Third: Satellite
Second: Magneto
Winner: Canta

Judge Russell Brown said Canta was the clear winner. He praised the bold, simple design and use of colour and appreciated the small touches like the ‘Last 7 Days’ panel in the news section. A smart, well-kept website with a distinctive look.

Best Headline

Third: Canta
Second: Critic
Winner: Magneto—”Can you manage a trois?”

Judge Jim Curran said he’d unhesitatingly plagiarise Magneto’s headline. Extremely clever word play, guaranteed to pull the reader into the story. An instant smile of a headline.

Best Cartoonist

Third: Stephan Gillan, Critic
Second: William Sainsbury, Chaff
Winner: Sam Northcott, Salient

Judge Al Nisbet said Sam’s hand drawings were fresh and energetic. They were well layed out, with slightly manic themes – not to mention Al found himself smiling at them.

Best Original Photography

Third: Critic
Winner – first equal: InUnison and Sarah Burton, Magneto

Judge Mark Taylor said InUnison’s images were fun with clear lighting. Magneto’s entry was a great selection of studio shots.

Best Sports Writer

Third: Angela McGuigan, Magneto
Winner – first equal: Sebastian Boyle, Canta and Liam Mitchell, Craccum

Judge Steve Kilgallon says Liam’s entry demonstrated he has a good writing style and he covered an interesting range of topics. He says Sebastian made the effort to go and talk to people and find a real story on his own patch of direct relevance to readers.

Best Education Series

Third: Chaff
Second: Salient
Winner: Critic

Judge Nicola Kean said Critic was the clear winner. Critic tackled a complicated, important issue and did so with wit and style. The entry was engaging and interesting, full of dirt and scandal.

Best Humour

Second equal: The Rt Hon Winston Peters, Chaff and Spencer Dowson, Craccum
Winner: Brendan Kelly, Debate

Judge John Ong said Brendan writes punchy, clever and dark satire. It’s well paced and tightly written, which means it isn’t plagued with utter banality.

Best Reviewer

Third: Tom Ainge-Roy, Critic
Second: Adam Goodall, Salient
Winner: Richard Swainson, Nexus

Judge Margaret Agnew said Richard’s entries showed he was fantastically film literate. Although a little verbose, he has a nice overall reviewing style.

Best Columnist

Third equal: Harry Caldicott and Jim Wilson, Chaff and Saraid Cameron, InUnison
Second: Mrs John Wilmot, Critic
Winner: David Farrier, Craccum

Judge David Slack says David Farrier writes with verve, imagination and punch – like he’s thrown a party in a column.

Best Cover

Third: Nexus
Second: Critic
Winner: InUnison

Judge William Chen said of the 33 covers submitted, the the standout “What’s Your Carbon Footprint?” set the In Unison portfolio apart. This clever concept took centre stage, its handwritten masthead and cover lines mimicking the topic in slightly smudged charcoal lettering – a creative twist on a hotly debated issue to pique the interest via a fiery footprint. The strikingly topical “Sins” and “Guilty Pleasures” also impressed, with the whimsical and anecdotal humour of the latter punctuating the cover design. All three entries fulfilled the basic tenets of an effective cover.

Best Editorial Writer

Third: Art Robinson, Nexus
Second: Sebastian Boyle, Canta
Winner: William Muirhead, Chaff

Judge James Robinson said William’s editorials were a foot above the rest. They were well thought out, well researched well articulated and well organised. James felt like he was being told something concrete that even if he didn’t agree he could still appreciate the perspective.

Best News Writer (Unpaid)

Second equal: Vaughan Alderson, Debate and Stella Blake-Kelly, Salient
Winner: Teuila Fuatai, Critic

Judge Keith Ng said Teuila’s entry set the most consistent standard. She had obviously put time and effort in to her piece on a fatal assault at a McDonalds. In other entries, she showed humour and solid news judgement.

Best News Writer (Paid)

Third: Sebastian Boyle, Canta
Second: Matt Shand, Magneto
Winner: Gregor Whyte, Critic

Judge Graeme Baker said Gregor dealt with important issues in a clear and thorough manner, while allowing for humour. Gregor’s copy was tailored to its audience in both subject and tone. The entry was entertaining, educating and informative – Gregor’s writing style would easily fit into the pages of the Herald.

Best Feature Writer

Third: Sebastian Boyle, Canta
Second: Matt Shand, Magneto
Winner: Charlotte Greenfield, Critic

Judge Tim Watkin said that Charlotte’s features were above all else credible stories that offer a range of voices on a wide variety of subjects, subjects that will interest her readers. She does the basics well. The stories are local – even the one that isn’t – and tells the reader things they don’t already know. Importantly, the facts are accurate and the opinions well attributed.

Best Feature

Third equal: Jess Bignell, Chaff and Craig Robertson, Craccum
Second: Elle Hunt, Salient
Winner: Dr Z, Critic.

Judge Donna Chisholm said she didn’t want to like Critic’s entry, but it got her in the end. It’s not a new idea, but Dr Z delivered the story of his wasted weekend with real panache that lifted it from run-of-the-mill first person piece to the seriously funny. Perfectly pitched. And nutmeg – who knew?

Best Design

Third equal: Salient and Craccum
Second: Magneto
Winner: InUnison

Judge Sally Fullam says InUnison is a very professional, cohesive, well-designed magazine. There is a very high standard of photography, lovely use of illustration and beautiful, original and playful typography throughout this magazine. There is excellent attention to detail – the creative use of fonts, drop caps and pull quotes. The use of colour is nicely juxtaposed against white space. Designer, Mark Lovatt and his team of contributors should be very proud of their achievements.

Best Small Publication

Third: InUnison
Second: Magneto
Winner: Canta

Best Publication

Second equal: Critic and Magneto

The winner of the best publication award for 2011 is: Salient.

Judge Simon Wilson says Salient is witty, intensely self-involved in a rather endearingly self-deprecatory way.

Judge Jackson Wood says Salient is a humming magazine which has by far the best balance of news, features, humour, students’ association garbage and everything that makes up the quintessential student rag.

The design pops. 
On the cover every week it says “the organ of student opinion” and judging from the diverse array of content and debate on the letters pages it is fulfilling that role.

Pumpkin, Beetroot, potato and cottage cheese pie

So I had all of the above ingredients, with a hefty helping of pastry from Cafe Mamba, a cafe in the CBD that seem to love me enough to donate rad stuff to the family now and then. I don’t like cottage cheese. I don’t use cottage cheese. It was inexplicably in the fridge, so I figured why not add it to stuff and hope for the best.

• 1 beetroot, cut into 2cm cubes
• ¼ pumpkin, cut into 2cm cubes
• 1tbsp cinnamon
• 1tbsp salt
• 1tbsp ginger
• 2tbsp oil

Toss the above together and roast until fully cooked. Put into a blender with a 250g container of cottage cheese, pepper, and salt to taste. It will taste odd, and rich. Like it would taste good in exceptionally small quantities.

• 5 small potatoes, cut into 2cm cubes
• About 300g savoury pastry (the stuff I get is flaky and not really designed for pies, but tastes so much better)

Boil the potatoes until just tender, and mix into the pumpkin/beet puree. Roll out the pastry to about 3mm thick, and use it to line a pie dish. Save a bit to chuck on top. Add the potato mix on top of the pastry, then the last bit of pastry on top, and cook at 180 degrees until the pastry on top is browned and the sides of the pie pastry are starting to crisp.

The pie filling will be bright red and eating it will mess with your head a bit, because it looks like a sweet pie. Enjoy

Firstly, accept that your hair will need bleach. I’d say bleach it about 2 shades lighter than your hair colour, and no more unless going white. Why? Because you have to deal with upkeep and regrowth – if you lighten it any more, it will only take 2 weeks before your hair is obviously in need of dyeing, and dyeing that often is bad for it and completely unnecessary.

If your hair is naturally black, or you don’t take the above advice, consider dyeing patches instead of the whole head – e.g. the middle section in a band from above your ear to just below it, or dyeing your hair a tamer colour all over, then dyeing patches of extreme colour over the top in big sections.

Try to choose colour based on the assumption it will be about two shades darker than it looks in tube. Yes, your hair will lighten to the colour it appears in-tube, but it will do so unevenly and by the time that happens, it’ll need a re-dye. You will need about 1/4 of a tube left over, so if you have a lot of hair, you may need more tubes than initially assumed.

Bleach can be any blonde hair dye. For your extreme dye, I’d recommend one of:

Fudge - my favourite, especially because if you get rained on in town the colour doesn’t run all over your clothes! But their red selection is a bit crap, in my opinion. Also, Fudge doesn’t fade too badly and I’ve used it years at a time with no unpleasantness.
Directions - Stay out of the rain. Really wicked colours and probably best looking if you really keep on top of upkeep. But after 8 months or so of use, the colour didn’t hold well anymore, so I personally won’t touch it. Also, this one will rub off on clothes/bedding.
Special Effects – I’d say avoid rain, but it isn’t too bad. Can be pretty cruel to anything the dye touches in terms of removal. Colours are pretty cool. Fades pretty heavily the first week or so, which can be a pain if you really thought through your colour and got it ‘just right’.

If you have an inside day or can wear a big hat, start the process. You need at least 6hrs with colour dye in your hair. This is a long time. Consider covering your bed in towels and letting it dye overnight. 

1. Bleach hair. Look at shade. Accept your hair colour will not be magically lighter than this shade!

2. Moisturise with an especially oily moisturiser around your hairline, over ears, down back of neck.

3. Apply dye. If doing more than one colour, think through your order of dyeing. I do it all at once, but can only get away with this because I don’t do dissimilar colours.

4. Put hair in a comfortable position and wrap with gladwrap, leave about an hour, then after this unless sleeping you can usually comb and style hair, wipe off excess barrier cream and go about a day which doesn’t involve people touching your hair.

5. After a good 6+ hrs, shower and wash it all out- the water may never run completely clear but make sure as much residue as possible is out of your hair.
 
Upkeep

Don’t wash your hair daily, it’s so bad for it. Try weekly, or every 3-4 days.
When washing hair, use as cool water as you can stand.
When showering and not washing hair, wear a shower cap. This makes an enormous difference.
Add dye to your conditioner bottle. Somewhere between a quarter and a fifth of your conditioner should be dye.
Use leave-in conditioner or do similar lovely things to your hair so it stays healthy.
Look at the back of your head to determine if your hair is fading too much, not the front, as the back/sides fade much faster.
Redye every 3-5 weeks. You should be good enough at looking after your hair because of regrowth, not because of colour fade.
Treat different colour sections separately in everything you do to avoid muddying colours.

Once you know how to do it, it’s easy. It’s just learning how to make small changes.

Don’t open with a pickup line. You shouldn’t need, or use, a pickup line. The aim of a pickup line is to get someone you don’t even know to sleep with you, which is transparent and not particularly classy. If you are genuinely that single minded, try to see a non-sexual conversation as getting to know the person for basic reasons such as where they live, the likelihood that they will have a disease, whether you will be compatible and have the same intentions. Starting out with the implication that sleeping with them is your sole focus is offensive and degrading. Have a conversation. Enjoy casual flirting and the fun of the chase. That’s what people like. Being put on the spot is uncomfortable and intimidating.

Have no expectations. If you spend money or time on someone, you can’t view this as their ‘owing’ you anything. You have chosen to spend that time and money, so unless they have explicitly discussed expectations with you, you cannot place unwelcome expectations on them. For the same reason, be very wary of people expecting you to purchase them a drink early on- they are likely to ‘pay’ for it by spending a short amount of time with you, and then bugger off. Viewing interactions with people as transactions will only bring similarly minded people into your life, as opposed to people who want to see you because they like you.

Watch where your eyes are when conversation lulls. The single most offputting, upsetting thing (as a woman, I don’t know about men) to deal with when in the presence of someone you don’t know well is prolonged eye contact with no conversation. Unless faces are being pulled, prolonged eye contact often leaves your face frozen in a slightly off-putting, uncomfortable expression. Unless the person you’re talking to really likes you in a romantic way, they will glance all over your face, picking up every flaw that they dislike, and then look away. You will make them feel uncomfortable in your presence and they will struggle to understand your intentions. If you aren’t actively talking to someone, don’t stare into their eyes; if you find yourself staring into their eyes and aren’t about to lean in for a kiss, shrug it off by giving a bit of a laugh. This can also force the conversation into avenues you want to pursue, with little compliments when they ask why you’re laughing.

Don’t bounce from one person to another, trying your luck. In any situation, be it a party, lecture theatre, bar or casual hangout, if you are trying to get someone to like you romantically, other people will pick up on the vibes. Upon testing the waters and giving up, the best thing to do is remain the life of the party- you’re there to have some fun, try to at least pretend getting laid is not the end goal. Making it apparent that you are out to find a partner will severely limit your options- noone likes to be second best, or have others looking at them as if they are. Further, people uninvolved in your interactions will quickly label you with concepts which are not enjoyable. I have no objection to people (safely) having as many sexual partners as they please, but being known as the person who will try it on with anyone that will talk to them will quickly erode the likelihood of any genuine connections… or getting laid.

• If you don’t like something, work out why. Is it the texture (too crunchy/soft/firm), awkward to eat, does it remind you of a bad food memory (like the taste reminds you of that time you vomited black bean noodle?), are you aware that there’s something wrong with the food (when preparing it, you dropped a bit on the floor and put it back in, so you keep thinking you can taste hair…), or, a common one – is it too hot or cold?
• Have a fallback for your meals. If you made a crappy pasta sauce, try adding tomato or barbecue sauce to it. If your veggies are too dull and bland, try tossing them in grated cheese, breadcrumbs, a spot of melted butter, salt and pepper, and some crushed garlic (in any combination, but I do all at once and chuck it under the grill for a few minutes). If you bake a cake, think through ways to keep it interesting – like heated with ice-cream for dessert, when it gets a bit dry. In general, if something isn’t tasty enough, try it with something which will add a bit of salt or sugar to it.
• When cooking a meal, ensure that there is at least one vegetable which you know you’ll scoff down. For instance, in a stir fry you can add mushrooms, mini corn cobs (buy them canned), etc.. Or, if a meal is predominantly vegetables, eg baked potatoes, chop up some nuts or meat (something you’ll really enjoy getting to), to motivate your serving size.
• Look at things you can have with your meal that will help you eat the boring bits. Some people always have buttered bread handy (lasagna sandwiches are the best), and if you make sandwiches you can add salad to them and be healthier. Some people like mashed potato, and mix it all up.. it’s about finding what works.
• Mashed potato is great for hiding things in. For every three spoons of potato, you can hide in about one spoon of mashed broccoli. Also, if you hate baked beans and need a cheap protein source, mash baked beans up with potato and it’s delicious.
• Generally, spreads or sauces aren’t the best for you. Hummus, even, is high fat (and often high salt), so really get into reading the packet before you buy. What spreads and sauces are good for, however, is enticing you to eat boring things. This only works if they taste good with whatever you’re eating.
• If you need to eat, but aren’t hungry, get involved with preparing your meal. Get excited about your food. Think about what you’ll drink with it and get that ready too. If possible, cook it in a frying pan and smell it cooking – even reheated food. See if there’s anyone around to share it with. You’ll find yourself snacking on it before it hits the plate.

The biggest hurdle to eating often, well, and healthily, is pressure. Make it a joy to explore your tastes, ignore everything but your health, and you’ll do fine.

The official line from the International Energy Agency is that restraining global warming to 2^OC is now nothing but a pipe dream. 4^OC of warming seems realistic, on current trends. And that’s pretty bad news – most people agree that this would lead to huge disruptions in lifestyle and food supply for billions of people, and to ‘conflict.’ (Read: war.)

This is usually the part of the article where I start to say something conciliatory or to give another point of view, and I have to admit that this time it was a bit of a struggle – at the outset it looks pretty comprehensively negative. What I came up with in the end is this: It seems certain that human society will change dramatically in the next ten or twenty years. Either we change our energy use patterns a lot, until eventually a sustainable point is reached, or we could do nothing and simply wait for the catastrophic crop failures, sea levels rising and subsequent war. In both cases, at the end of the day we have to change the way we live.

And here’s the thing – the new society could be better. It could potentially be the case that after the dust settles, we live in a more peaceful and plentiful world than before. There are a lot of myths about climate change. It won’t destroy the Earth… our planet is a lot more resilient than that. It won’t kill all the humans either, or all the animals, although it will in all likelihood cause the extinction of a huge number of species. It won’t even necessarily result in a more meagre existence for those humans that survive. What it will do to humans is be hugely disruptive – which is a pretty gentle way of saying famine, pestilence and warfare.

I suppose, given that scenario, the best we might hope for is that the change in our society and in our climate comes gradually rather than suddenly. It’s not unthinkable that this might come about… human society (or at least Western society) has been pretty successful in reinventing itself on roughly a thirty year time frame for the last century or so, so who knows? Maybe this change might not be such a challenge as we thought it would be.

So what does it mean for you? I don’t recommend any more that you think about measures to stop climate change – I don’t think that it can be done. Think instead about measures to slow climate change, as slowing the changes in our environment is still a valuable task. There needs to be a realisation that we will have to adapt to a new environment, even as we implement measures to slow its coming. There need to be plans to live in the new hotter world, because it seems like that is the only option left. So ask your local MP or your local scientist – what is New Zealand’s plan for living in a post climate-change world? (Hint – NZ doesn’t have one yet.)

Bit of a downer of a column I guess, but one can’t ignore the evidence, and it’s better to plan for unpleasant parts of the future than to live in denial of them.

There has always been scepticism surrounding Lance Armstrong and his famous seven Tour de France victories. He is one of the most tested men in the history of sport and yet until just recently there has been no damning evidence against him. That was until former teammate Tyler Hamilton was forced to testify to a grand jury about Lance Armstrong and his link with the performance enhancing drug EPO which is a human blood-cell that can be taken out of someone and then put back in later to increase red blood-cell production. He then proceeded to be interviewed on 60 Minutes where he categorically stated that he had witnessed Lance Armstrong inject himself with EPO during the Tour de Suisse in the same year that he won the Tour de France.

Now Tyler Hamilton is a drug-cheat himself, and many drug-cheats have also accused Armstrong including disgraced Tour de France winner Floyd Landis. Typically the public do not readily trust these people and so Armstrong and his ‘no positive tests’ have been trusted by the public. But this time, Hamilton is not only telling his story to the Press put also to a grand jury. It is also thought that the clean George Hincapie has also given evidence which could be damning to Armstrong’s cause.

Now this would be a great shame on the sport of cycling if this ends up being true, especially as it is now suspected that positive tests on Armstrong were covered up by the governing body. So where would cycling go from here? Would this be the final nail in the sport’s coffin or could it mean the legal introduction of performance enhancing drugs into sport?

There are a number of arguments for and against drugs in sport and it would seem that with every new scandal you have to lean slightly more towards the ‘for’ side when it comes to cycling. There are so many drug-cheats and they all have the same excuse “well everyone else was doing it, so we just wanted to level the playing field”. It would almost seem now that just letting everyone utilise performance enhancing drugs would level the playing field in cycling. Because there sure isn’t a level one at the moment, assuming that everyone isn’t already cheating.

Another argument for drugs in sport is that it would allow people to witness humans at their fastest, strongest, most elite levels. Imagine how fast someone could run the 100m and all the home-runs we would see like in early 2000s baseball. And we might think the Tour de France was pathetic if we saw people struggle up hills once again if there were no drugs in sport.

But is this really what we want? Moving forward, it may seem impractical to not allow drugs into sport because we will never see a fair, level playing field. But surely we have a responsibility to at least try and keep drugs out of sport. Because for me, drugs and sport cannot co-exist within a model where the integrity of sport is paramount. I do not want to see people running fast because they have taken a whole lot of drugs; I want to see the natural height of human accomplishment.

It will be a shame to see such a great man like Armstrong brought down because of doping. The way he defeated cancer, triumphed in adversity, and has used his profile for the greater human good with the creation of the charity Livestrong, is the absolute embodiment of what people love about sport. However, this will mar his integrity just as he will have devastated the integrity of sport. It is essential, if Armstrong is found guilty of blood-doping, that sport and drug institutions utilise the profile of this devastating truth to try and enhance the anti-doping cause. I for one do not want to see another champion embroiled in drug controversy. We don’t need any more Marion Joneses and Floyd Landises. We need true champions.

Sport of course has universal importance and attraction, but one of the special things about it is also the personal relationship we have it. This relationship differs from one fan to another and can be highly individualised and have myriad personal intricacies that only that specific person can understand. For me, I do not believe that I am obsessive about sport, but I might be close.

I read the ESPN football pages every day, I check the MLB and NBA scores constantly throughout the day and could tell you the win-loss record of the teams in the AL East, the approximate batting averages and pitchers ERAs for the Boston Red Sox, I also scrutinise cricket scorecards on cricinfo.com, until recently had my fantasy football team to manage and finally will check the potential All Blacks injury count after a weekend of Super 15 rugby. But I’m sure most people do that.

The reason my head is in this place is that lately I have been reading Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby which is essentially the quintessential book about sport fandom. Highly recommended as a much better source of sports writing than this blog. It made me think: what would I give up for sport? If I were ever lucky enough to get married, well the wedding could never on the day of the Champions League Final; if I ever manage to have children, then I would have to make sure the baby wasn’t conceived nine months before a Rugby World Cup Final… or any All Blacks game for that matter.

Perhaps with these two sporting events some would sympathise and understand that these are occasions not to be missed. But this morning I also woke up at 6am to watch a friendly testimonial football match for Gary Neville that had absolutely no bearing on anything whatsoever, other than a farewell to a player whose best days have passed and who I never saw play that much during his career. Surely that game would have been easy to give up? Surely I watched it simply because I had nothing else to do at 6 on a Wednesday morning. But I am not too sure. I wouldn’t have missed my own child’s birth for it, but it was still important to me.

That is how you measure a true sports fan. One that is ready to wake up at any time of the night in order to watch the meaningless games, so that the meaningful ones are even more so because you deserve to watch them. You have done the hard yards and so you are worthy. And this week I am worthy of the Champions League Final. Manchester United vs Barcelona at Wembley Stadium. Another page of history will be made, and I will be there to see it written. Majesty will be on show. The two best clubs on the planet will come head to head. And they will embody the beauty of sport. Just you wait and see.

Any scientist worth their salt will avoid pronouncing something to be absolutely true[1], and what we get instead are statements like those above. Understandably, this seems strange to some people. It’s not the way that people talk in casual conversation, after all. It sounds as if they have something to hide! Often this is interpreted by the public as being a sign that scientists aren’t really sure about what they are saying. Some people of malicious intent will then insist loudly that any findings of researchers that might impact them negatively cannot be trusted. Examples include climate change deniers (‘so there’s no need to use less oil!’) and politicians (‘no, 90% of New Zealand’s lowland waterways are not polluted!). A scientist might say that a particular aeroplane design has a failure rate in turbulence of one in ten to the eight. What they mean is: the plane won’t fail. I would like to explain in this column why scientists talk this way, and why it is necessary for them to keep doing so.

Now, in most cases I am a strong advocate of scientists exercising humility and being themselves the ones responsible for communicating clearly with the public. But this is one mode of speech which I believe that scientists must not stop using, even though it can be difficult to understand, and I’ll explain why. It takes a wee while to explain, so bear with me.

The source of this turn of phrase is a curious quirk of the scientific method. Science is our best tool for finding out what is fact, but it is only capable of proving general behaviours false – it is not capable of proving them to be true. We can show that Newton’s Laws of motion do not correctly describe objects moving at near-light speeds. But we cannot show that general relativity always gives the correct answer. It is impossible to test every circumstance, even in a well controlled laboratory experiment, so all that we can reliably say is that in all the times we have tested it so far, general relativity has given the right answer[2].

To complicate matters, many of the questions that scientists seek to answer involve processes that are either complex or statistically random. The best that the scientific method can hope for in these circumstances is to give an accurate statistical average. This number won’t be the actual figure found in any particular example set, except by chance or when the sample size is infinite – clearly not a physical[3] circumstance!

So scientists, when answering any question, must give only their best estimate or prediction. To do otherwise would be to lie to the questioner, and as I have said before trust in science rests on a foundation of honesty and reliability. If you compromise that basis of the relationship between science and the public, you can no longer expect people to believe you, and the public loses a valuable tool for predicting the outcomes of its actions. This is why I think it essential that scientists continue to use this language, which implicitly tells the listener that the speaker is not delivering fact, but prediction. (A reliable prediction mind you! – A prediction good enough for you to invest on.) So given that I don’t think it would be right for scientists to change this mode of speech, I do think that the public have a responsibility to understand it. If they want to get the most out of the science they pay for, they are going to have to.

If you are still concerned by the apparent lack of certainty displayed by scientists and engineers, let me assuage your fears by saying that absolute certainty has never been a necessary feature of technology or science. For example, we (humanity) understand aeroplanes with enough certainty to ensure that they very seldom fall out of the sky. We understand biology and agriculture with enough certainty to ensure that enough food is produced every year to feed us all[4]. We understand medicine with enough certainty to extend the average lifespan of humans in wealthy countries for decades longer than ever before. In fact, for any given application of science to our world there will exist some degree of certainty that is sufficient, and it is always possible for scientists to test to these degrees of accuracy. It may not be absolute certainty, but pretty good certainty is enough to work miracles.

[1] Not to be confused with the behaviour of some science teachers.
[2] Actually this statement is not true any more either, but I couldn’t think of another example that was both correct and well recognised outside of specialist fields. There have now been experiments with results which differ from those predicted by general relativity. So you’ll have to imagine that we’re in the nineties or so when you read this statement. My apologies for this!
[3] read: “realistic”
[4] I realise that people still go hungry. The tragedy is that humanity does actually produce enough food to feed all of us. It just isn’t making its way to countries where people are starving because no-one can find a way of making money from that.

This year’s Premier League has been the best in recent years. I say that not just because I am a Manchester United fan, but instead because for once we have had a season of which the last month will not be about the top four. It will be a relief, for once, that we can all divert our attention elsewhere, and enjoy the last fortnight of football without wondering who will be in the Champions League. We all knew it anyway – it’s the four richest clubs.
Though Premier League football is the best of the best and is also the easiest to follow, I can’t shake the niggling feeling that it’s slowly killing the heart of football – the ‘beautiful game’. The top six or seven clubs are the richest, the bottom four or five the poorest, and – in the end – clubs are rewarded for selling shirts, rather than playing daring and beautiful football.

Take Blackpool, for example. For me, they represent a breath of fresh air to the modern game. Most newly promoted sides would play negatively to secure another season in the top flight. Not Blackpool – they’ve played fearlessly, and attractively, but without the squad depth of the bigger clubs, they sit remarkably close to the drop zone. With a game against Champions-elect Manchester United on the final day of the season, Blackpool look set to go down.

It’s a side like Blackpool that I think would have flourished in a more even environment. Even from myself, a Manchester United fan, I would love to see a more open, and a more even Premier League. Every year, I would like to see the smartest clubs (both on and off the park) win the league, not just the wealthiest. So how do you make the Premier League a more even and fair environment? It seems to work in other competitions, even other sports – there are all sorts of regulations in place. The NBA has a draft system. Some leagues have regulations on the amount of internationals, or over-21s in a team’s squad. Most modern competitions have a salary cap, and the clubs that choose to ignore them (we’re looking at you, Melbourne Storm) are punished. And it works.

From a neutral perspective I, personally, find the NRL more competitive and more exciting to watch than the Premier League. Not just that, but it’s keeping the game within their best interests. The A-League operates in Australian football’s interests. Without it, there would be very small an avenue for young Kiwi and Aussie players to make it into the world of football The NRL is doing New Zealand and Australian Rugby League a favour. I don’t see the same behaviour from the FA. In 2009, a game between Arsenal and Portsmouth became the first top flight game not to feature an Englishman. At the time, it publicly spelt doom for the future of English football. A year later, a humiliation at the hands of Germany at the World Cup spelt doom for the future of English football. Am I the only one to see a correlation?

Manchester United will line up against Barcelona in two weeks in the Champions League final. I suspect their team will be made up of a three Englishmen, a Welshman, Dutchman, Frenchman, Serb, Brazilian, Mexican, a South Korean and an Ecuadorian. I might be fooling myself, but a win in that final is barely a win for Manchester. Instead, it’s a reward for the businessmen who poured their millions into the side.

Imagine an English Premier League season in which each club had a salary cap, had to include an under-21 player in their team, and could only have two or three offshore players in the line-up. Sure, the FA might have to deal with complaints from a few Manchester United and Chelsea fans, a few Russian trillionaires might get grumpy, but overall, they’d be dealing with a more exciting league, one which is creating a pathway for new talent, and the possibility of an English side competing admirably at a World Cup.

Of course, this is nearly impossible. The FA is unlikely to listen to reason, more the sounds of their wallets bursting at the seams. For every unhappy fan in Stoke, there are twenty happy fans in South Korea, each happy to purchase Chelsea’s newest alternative-commemorative-away strip. Every year the Premier League and the FA will continue to produce high quality, imported football, and every four years they will embarrass themselves at a World Cup. For me, it’s a no-brainer.

But wait.

Have they tried sacking the coach?