Miguel Sanchez

Australia is in a strange position as a sporting nation, since football is behind quite a few sports in popularity. For footballers I'm inclined to say Mark Schwarzer with 109 caps and a career mostly spent in the English Premier League. If it's not him then it's probably Tim Cahill, with 108 caps and 50 goals, plus a career mostly spent in the English Premier League. There's also Harry Kewell and Mark Viduka, and I'm leaning towards Kewell because although their national team careers aren't as long as the first two, Kewell played the most at the highest level, with lots of Champions League experience with Leeds and Liverpool. All of this is relevant because I'm going to guess there's a rugby, cricket or Australian Rules Football person who blows all of that out of the water. Or ironically someone who actually did blow competitors out of the water, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Thorpe with 5 Olympic golds for swimming and loads more swimming medals. Whether him or someone from rugby or cricket, I think it's fair to say the non-footballer wins this round. If you know a rugby or cricket person who should go here, fire away. Austria are currently captained by David Alaba - Wikipedia, their best ever player. Wikipedia tells me there's competition from before the Nazis however with Matthias Sindelar - Wikipedia. I'm not even going to try and quantify this. Football in Alaba's time isn't comparable, but the amount of time he's spent at the absolute top level edges it for me. Austria also has this very helpful wikpedia page: List of Austrian sportspeople - Wikipedia Niki Lauda was Formula 1 world champion three times. Austria is also famed for alpine skiing with sustained success throughout that sport's history. Toni Sailer - Wikipedia won three gold medals at the 1956 winter Olympics and 4 gold medals at that year's world championships. He was also names Austrian sports personality of the century in 1999. There are a few other skiers with Olympic and world championship wins but Sailer seems to be the most prominent. This is a difficult choice to me because I feel as if skiing is more prominent in Austrian culture than football, and that if you asked the average Austrian they'd be inclined to pick a skier rather than a football. But then, Alaba is an extremely talented individual who's had sustained success with one of the best teams in modern football. I'm also pretty biased and would want to pick Lauda anyway. This is a tough one and I'm definitely opening this one up. Azerbaijan don't have much in the way of footballers. Rashad Sadygov - Wikipedia has won Azerbaijan Footballer of the Year six times in his career and is their most capped player with 111, so I'm voting him. He spent almost all his career in Azerbaijan, with a few games in Turkey thrown in. Most of Azerbaijan's Olympic success has come in wrestling. Namig Abdullayev - Wikipedia seems to have had the most and longest success with Olympic and European golds in freestyle wrestling, which a bunch of silvers thrown in too. Farid Mansurov - Wikipedia was Olympic champion once and world champion twice in Greco-Roman wrestling. Chess is also a big one from here, with Garry Kasparov being born in Baku in Soviet times. Since independence Shakhriyar Mamedyarov - Wikipedia seems to be their best bet for individual success, though I'm not going to attempt to list all of the tournaments he's been in. I think both of these candidates are better than the footballer. Wrestling seems to be more important in Azerbaijan than football, and chess (which I'm perfectly happy to count here) has a long-standing cultural importance too. While a mind sport like chess can easily have a longer career than wrestling, I think the longevity of Mamedyarov wins out here, and puts him ahead of Sadygov for football. The Bahamas sees us enter the Bs and it's another diddy Caribbean outfit. Lesly St. Fleur - Wikipedia has the most caps (22) and goals (10). Their highest ever FIFA ranking was 138, in 2006. They have a few Olympic champions, so it's an easy win for the non-footballer here. Chris Brown (sprinter) - Wikipedia is the best of their sprinters with an assortment of silver medals in various competitions, as well as national records at several distances. Deandre Ayton - Wikipedia is a 1st overall draft pick (2018) in the NBA and seems like he could have a big career, but I'm giving this one to Brown for the time being.

I'd be happy to include chess players where relevant but it's a difficult one counting someone from the Soviet Union era IMO. I'm going to completely undermine that when we get to Russia and include people like Vladislav Tretiak and Valeri Kharlamov, but we're probably months away from that.

Space tourism Planet's dying and some sociopathic billionaires are spending untold millions to go high up on a plane for a few minutes. f**k the f**k off.

Argentina's best footballer is Lionel Messi. Non-football is interesting. In motor racing there's 5 time F1 world champion Juan Manuel Fangio - Wikipedia. In basketball we have Manu Ginóbili - Wikipedia who has an Olympic gold medal, an assortment of basketball world cup medals and won 4 NBA titles. Juan Martín del Potro - Wikipedia leads the way in tennis with a US Open win in 2009 and a Davis Cup win in 2016. There are also a bunch of world and Olympic champion boxers I've never heard of, which in my somewhat ignorant view means they're not on the same level as Messi (or Maradona). I'm going to be contrarian here and argue Fangio as Argentina's best non-footballer. It's hard to quantify what someone in any sport achieved that long ago compared to the modern day, but five world titles in a sport with a mechanical and human attrition rate that early motor racing had is remarkable. I'm mainly arguing for Fangio here because I know nobody is comparing to Messi or Maradona, so this is effectively a guaranteed win for football. Armenia's best footballer is Henrik Mkhitaryan. Armenia is also out first instance of a former Soviet state which would have made for an interesting historical comparison. Outside of football as an independent country their biggest successes seem to be in chess, wrestling and weightlifting. Artur Aleksanyan - Wikipedia won gold in Greco-Roman wrestling in the 2016 Olympics and has several world and European titles too. There's also Armen Nazaryan - Wikipedia who seems to have had more success but has represented Bulgaria too, so I'm less likely to lean towards him. Aruba are another one of these Caribbean diddy outfits. Their most capped player is Theric Ruiz - Wikipedia with 24. There's a few people in their current squad playing for Dutch teams, but none of them seem to be up to much. Outside of football they're similar to American Samoa with a few baseball players. The longest career seems to belong to Sidney Ponson - Wikipedia with over a decade-long MLB career. Lots of the Aruba.. Arubian? baseball players seem to represent the Netherlands, which is probably fair enough since it's not like Aruba is putting out big teams in multiple sports. I'm going to vote for the non-footballer here though, whichever MLB player you pick is higher up than any footballer you can pick.

British Grand Prix - Wikipedia (this links to venues) It alternated yearly between Silverstone and Brands Hatch from 1963-1986. Brands Hatch is shite, although it would be fun seeing these cars on a track with its elevation changes. Donnington held the 1993 European Grand Prix where Senna did this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pktF3wJKfxo (I'd embed but can't, but trust me, it's worth watching) The trophy for that race was Sonic the Hedgehog:

I believe in Leglerg

This aged well

Hamilton didn't go for the gap, he was trying to go for it then tried to pull out because he started unsteering because he was too tight for a corner that's flat (and in a heavy car full of fuel). PS get fucked Toto

That's what I thought. I don't think I've ever seen a tyre come off the rim in one piece before. Hamilton's fault btw, stupid place to go for a move without committing to it.

Omaze have a new house.

Isn't it? Aside from things like basketball or baseball which have soft caps and a luxury tax, the North American system means that regardless of the personal wealth of the persons owning teams, they've all got the same playing field to build from. You can obviously argue that teams can be and are limited, but you'd have to wonder then whether it's worse that a few teams can become unfathomably rich or that a few teams suffer no consequences for losing. I don't think the American model works when more than one country is involved, for what it's worth. I also don't think European football would be improved if it moved to that system, or in an alternate universe where it had always been that way.

Anguilla are similar to American Samoa with a goalkeeper as their highest capped player: Ryan Liddie - Wikipedia. They're also coached by Stern John, if you remember him. Seems like being the manager of one of these diddies would be a nice life. Omari Banks - Wikipedia played cricket for the West Indies and it's not really a high bar to clear for the non-footballers here. Antigua and Barbuda once looked like this: Aaron Taylor-Sinclair currently plays for them. It looks like a toss up between Peter Byres (93) who has the most caps and Derrick Edwards who has the most goals (59). There's also Kerry Skepple - Wikipedia who scored the winning goal over Haiti which sent them to the highest stage of World Cup qualifying they've ever reached. I'm inclined to vote for Peter Byers - Wikipedia since he played at the highest level out of them, spending a few seasons in MLS with Montreal. They're also one of the West Indies countries (I've also just discovered what the West Indies are). Viv Richards - Wikipedia is someone who did some cricket and seemed quite good at it, so it's an easy win for him.

Absolutely nothing, given they're founded and operated as second tier clubs with no expectations of moving. The entire sporting and cultural structure in North America is set up in a way which makes it incomparable with European football.

Oh that's definitely a shout and a winner.

Found "Britpop at the BBC" on channel 1 last night when I went to bed and seeing this in amongst shite like Oasis, Blur and something called "Menswe@r" was how I imagine people stranded in deserts for weeks without sight of water feel when they start hallucinating:

American Samoa (big thanks for the suggestion to add all FIFA members) started playing football in 1983. Nicky Salapu - Wikipedia is their highest capped player with 22, and the highest level he ever played at was Austrian amateur. Elsewhere, noted American diver Greg Louganis (4 Olympic titles) was born in American Samoa, but since he didn't represent them he doesn't count. In baseball we have Sean Manaea - Wikipedia and Tony Solaita - Wikipedia. Wikipedia also rather annoying lists a bunch of people in things like American football and boxing but they're all American and of Samoan descent, which I'm not counting either. Either way, one or both of those baseball players is clearly better than Salapu since they played at a much higher level and have been much more successful. I'm going for Manaea since he seems to have spent most of his pro career in MLB rather than minor leagues. Andorra are captained by the 41 year old defender Ildefons Lima - Wikipedia who is also their leading scorer with 11 goals in 130 caps. He played a game for Espanyol's B team once. Andorra have a 19 year old goalkeeper in Villareal's C team, that's the sort of level we're dealing with here. They have no Olympic medallists. Hocine Haciane - Wikipedia represented them three times at the Olympics in swimming. They have a rugby team too which doesn't seem to be any good. I'm voting for the footballer, purely for longevity. Angola have Flávio Amado - Wikipedia as their leading cap holder (91) and Akwá - Wikipedia as their leading scorer (39). Both played in Angola's only World Cup appearance in 2006. At club level it looks like a toss-up between the two, although Akwa managed some games for Benfica once. The only other sport they seem half decent at is basketball: Angola men's national basketball team - Wikipedia. Carlos Morais (basketball) - Wikipedia once signed a contract with the Toronto Raptors and has won 4 AfroBasket titles, the African basketball championship. It feels like a toss-up between the two sides here so I'll open this one up. Any thoughts?

For Algeria... IMO Madjer gets the nod over Mahrez so far, mainly for the European success with Porto. If Mahrez ever wins a Champions League I think it would switch quite quickly, but I also get the feeling if you asked an Algerian they'd pick one of the players from the 80s. It's a decent argument whether any of those footballers compare to a runner who effectively dominated their specialist distance (plus some others in terms of times) for a prolonged period. I'm inclined to put the footballers ahead but I'll go with the consensus we have here.

This is a fair point.

Week 29 update Remember earlier in the year when there would be several picks up every week? Halcyon days. Like the world before Covid, or P&B before the Covid thread.

Good lad. I hope your absence was just boredom and not something unsavoury.

Have you done Latvia yet?

@KnightswoodBear

We're in the thread's BRALT phase, aren't we?

That was a lovely lap then a procession. Bin.

Did she shag you?