Sporting Life
The Age
11 June 2008
Geoff McClure
Not only is she a sporting hit . . .
Now it's Alex the lifesaverALEX Blackwell has made quite a name for herself in Australia as a member of our national cricket team but her star has never shone as brightly as it has in England this week, as she plies her trade on the women's county scene with Berkshire. But her fame has not been so much to do with what she has been achieving on the field as off it. The 24-year-old former medical student from Wagga Wagga in NSW was involved in a league match a few days back when, during a rain delay, an 80-year-old supporter collapsed and there were calls for anyone with medical experience to go to his aid. "Myself and another player, Louise, rushed over and immediately knew this man was in a great deal of trouble," Blackwell said. "With no breathing and absent pulse, we had to commence CPR." Blackwell is no stranger to life in the medical world, having spent four years doubling her cricket training with medical classes and although she had not been confronted with such an emergency before she was confident in putting her training into practice. "Louise was on compressions while I was delivering mouth-to-mouth," she said. "We continued CPR for nine minutes, and to be honest, I thought we had lost him, but we just kept going until paramedics arrived and were ready with the defibrillator." The patron, known only as "John", was taken to hospital and Blackwell was relieved to be told later he had made a full recovery and was in a stable condition. "After I batted in the second innings, John's son wanted to meet me," she said. "He was very appreciative and explained that John was now stabilised in the hospital and hassling the nurses already," she said. "It was such a great feeling to hear the news."What a teamBEING in the spotlight is never easy, as West Coast star Brent Staker has discovered with a vengeance this week. No sooner had his girlfriend of six months, controversial ironwoman Candice Falzon, told the ABC's Australian Story on Monday night she had quit Sydney to live in Staker's home town of Perth than his former squeeze, Jessica McGrade, was quoted as saying she ended their four-year relationship after a falling out. "I don't stay in contact but from what I've heard about Candice, she and Brent will make a perfect match," Jessica snapped.Missing: 20 minutesTHANKS to everyone who reacted to our item yesterday, which praised Foxtel for its footy coverage (but was not so kind to channels Seven and Ten). A bag full of letters of support (now there's a first). Most of the mail criticised Seven for continuously ending its coverage near final siren time so as to feed straight into the 6pm news, one reader noting it starts its coverage on a 60-minute delay and ends it on an 80-minute delay. So where do those missing 20 minutes go? Trying to recoup some of those millions it forked out for the footy rights with commercials, of course!Odds agogMATHEW Goggin may be in fine form, recently finishing equal-second in the Memorial tournament in Ohio, but try telling that to American bookmakers who framed a market for next weekend's US Open. The Tasmanian, who had to go into a nine-man play-off to get one of three vacant Open spots, has been listed as a $301 chance.What price, soccer loyalty?GOALS weren't the only thing that Australians found hard to come by in their World Cup qualifier against Iraq last weekend - some of our supporters had the same trouble with tickets to the game. A mate who lives in Dubai tells us that he and a group of friends had been trying all week to get tickets and eventually tracked some down at a local bakery, of all places, where they convinced the "baker" to sell them 40 tickets at 20 dirham (about $6) each. They were to be pleased with their purchase. When they arrived at the ground on the night, tickets were selling ("if you were Australian," reported our mate) for 370 dirham ($112) each!What about these clubs, Paul?MELBOURNE Football Club's outgoing chairman Paul Gardner may boast that the 150-year-old Demons have been around longer than Manchester United, the New York Yankees and Real Madrid (Sporting Life, June 11) but footy fan Bill Tuck wants to take him to task about the Dees' Saturday night bash being "the first and only 150th birthday party ever celebrated by a sporting organisation anywhere in the world". He cites several other Melbourne organisations, all of them cricket clubs which are older, among them Coburg (152 years old), Brighton (166), and Williamstown (156).And they think OUR footy fans are crazyPLENTY of colour at the 2008 European soccer championships now under way in Austria and Switzerland . . . and that's before a ball was kicked in anger. These fans certainly didn't mask their support for the respective countries, including a Dutch woman who wore glasses in the colours of her national flag, a fellow countryman who looked more like a zebra and a couple of Italians who looked happy enough before their game but wouldn't have been so cheeky afterwards. The Netherlands won the game 3-0.Who said that?Ah, hard-living, Holden-driving Casey that all of Australia seems to love. -- Fed Cup captain DAVID TAYLOR hails Casey Dellacqua's remarkable rise from tennis obscurity to grand slam contender.
