You guys would know I am an avid Hockey fan, Ice Hockey that is, from the early days of me catching glimpses of the Red Wings playing with Yzerman, Federov and Hasek on ESPN, I have always been intrigued by the sport and follow it more because of the massive hits dished out on a regular basis, its like Football with the hard tacking of Rugby.
Often I troll about the internet searching for various clips of hockey, best plays, best dekes, best saves etc. To my surprise I found this list with the title "TSN Sportscentre Top 10 Shootout goals", for a minute I thought, the spelling is incorrect, its "SportsCENTER" like the Indian version we get on ESPN, which again is not even close to the awesomeness of the few American editions I had seen ( a throw back to the 2000's, when between 2 -3 PM every weekday the American sportscenter would be on air, I got my daily fix of hockey, NBA etc from that). This Sportscentre in fact was the one which airs on TSN, a channel in Canada , its their flagship program so it basically is run around 10 hours a day , everyday , like CID for Sony in India.
Even before the countdown/top 10 started, they had the presenters make a few jokes on themselves and others, Jay Onrait and Dan O'Toole, these two gentlemen have taken presentation to a whole new level, the madness and the quirkiness is expected from most Sportscenter's but this CenTRE was totally off the hook.
So for the past 4-5 days all I have done in my past time is watch their unlimited videos on youtube, they even have a top 10 Jay Dan segment where they poke fun at the Coyotes, Maple Leafs head coach, Thanksgiving, random Red Wing mascot who was holding up play, nothing is off hands for them, they have a go at it all, even Jay mailed Dan's wife to ask if she watched the show or not and the reply was broadcast on air, no one in the Indian media can even think of doing such crazy hilarious things on live TV. Unfortunately I may be one of the few thousand in India who tries to keep up with hockey, TSN is primarily a hockey channel with a few splurts of the NBA and the BPL.
Plus the guys at TSN seem to be decent enough to give people a chance, MrLogue was this guy who would post a lot of the top 10 videos on youtube but recently his account was blocked and removed since all the videos were "copyright infringements" so with all the backlash and anger online, TSN HIRED HIM!!!!, he is now part of the crew who uploads the Top 10 legally.
I just wish I was in Canada to be able to witness this show regularly, for now I would just have to do with the clips on youtube, damn I could have actually worked at TSN if I did some copyright infringement myself.
Oh well, here is a glimpse of what I was talking about, Jay and Dan, funny on tv personified.
If you are watching TSN, you got love here in Calcutta, give me a chance as well to work with this awesome team!
Apologies to all the readers of my fantastic blog, that is for the 5 people I know who try to follow what I have to say, so thanks for that.
I haven't updated my blog in a while, call it the curse of work which literally destroys any so called work life balance, or lack of it, makes me go nuts just thinking of the ton of work we all or at least I end up doing but none of that for now, I need to put this out now.
Twas Valentines day 24 hours back and while half the world was trying to prove their love or show that they remembered it, I was here as usual forever alone, well not alone actually, I had my ps3 waiting for the glorious weekend to start but then again I had the same plan last week and baam all that went for a toss with a ton of work during the weekend, fair enough, I have football, right?
Not really, my following of football, well every sport has drastically been cut, thanks to work and well my own need for some r & r , gone are the days where I would be awake till 3 AM watching Osasuna Vs Espanyol, just for the heck of it. Those glorious days of me knowing and naming at least 15 players per Premier League club, gone. Champs league games to watch, to be fair I have not watched ONE champions league match in the last 14 months.
The emptyness of football is growing larger within me, I may never have been the go to guy for football knowledge but I knew about most new kids on the block and what clubs they play for , positions etc, all that is just a fading distant memory of what I used to be and what I am now, thinking half the time about what scheme to run and what promo can I use. True that is a requirement in the current capacity but certainly football should be in my mind, if a guy would think about sex every 20 seconds, well I would or at least used to think about why Torres was sucking so much post his major injury (2010 ) or how the hell can Etoo make so much douhg for Anzhi and how would they run the club at all , paying such huge wages.
Work was supposed to be freedom from the shackles of constant college and tension, studies, exams etc, where I would make dough and just live, away from all inhibitions and just enjoy life as it comes, who would have thought I would have to give up this much for something that is a trivial thing in more developed nations.
Someday, sometime in the future, I sure hope I can be with it again, this may not be the best time but we will have better days.
Football, thou are still there to make me smile during those awful days , may you never go away, I will be back. I know it.
