Tyson tonked you with ease Deontay so give uspeacewithcostume
SHOW me a good loser and I’ll show you a loser.
Vince Lombardi – the American football coach, not the baldy winger who played for Sampdoria – has always been a good rent-a-quote when it comes to sport.
And the grid iron guy is right. You can tell a lot about an athlete or a team by the way they lose. They all have to do it sometimes but it’s what happens afterwards that usually dictates if they end up a laughing stock in the dustbin of history or hailed for rising back to the top.
Big Deontay Wilder is in big danger of finding himself in the former camp if he’s not careful.
There was no shame in getting tonked by Tyson Fury but his excuse for the defeat was the kind of cracker that sportsfolk can end up taking to their graves.
The Bronze Bomber claimed he got clobbered because he was knackered before the fight even started due to the two stone costume he wore on his ring walk.
Poor Deontay was a busted flush hauling his outfit around for so long and it barely took a whisper in his ear from Fury to topple over.
No bother big man. Straight away the cop-out has joined the list of famous sporting excuses, along with belters such as Man United’s grey strip, David Haye’s big toe and Tottenham’s dodgy lasagne.
There’s a long list. Ukraine blamed the frogs outside their hotel for getting roasted 4-0 by Spain at Germany 2006.
Kenny Dalglish went all dog ate my homework when he claimed the match ball was too bouncy when his Newcastle side went out of the FA Cup.
Ronnie O’Sullivan pointed the finger at a streaker when he lost seven frames on the bounce to get turfed out of the Masters a few years back. The Rocket must have been playing pocket billiards ...
The excuses don’t come for just defeats though. Bad behaviour can get the Shaggy style “It Wasn’t Me” treatment.
Luis Suarez tried to say sinking his teeth in to Giorgio Chiellini’s shoulder was because he’d lost balance and fell face first in to the Italian and it was just bad luck his mouth was open.
He even said the clash left him with a sore tooth as well.
Sprinter Ben Johnson claimed his drink was spiked while LeShawn Merrit blamed his drugs test on some, erm, male enhancement tablets he’d bought over the counter.
Dennis Mitchell won a gold at the 1992 Olympics and claimed his testosterone levels where through the roof because he’d been up all night giving his wife her birthday treat. Fair play lads, it was worth a bash.
But let’s face it, everyone involved in sport makes excuses when the results don’t go their way. The last thing most of them want to do is accept personal or group responsibility.
Football managers are the best at it. The ref is usually the easiest scapegoat when it comes to the “if onlys”. It’s only when the poor sod in the middle hasn’t done anything wrong they need to get creative.
Then it’s injuries to key players, players coming back from injury or players playing too many games ... see the pattern? Not available, not fit enough or too tired. Blimey, it doesn’t leave much of a window.
After that? Take you’re pick. Jose Mourinho blamed the ball boys – or lack of them – for an El Clasico defeat, Gordon Strachan said Scotland were snookered because of our rubbish genetics and Barry Fry peed on the corner flags at Birmingham City in a bid to lift a curse. They’re all at it.
But we shouldn’t blame athletes or managers for looking to make excuses.
Simply admitting their team was guff won’t cut it as it’s a surefire way to the dole queue.
They have to find a way to deflect, how to maintain fragile confidence, just to bounce back. Even if they run the risk of sounding completely nuts.
Sometimes they have to be sore losers – or they’ll never be winners.
Ukraine blamed the frogs outside their hotel for getting roasted 4-0 by Spain at Germany 2006