Kenya v Qatar

Do tennis players really play for their country (Davis Cup notwithstanding)? Do boxers box for their country? There must be some reason for these defections, and money would seem to be the main factor, as it buys training facilities and a better quality of life as an athlete, I would imagine.

Surely this is no more dodgy then when Ged Brannan (ex-Hibs and Motherwell) was capped for the Cayman Islands since he was never likely to get a gig for whichever of the home nations he was qualified to play for? But football is a different kettle of fish, and so many players have played for countries they have no real connection to (Vinnie Jones being the most obvious example, along with half of Jack Charlton's Eire squad, the time Nigel Spackman tried to get a game for Scotland etc etc) presumably because a cap for anyone is better than a cap for no-one.

But running for your country? I like to think our athletes do well in team events as they are a team. It always comes across like that anyway. But I suppose if better financing and facilities come along, then any sense of loyalty may go.

Ailsa, I didn't know about Brannan. That's priceless!

Still, the world isn't what it was when competitive international athletics first began. People travel, train/play outside home countries, fall in love with people from the other side of the world (e.g. my children would be eligible to represent Japan!) etc.

But plucking an established sportsman, signing a cheque, getting him to change his name and rushing his nationality through in double quick time takes some cheek!

It does make you wonder if the trend might move into other sports. Will Qatar start buying international footballers when they're in their prime? Will other rich countries suddenly become cricket world champions, for example?

I seem to remember Peter Lorimer going to Israel in the late 70s and changing his name to Alon Ben-Avraham! Was he suddenly eligible to play for Israel?

As for Chris' point about baseball and city clubs, playing for your international team is different. Athletics is, if I'm not mistaken, the national sport of Kenya. It's a country that doesn't get much international recognition, so to see one of their (most successsful) number spirited away in this fashion must be galling.

Carlo Cudicini for England?

Besides, we've got Kirkland!

Yeh, the quatar ting is shocking. As I mentioned in the Athletics thread, the IAAF should do somethign evil to him. That ain't on - you represent,your country. You don't swanny off just cause someone gives you more cash. There are presidents, but there are usually mitigating circumstances - Zola Budd running for the UK 'cause she wasn't allowed to run for SOuth Africa springs to mind. But it still ain't right.

you've got to look after yourself if your country won't pay you enough so its fair.

I just wonder why qatar did it or whoever came up with the idea for this. what was the intention behind it?

kenya

(hooks his thumbs behind his lapels and looks satisfied)

terrible shabab militant attack today

147 killed. Horrible.

That is the word.

Recent security warnings have emphasized a continued risk of attack by the Shabab.

The group has actively recruited and radicalized young people in Kenya, especially in economically depressed areas along the Indian Ocean coast where tourism, a vital industry for the country, has suffered badly because of terrorist activity.

While there's no proof in the article that the Shabab members who carried out this terrorism were "radicalized young people in Kenya" as opposed to Somalian Shabab extremists, this act will once again dissuade tourists from going to Kenya and hurt Kenyans from making a living via the tourist industry to feed their families.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/04/us-kenya-security-militants-idUSKBN0MV03Z20150404

Somali militants vowed on Saturday to wage a long war against Kenya and run its cities "red with blood" after the group's fighters killed nearly 150 people during an assault on a Kenyan university.

Kenyan officials said they had arrested five men in connection with Thursday's attack by al Shabaab gunmen at Garissa university, 200 km (120 miles) from the Somali border.

The raid has put Kenya on heightened alert and spooked Christian congregations, horrified by survivor tales recalling how the Islamist militants had sought out Christian students to kill, while sparing some Muslims.

In a message directed at the Kenyan public, the al Qaeda aligned group said the raid was revenge for Kenya's military presence in Somalia and mistreatment of Muslims within Kenya.

"No amount of precaution or safety measures will be able to guarantee your safety, thwart another attack or prevent another bloodbath from occurring in your cities," the group said in an emailed statement received by Reuters in the Somali capital.

It said it would run cities "red with blood", adding: "This will be a long, gruesome war of which you, the Kenyan public, are its first casualties."

Kenya has now bombed Al Shabaab in Somalia

Some background on the Kenyan air force. Evidently they've been bombing Shabaab, in conjunction with ground advances, since 2011.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/07/world/africa/setbacks-press-shabab-fighters-to-kill-inexpensively.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

In conventional military terms, the Shabab are losing. They have been routed from many areas, and are no longer able to rake in millions of dollars by shipping out mountains of charcoal or importing cars, as they did just a few years ago. Even in the small towns in Somalia they still control, Shabab fighters are not safe. They are relentlessly hunted — from above.

Their revered leader, Ahmed Abdi Godane, was killed last year in an American airstrike, and other Shabab agents have been killed by drones.

The American government has invested nearly $1 billion in this strategy. But Shabab attacks, as shown by the university massacre in Kenya, continue to grow in scope and ambition, raising the question: How can they be stopped?

“It’s not an easy game,” said Stig Jarle Hansen, a Norwegian professor who has written a book about the Shabab. “You have to have a people-centric strategy. You have to bring security to the villages in Somalia and stop corruption within the Kenyan security services. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard over the past five or six years, ‘The Shabab is dying, the Shabab is dying.’

Continue reading the main story

“The Shabab is not dying,” he said. “Case closed.”