In long pants?

I'm talking about pants here, or trousers if you must, not Lycra cossies

In fact I will add another caveat here.

Any "sport" that does not produce a clear winner by being fastest, hardest or longest or whatever but relies on a panel of judges to "score" the opponents should also be excluded from using the term "sport". Any winner should be chosen by purely objective means and not subject to the whims and dalliances of any "judge". I realise that means that boxing would be excluded from the Olympics but unless they're willing to fight until there is a clear winner, then it's not a sport. But it would mean that we get shut of those formation drowning women, those others that twirl cnady-floss ribbons and synchronised diving

The thing with Synchronised diving is surely you could develop some sort of laser mapping to see who is the most synchronised.

Women golfers usually play in shorts, so they are clearly playing the more genuine version of the sport.

As I understand it, the award used to be called Sportsman of the Year, the term personality was introduced to cover both genders, not because it reflected personality.

But who cares. The programme is a joke these days, it is more about so-called celebrities. I bet unfunny-man James Corden gets more airtime than Rugby League.

It's like Question of Sport, no longer a quiz about sporting knowledge, but a couple of luvvies trying to outshout each other. I watched the last couple of episodes because Sean Long and Sam Tomkins were on, but they needn't have wasted their time.

Spot on. All of it

That should've been renamed "We've found something for Sue Barker to do in between Wimbledon and the ATP Masters"

Coddy's saying that long trousers disqualify it, he's not saying that shorts make it a sport.
If he was, any beach is full of blokes being sporty even thought they are just lounging around.

Anyway, golf is not a sport it's a pastime.
Like tiddlywinks or darts.




Sport involves skill, athleticism and sweat.
So that rules out rugby union too.

I quite agree. This is not a sportsman:

Plenty of sweat there

Sport to me is anything with any physical dimension that is a challenge between people or teams. Darts clearly is a sport. It's mini javelin against a target so arguably should be part of track and field at the olympics.

Sweating because you've just eaten a giant kebab and/or are days away from a massive heart attack doesn't count.

Some female sports should be taken far more seriously by the media and given wide exposure.

That's disgusting and sexist. Do you have any more?

Reluctantly, and only to demonstrate how exploitative and sexist the sport of lingerie football is, you understand.

Garters. Awesome.

I'm sorry, but this is yet another non story, whipped up out of all proportions, by our media (Andy Gray/Richard Keys and Sepp Blatter, anyone), to deflect attention away from their 'behaviour' of the last few months ...see the Leveson enquiry

To be honest, there's not been much British female success this year, bar Beth Tweddle (and that was 'only' Euro level). The rest of our successful sportswomen, will have been in sports that don't get much exposure. One of today's national newspapers wanted SPOTY recognition for a woman who'd lost her parents but was still a world champion....in taekwando. Now, I'm not knocking taekwando, but I'm guessing 99.9% of the UK wouldn't know this woman's face if she fell over them, let alone know her name.

It's just been announced that the Beeb are to review their selection procedure for SPOTY. WHY? Are they trying to be deliberately politically correct, so no-one can be left out. It'll be like Big Brother, where they HAVE to have somebody that's either gay/lesbian/black/jewish/disabled/asian/agnostic/transgender/dwarfism/fat/disfigured/intellectual etc.
Why can't people just be chosen for what they've acheived thatsporting year, not because they "tick the box" for some particular 'group of people'

The Beeb need to look at axing SPOTY anyway, as they really don't show much LIVE sport anymore

F1 (which they'll lose 60% of next year, and share the rest with Sky), and Moto GP
A few games of rugby (both codes)
A few selected horse race meetings
Two, four round golf tournaments
A few live football league/league cup games (with the World cup and Euro's every four years)
A couple of athletics meetings
A couple of snooker/darts comps
3 weeks worth of tennis
and the Olympics/Commonwealth's every 4 years
and that's it

They show NO cricket or boxing,and precious little football, at all

So, like, if they've won a world championship?

So, of the nominations we have:

Mark Cavendish - Rides a bike and became famous for a supporting role in this year's Tour de France

Alastair Cook - Long pants - disqualified

Mo Farrah - Who? I bet I'm not the only one who thought this was a female nomination to slip under the radar

Amir Khan - Nice lad and decent boxer but needs to step up and test himself

Andy Murray - Terminally whingeing kid who desparately needs to sack his mum and make his own way in the world

Darren Clarke - More famous for tragically losing his wife than any sporting achievement. But anyway: Long pants - disqualified

Luke Donald - Long pants - disqualified

Dai Greene - (see Mo Farrah)

Rory McIlroy - "The youngest since..." says it all really and..... Long pants - disqualified

Andrew Strauss - South African and....... Long pants - disqualified

If that's the best they can come up with then it really does need euthenasing

If that's the list it's a fiddle to get Murray to win - on the basis he'll be the only one most have heard of. BBC Sport is a joke. The sooner that particular fawning show gets scrapped the better. It's awful.

Saw him win the world 5000m title in pretty impressive style this year.

That's as may be but if you polled the average street, I reckon the answer would be "that little dark-haired girl off Eastenders"

Winning the green jersey in Tour de France is a pretty big deal, Cavendish is much more famous on the continent than he is here.

This year he also, became World Road Race Champion in London and became only the second man in history to win the final stage of the Tour de France on the Champs-Elysées 3 times in succession.

As regards the job he does as a road race sprinter, he's comfortably the best in the world.

But in Britain cycling is a non-event for most people except for the Olympics. I'm sure fans of most of the other contenders could reel off a list of their recent achievements that will sound as vaguely impressive as the above. Cavendish's achievements are all well and good, but I'm sure most people don't care - hardly anyone would notice if you'd made all that up.

The Viking couldn't lace John Thomas Wilson's boots.
A real athlete.