feltmonkey

what's going on? it's like this set the old, passive Murray has returned. edit - oh my word he stepped it up in that Djokavic service game though! back on serve.

here we go then, Murray serving for the set. i'm not confident. both players are making hay on the other's serve. the tension and apparent fatigue might get to Murray. edit - and it was hilariously straightforward.

ok, there's definitely something weird going on with the line judges and umpire. there was an incident a couple of minutes ago where the umpire called the ball out and was ignored by everyone. the line judges have made a number of questionable calls, not favouring either player. Djokavic got away with one, but Murray was given an "ace" that was an inch or so wide. if the players weren't seemingly reluctant to use their challenges, the scoreline could be quite different. edit - what a hold that is! nerve-shredding. hopefully Murray can engineer another break from Djok's 0-30 here, as i don't fancy watching him trying to serve out for the set.

Murray is struggling to hold on to the breakthroughs he keeps creating. just broke Djokavic for the 2nd time and on his own serve is 0-30 with two double faults. he absolutely has to hold serve here.

that 25-shot rally a few minutes ago, at break point on Djokavic's serve - is it just me or did one of Djokavic's shots land a couple of inches out on the right sideline? the crowd reacted, but Murray played on, and the ball was called in. i guess it was probably an optical illusion. Murray needs to take one of these bloody break points.

i am tempted to buy the Mother-in-law a copy, just to see what happens.

this all sounds like fun, and i'd be sort of tempted to get myself a 3DS and join in, if it wasn't for the knowledge that you can only really play Animal Crossing extensively once. i played the first Gamecube AC to death. my wife, myself, and my wife's mother all shared a town. i still remember many of our town's inhabitants. there was Limburg and Hambo, two inseparable bullshitters, kind of like a couple of New York smartarses. due to their names, and the fact that they clearly came as a pair, they were generally referred to as Hamburg and Limbo. then there was the idiotic, infantile horse, Peaches. her house was full of the nursery set, and everything she said marked her out as a simpering simpleton. then there was the nice, likable dog, Daisy. oddly, Daisy had the same personality AI as Peaches, and yet we liked her and didn't like Peaches. you could probably do quite a revealing psychological study based on Animal Crossing, and how people react to the different characters. and of course there was the flamboyantly gay rhino, Rocko. Rocko tried to talk macho, but he was obviously compensating for something. the fact that he generally wore a pink tutu didn't help his halfhearted attempts to stay in the closet. and last but not least there was Friga, poor, poor Friga. the stuck-up bitch. Friga was a haughty penguin with an i'm-better-than-you attitude. she became a much-disliked figure in our village, always saying something bitchy and smug. she laboured under the misapprehension that we liked her, looked up to her even, despite us pointedly sending presents to every other inhabitant of the town apart from her. we started to play tricks on her, leaving traps outside her house for her to fall into, sending her terrible clothes, that sort of thing. my wife's Mum, however, took it further. much further. she would dig up Friga's flowers, dig traps for her every day, and then when Friga fell in them hang about near her so she couldn't get out. (they escape from the traps when you move far enough away for them to be off-screen.) she would follow Friga around hitting her with a bug-catching net until she had those little put-put-put angry bubbles coming out of her head. at this point she would repeatedly talk to her, winding her up further. she would trap her in her house by digging holes around her front door. she would send her hate-mail. yes, hate-mail. it's impossible, but it did seem that Friga became gradually changed by this campaign. she seemed less sure of herself, nervy and possibly depressed. she still said nasty things, but it seemed underneath she had started to understand that we hated her. then one day she didn't come out of her house. the village police department broke down her door to find Friga hanging in her living room, surrounded by all the hate mail she had been sent. ok, that last bit didn't happen. not in-game at least. you see, this is how you play Animal Crossing. it's a weird, fucked-up little world for you to inhabit, fill with your own psychosis, and make your own entertainment within. i sometimes see people complaining about "press A for Awesome" games. well Animal Crossing is a game in which no Awesome is going to happen, no matter how many times you press A. no Awesome, except that which you bring to the table yourself. do it. start a hate-campaign against one of your villagers today.

Baines is a good player though. i think it would be a very good signing. Evra has been in decline for a while, his strangely high goal tally last season just papered over the cracks in his overall game. the club seem to be losing faith with Fabio, and Buttner is never going to be good enough.

unlucky England. well played New Zealand. great match, don't feel too bad about losing a match like that.

i thought that at first, but on the replay, the high trajectory makes me think he might have been aiming for the bowlers end. shot, Stokes!

lmao beautiful scoop shot from Buttler!

yeah, it was a stunning catch. England's biggest problem is that Bopara tends to get out around this point. him and Luke Wright both have the same habit of playing great innings, but not being there at the end. we need a six or two here. target that short boundrey.

considering your last couple of Kiss of Death posts, i wish you hadn't said that, Sirloin.

i'm playing this at the moment too. not the PS+ version though, as i actually got the game for christmas. it had then sat in my stack until i started playing it, just before it arrived on PS+. never buy any games ever. the thing i'm finding most fun is to run around repeatedly pressing the punch button so Drake does a weird rampaging walk. try it!

i blame Ravern.

Buttler too now, and the fat lady is clearing her throat. a couple of jammy slogs are the only thing that can bring it back, but that's not going to happen on this pitch.

Bopara's followed him! defeat from the jaws of victory? nnng, we had this in the bag, and the guys who were winning it for us have got out to a lanky pie-thrower.

awesome try by George North!

i've fired up Rift again now the F2P is up and running. so far i've logged each character in, cleared out their mailbox and transferred them to a shard that isn't reserved for trial players. in the case of each character what i've done then is stare at the reset soul trees in bewilderment. i've not done any questing yet, but since returning, i have spent two and a half hours "playing" the game in this way. this is a hell of a complicated leveling system. it was probably my favorite thing about the game when i played it before, but going back in is kind of difficult. the cookie-cutter templates they give you are handy, but even then there's a lot to choose between. are there any decent guides online to designing your own soul templates? or good custom ones that other people have come up with? it almost seems like a waste to just use one they have put in the game.

ah, i thought it needed to be that the foot made contact with the ground behind the line, but your explanation does ring a bell, actually. either way, Broad's a lucky boy, as if he had no-balled, and Williamson had gone on to win the game for NZ... anyway, irrelevant now, as England have just won it.

that was a no-ball, wasn't it? slightly strange decision, not that i'm complaining! key wicket.

cracking game between New Zealand and Sri Lanka coming to a conclusion right now. NZ need 4, SL need 1 wicket. classic low-scoring game.

heheh interesting. and once you know it's a complete 'shop composite image, it becomes obvious when you look at it. where is Rooney's right arm supposed to be going? down RVP's shorts? weird that they took Anderson and Hernandez out though. i heard a theory that Hernandez is the player in the "player plus £65m" deal for Ronaldo.

before the Ireland match he had scored 6 in the last 5 England matches, you bellend.

anyone watching the cricket today? absolute peach of a delivery from Swann just now to dismiss Brownlie. edit - and he's done it again! same delivery, same result! different batsman, naturally.