The Sun Delusion

You may or may not be aware of the weekly science Podcast "The Pod Delusion". It's best thought of as a UK version of "The Skeptics Guide to the Universe", which I've previously mentioned.

Their latest episode (#36) includes a report by Marsh which is entitled "Football Crazy?".

It relates to an article in the Sun about a claim that men - playing to a stereotype - do think of football more than sex.

I don't want to give it away - other than saying that there's less than meets the eye to the Sun's claim - and so you just listen to it (starting at 28:25) as well as the rest of the podcast. I would also recommend subscribing to the cast as part of your regular listening.

It's not a matter of life and death, it's more important than that , II

Back in April I had a go at the Sun's fear-mongering about the prospects of the England football team.

Wayne Rooney and his wife are due to have a child in October and so presumably Rooney would take off a few days paternity leave.

The Sun's article was pretty much saying that they should put the World Cup qualifying game on 10th October between Ukraine and England ahead of the health of Coleen and the baby.

As I said at the time, not only should the Sun be ashamed of this sort of article, but the way the fixtures lined up, England may not even need to play Rooney as there was a very good chance that they would have already qualified before it took place.

Last night's events, England thrashing Croatia 5-1 and Ukraine's 0-0 with Belarus draw, ensured that with two games to play England will finish top of their qualifying group and are now guaranteed a place at neat summer's World Cup in South Africa. Therefore, as far as England are concerned, the game against Ukraine is meaningless.

I'm hoping that the Sun will withdraw for its article as it was clearly inaccurate, which anyone with even a minimal amount of research would have realised.

UPDATE: I've added a comment on the Sun's post asking whether it will be withdrawn.

It's not a matter of life and death, it's more important than that

Here's a pointless article even for the Sun: they're fear-mongering about the prospects of the England football team!

Last week Wayne and Colleen Rooney said that they're due to have a child in October. The Sun says that her due date means that Rooney may miss the "vital" Ukraine-England World Cup qualifier on 10th October because if still pregnant Colleen would be at 41 weeks and so may need to be induced.

There are three main things wrong with this article:

• Firstly, the Sun should be ashamed to even suggest that they should put a football game ahead of the health of both Colleen and the baby;
  
• Secondly, the majority of women give birth at 40 weeks, which in this case would be the week before the game;
  
• Thirdly, the game will be England's 9th out of 10 qualifiers. In case you're not aware, in the European section of the World Cup (Group 6) so far England have won their first 5 games, with a total of 15 points, are 5 points clear and at the very worst need 25 points to qualify. Their next two games are against the two weakest teams in the group - Kazakhstan and Andorra - and it is pretty certain that England will win both of these which will give them 21 points. Therefore, aside from the fact that the article implies England are a one-man team and they will fall apart if Rooney isn't playing, it is likely that he may not even need to be selected because they may have already qualified!