the greatest sporting comeback of 2005, Champions League Final. Owen has done countless things for the national team and for club sides. Ferninand's a joke, but there's one in every pack. The only thing Henman has going for him is he is a good serve-volleyer.

[Rachael]

Originally Posted by Paoli69

Rach, why would you want him to win the French more.

Clay is the surface for artists: if you want to see players working the angles, running througha full range of shots and using the entire court.... to say nothing of playing extended scraps.. that's the place to see it.

[greg]

I thought the award was for sports personality?

Henman has no personality

[greg]

My predictions would be
Personality - Flintoff
Team - England Cricket Team
Overseas - Tiger Woods or Roger Federer
Coach - Duncan Fletcher

Young Personality and Lifetime Achievement could be anybody.

As for a creditable rival to Flintoff i would say that the only one who would deserve it is the woman who has terminal cancer who did the New York marathon the other week.Is it Tomlinson?

[Oliver]

Originally Posted by Rachael

Can't we lobby for Shane Warne instead? He made Freddie look quite ordinary...

Except in the Test match where he batted with one arm to put England into a dominant position, making a hundred and having Warney applaud him off the pitch.

Flintoff didn't look very ordinary then.

But actually Warne did make some guys look ordinary, most of them were Australian.

[Oliver]

Originally Posted by Henners

"Strong candidates for the main award include cricketers Andrew Flintoff and Michael Vaughan, sailor Ellen MacArthur, athlete Paula Radcliffe, tennis player Andrew Murray and footballers Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and John Terry."

It's a good list isn't it?

Now without wishing to upset anyone unduly, I shall take it apart, bottom backwards.

John Terry (captain of a very boring Chelsea outfit, who screwed up severely when losing to a goal that didn't cross the line in the semifinals of the Eurpopean Champions (and runner's up and third and fourth places too) League. He is a must for England captain in the future, and one of the few remaining pre-Abramovic players at Chelsea - who also won their first Championship in fifty years.)

Frank Lampard (consistently excellent aggressive midfielder for Chelsea and England)

Steven Gerrard (inconsistent occasionally excellent scouser who captained Liverpool to triumph by dint of a goal that didn't cross the line in the "Champions" "League" semi-final before overcoming their final opposition on penalties... yawn, yawn, yawn). Well done Sepp Blatter, you've now truly ruined the "other" beautiful game.

Andrew Murray (rising tennis player, who hasn't won anything, but from a working class home is already more popular than "Gentleman" Tim Henman - not difficult)

Paula Radcliffe (famously failing Olympian, who mashes the opposition out of sight in "money" road races and even more famously took a leak, in the middle of this year's London marathon.)

Ellen MacArthur (very worthy of this award, as we do actually know something of her "personality" which cannot necessarily be said about many of the others, holder of the record for fastest circumnavigation of the globe, on a boat specifically built for the task with all the latest computer navigation software and a vast team of advisers ashore somewhere in (I don't know) France? Winner of the Vendee Globe round-the-world race.)

Michael Vaughan (captain of a team that peformed out of it's skin, for one glorious summer against the Australians before slipping back into the mire against a well drilled Pakistani outfit)

Andrew Flintoff (all-round champion and focal point of the team that performed out of it's skin to beat the Australians, less good v. Pakistan.)

I don't know, I might be tempted to go for Ms MacArthur. She is a consistent performer, and even the French love her. And it's quite hard to be loved by the French, particularly if you're English.

[Kirsty Harris]

Originally Posted by Oliver

Paula Radcliffe (famously failing Olympian, who mashes the opposition out of sight in "money" road races and even more famously took a leak, in the middle of this year's London marathon.)

I think you may have forgotten the gold medal that Paula Radcliffe won at this years World Championship's, the only gold GB won at that games.

I'm no huge Radcliffe fan (she reminds me a bit of a robot!!), but the Olympic defeat of last year was a one off fluke due to poor preperation, stupid timing of the race and the sadly unknown factor. Radcliffe is a remarkable athelete.

[Richie Benauds Love Child]

Not to bang on about hanman again, great he one the paris masters but it was in 2003 ! How is that relevent to a 2005 sports personality award ?