The Wisdom of the Wise or the Keenness of the Keane?

The inverse-correlation between mahjong results and football results continues apace.

Until last weekend we had confined our speculations to the English Premiership and Championship, however, when Jaime finished top last in last Friday's game the feeling was that it boded ill for his team, MUFC, which was to play Chelsea in the FA Cup Final at the new Wembley stadium the following day.

Now, according to the inverse-correlation rule, a player's form at the mahjong table yields the opposite result for his team on the pitch. David's recent recovery of form at MJ coincided with Leeds United's relegation to Division One (i.e. Division Three in the good old way of reckoning things), while Jaime's poor form marched in step with MUFC's successful Premiership campaign.

So with Jaime chalking up a couple of victories and getting himself back into the black the feeling was that Chelsea would be taking the cup home with them this season.

And so it proved: Chelsea 1, MUFC 0

As I sporadically followed the match on the BBC website from the comfort of home I felt relieved that I had not gone traipsing into town to watch the game with the lads:

1505: Incredibly slow start. Not much to get excited about.

"It's a bit more Community Shield than FA Cup final at the moment."BBC Sport's Mark Lawrenson

1512: Didier Drogba has never scored against Manchester United. At this rate he won't today either. (...!)

"This is a good advert for the cricket season."BBC Sport's Mark Lawrenson

1520: This is utter rubbish. These two are the best in the land. Never mind a good advert for cricket, it's a terrible advert for English football with an estimated 500 million watching around the world.

1523: Anyone got any paint to go and watch dry?

1530: A shot on goal. Do not fall out of your seat, but it is worth repeating, we have had a first shot on target.

1533: John Arlott once fell asleep while commentating on a county cricket match.

...

Talking of Chelsea and MUFC, I have been pondering the management careers of two of their veteran players, Dennis Wise of Chelsea (1990-2001) and Roy Keane of MUFC (1993-2005).

Roy Keane became the manager of Sunderland at the end of August 2006. A month later Dennis Wise was installed at Leeds. Both teams were stuck at the bottom or near the bottom of the Championship when their respective managers took over.

One year later and Sunderland have won the Championship and promotion to the Premiership while Leeds head the other way.

Management stats:

Keano: 39 games; 24 wins; 8 losses; 7 draws = 61.53% winning margin.

Wise: 33 games; 10 wins; 17 losses; 6 draws = 30.30% winning margin.

For more comparative info on Keano and Wise click here.

David Hurley
japanese-mahjong.com
japanese-games-shop.com

Friday 18th May: Double Chombo at Koyo Janso!

There were just the three regular gaijin in tonight's game so we took the opportunity to head over to Koyo Janso, aka Jantopia where the Mama-san is very friendly and cheerful but the food not so good. Actually, the food is non-existent and has to be ordered in from some distant locale. It took well over half an hour for the Poor Starving Little Cypriot to get his yakimeshi order delivered and when it arrived it was luke warm, less than half the size of Kodama Janso Mama's stirling culinary masterpiece - oh, and the soup was missing too!

Talking of soup, that is what the PLC was stuck in for the duration of the evening.

Such were the trying circumstances appertaining to supper. They provided the PLC with a convenient excuse for his miserable performance at the table tonight. Tired and hungry and on his third beer before any vittals arrived, and of course distracted thereby when they did arrive, he managed to do the dreaded deed twice in a night - he committed two Chombo as he struggled to complete hands with the table form running against him.

The first Chombo was committed in the first game, before dinner had arrived, when he declared an open Pon forgot about it (despite the obvious shortage of tiles in the remnant of his closed hand), got to Tenpai, smartly declared Riichi, completed his hand, and was busy counting up the score, including the open Pon, discounted the Tsumo, but still failed to notice his error until the ever beady eyed Kenyon pointed it out!

That game went to Jaime. The second game went to Kenyon with Jaime second and in the black. The third game went to Jaime and it was during that game that the PLC's second Chombo was committed.

Once again he had opened his hand, but instead of going for a quick safe low scoring finish, he opted to try and add Toitoi to the score on a one-tile wait. That was all well and good while he was waiting for the 2-Bamboo, but when he threw that safe tile and kept the 8-Coins he got himself into trouble as he had a set of three 6-Coins and had thrown two 7-Coins and was completely oblivious to the 6-6-6-7-8 alternative finishing option to the 6-6-6-8-8. He completed his hand and was once again engrossed in the cheerful pursuit of counting up his score when The Finger of Kenyon hoved into view and began to prod the 7-Coins, so innocuous-seeming sitting in his discard row like the little foxes that spoil the vines.

That put the kibosh on any hopes of his staging a last game recovery although it was his best performance of the evening, finishing on -2, with Kenyon on -17 but doing just enough to finish the evening in the black.

Jaime is staging something of an end of Premiership recovery. Unfortunately for him, however, his victory tonight boded ill for Manchester United's chances against Chelsea in the F. A. Cup Final at the new Wembley, but we will save that for our next blog!

The PLC's one victory of the evening was to escape relatively lightly on the cash payout front and to catch the last tram home!

Jaime +42, +18, +19 = +79
Kenyon -12, +34, -17 = +5
===
David -30,* -52, -2* = -84

David Hurley
japanese-mahjong.com
japanese-games-shop.com