Monday, April 4, 2011

Oh God let me win…

but if I don’t win, let me make the other guy break the Olympic record.


I have a little book in which I write down intriguing quotes I come across. I read something today that I knew instantly should go into that little book.

I’ve been filling up the book for 12 years now, and I have a good collection of quotes in there. Many of the more inspiring and amusing ones come from the world of or related to sports.

I’m sure you’ll agree from the following…

*******

“Don’t count the days, make the days count.”
Mohammad Ali

“I was full of expectations for every single member of the team. Some of them lived up to those expectations, and the others exceeded them.”
Sam Torrence on winning the Golf Writers Trophy for 2002 for Europe’s 15 ½ - 12 ½ triumph over America in the Ryder Cup at the Belfry in September

“To use the old adage, the 31 year old looked capable of starting a fight in an empty room.”
A comment on Roy Keane

“What you achieve in life, echoes in eternity.”
Liverpool banner at the Cardiff Stadium during the Worthington Cup Final on 2 March 2003 where Liverpool beat Manchester United 2-0

“The difference between dreams and accomplishments is purely desire.”
World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE)

“Twenty years ago or so, I was walking through Harvard Square in Cambridge Massachusetts, and I walked past a huge poster in a window. The poster looked like a scene from Chariots of Fire, there was a chap in a 20s or 30s running costume, breasting a tape and across the top it had a very American motto. It said ‘Oh God let me win.’ I sympathise. And across the bottom, it said ‘but if I don’t win, let me make the other guy break the Olympic record’.

He did that, didn’t he?”
David Davis, in his speech after losing the election to be Conservative Party leader to David Cameron, December 2005

“I never predict anything, and I never will.”
Paul Gascoigne

“A man who someday no doubt will orchestrate a hostile takeover of hell once he gets there.”
Jim Ross, WWE Announcer, on Vince McMahon, WWE Chairman, at Summer Slam 2006

“That day in March 1996 when you married her in this church, you won the greatest trophy of your life.”
Rev. Jim Frazer to Darren Clarke, European Ryder Cup player, who lost his wife to cancer in August 2006

“If I wanted to have an easy job I would have stayed at FC Porto – beautiful blue chair, the UEFA Champions League trophy, God, and after God, me.”
Jose Mourinho, Chelsea manager

“There’s never been a guy who has more fight in his heart and grit in his soul, he wears scars like badges of honour, he smells like smoke ‘cause he’s been through fire and dammit this is where he’s home and that’s in battle.”
John Bradshaw Layfield on the Undertaker (before his match against Batista) at Wrestlemania 23

“Any Champions League semi-final defeat is a killer but to lose in a penalty shootout is death by a thousand cuts.”
The Sun, after Liverpool beat Chelsea 4-1 on penalties on 1 May 2007 (the tie finished 1-1 on aggregate)

“I want to at least be in a position where I’m able to win.”
Michael Schumacher

“We used to try and prove people wrong – but now we’re proving them right.”
Alex McLeish, Scotland coach, after Scotland beat Ukraine 3-1 at Hampden Park in a Euro 2008 qualifier on 13 October 2007

“I wouldn’t say I was the best manager in the business but I was in the top one.”
Brian Clough, Football Manager (1935-2004) – my personal favourite!

“Occasionally, the train goes past and you must catch it because it will never come back, and that’s true even when it is passing at an inopportune moment.”
Juande Ramos, quoting an old saying, on the night he quit as Sevilla manager for Tottenham Hotspur

“I’m the best there is, the best there was and the best there ever will be.”
Bret Hart of the WWE

“I was the equivalent of the first man on the Moon. He’s the equivalent of the first on Mars.”
Mark Spitz, winner of 7 gold medals at the 1992 Munich Olympics, on Michael Phelps’ 8 gold medals at Beijing 2008

"He has carried the burden of the nation for 21 years so it's time we carried him on our shoulders."
India batsman Virat Kohli summing up the feelings of a grateful nation, when they hoisted Sachin Tendulkar on to their shoulders and carried him around for a lap of honour at Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai after India beat Sri Lanka in the final of the 2011 Cricket World Cup Final