As if winning Euro 2004 and hosting the Olympics isn’t enough, the Greek national rugby league team beat the VRL 24-18 on Sunday. That’s the Victorian Rugby League. It was the early game to the Melbourne-Canterbury NRL fixture. For Greece, the game was a warmup for their big international clash with Italy on October 2 at Marconi Stadium, Fairfield. Which, I presume, is an Italian home game.

Newtown went down to Canterbury reserve grade 28-38 in the Premier League at Henson Park on Saturday. I would have been there except for the fact that I was recovering from a virus and had no voice (still don’t, actually). The Jets are now in ninth place with two away games (Cronulla and Manly) to play. Touch and go whether they will make the eight.

In the Jim Beam, Newtown lost to Ryde-Eastwood 20-22. They’re 10th in an eleven-team competition.

In England, National League Division Two: Gateshead Thunder 8, Workington 80 in front of 958 people. Ouch.

Cricket: Surrey drew with Kent. They can just about forget the Championship this year.

Rugby Union: Wobblies lost to South Africa 19-23. SA’s first tri-nations crown since 1998. Petersham lost to Campbelltown 12-53 in the Sydney Suburban RU Division 2 1st Grade. That’s their season finished.

Soccer: Crystal Palace 1 Everton 3. The Palace are 20th in the Premiership after two games. My fiver on them to take the title at 5000-1 is looking shaky. Still a week till La Liga begins.

Second last weekend of the NSW Winter Super League. Fraser Park Dragons beat the Hurstville City Minotaurs 2-1, Stanmore Hawks beat Ryde City 4-2. Manly have secured the minor premiership, Stanmore will be second. The Dragons are hovering around fourth and finish the league season at home to Macarthur next Sunday. (One day I’ll get to a game.) Womens SuperLeague grand final, Marconi Stallions beat Macarthur Rams 3-2 with an extra time golden goal. (How can two women’s teams be called Stallions and Rams?)

Australian Rules: Essendon lost to Sydney in the Marn Grook at Stadium Australia on Saturday night. This fixture used to be an annual gig for Di and I, but we haven’t been since Adara has been born. Maybe next year. In the Sydney AFL, the North Shore Bombers beat the East Coast Eagles and are runaway minor premiers (16-2). They meet Uni of NSW at Henson Park (!) next Saturday in the major semi. St George play Pennant Hills in the minor semi at the same ground on Sunday (sacrilege!). SWAFL: Wests beat Sydney Uni 5-16 to 4-2 in the preliminary final. Grand final next Saturday, Newtown v Wests at Wagener Oval at midday. Guess we won’t be going to that one.

Hurling: Nothing to report till the All-Ireland Final at Croke Park on September 12 between Cork and Kilkenny.

Camogie: All-Ireland semi-finals on Saturday: Cork 3-9 beat Galway 1-4 and Tipperary 1-10 beat Wexford 2-5. Final at Croke Park on September 19.

Baseball: Holroyd beat Petersham 8-2 in the Sydney Winter Baseball League preliminary final and will play Cronulla in the grand final at Petersham Oval next Sunday. The Little League World Series has begun in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, with the championship game on August 29. I’m cheering for the Caribbean representatives, the Pabao Little League of Curacao in the Netherlands Antilles, who have already won their first game against Guadalupe Linda Vista Little League from Mexico.

Lacrosse: The Philadelphia Barrage are the 2004 Major League Lacrosse champions after defeating the Boston Cannons in the Championship game in Boston on Sunday.

Sunday was the 100th anniversary of the birth of Deng Xiaoping. Comrade Deng was “a great proletarian revolutionary [and] statesman,” President Hu Jintao told revellers at the Great Hall of the People, “a long-tested Communist fighter, the chief architect of China’s socialist reform, opening-up and modernization drive”.

Hu told the gathering of prospective Beijing 2008 volunteers that the day’s commemoration would “further inspire the whole Party and nation to push forward the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics”.

Socialism. Olympics. Oxymoron. See you in four years time, Hu.

The Chinese olympic team celebrated their beloved late Comrade’s 100th by winning three more gold medals to take their total thus far to 22. Teng Haibin won the men’s pommel horse, Jia Zhanbo won the men’s 50m three positions rifle shooting, and Zhang Yining won the table tennis women’s singles.

But How’s This For Spooky? Zhang’s victory was the 100th Olympic gold medal in the history of the People’s Republic of China. And on Deng Xiaoping’s 100th birthday! Wooooooooo…. (Here’s a list of China’s 100 gold medallists, compiled by the Xinhua News Agency.)

All I can say is:

Let a hundred flowers bloom:
let a hundred schools of thought contend.
- Mao Zedong.

Curiously, China’s most successful sport at the Olympics has been diving, where they have won seventeen gold since their entry to the Games in 1984. One that they didn’t pick up in Athens was the women’s 10 metre platform. Loudy Tourky was the Australian most likely in this event, but it was Chantelle Newbery who came away the winner. She was Australia’s first diving gold medallist since Dick Eve won the high dive at Paris 1924. Read Caroline Wilson’s report for The Age.

Khuloud Tourky, to give her correct name, is a Palestinian by heritage who was born in Haifa. See this rather sour piece from the August 2002 edition of “The Review”, the monthly journal of the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council.

Speaking of Palestine, Raad Aweisat finished third in a heat of three competitors in the men’s 100 butterfly with a time of 1:01.60. Sanna Abubkheet came seventh out of seven to finish her heat of the 800 metres on the track on Friday with a time of 2:32.10, 25 seconds behind the sixth-placegetter.

Coming up in Day 9 Part 2: Timor Leste, Great Moments In Choking, and the War on Error .