The Heat Goes On

King James!

Miami Heat defeated Cleveland Cavaliers 98-95 on Thursday to achieved the second longest winning streak in NBA history.  

The victory means the Lebron James inspired Heats has now won 24 games consecutively. Miami is now nine victories away from tying the Los Angeles Lakers' NBA record of 33 straight wins.

One Mistake Too Many

PIECE OF THE WEEK

Angry! Emmanuel Emenike

When the news broke last week that AFCON 2013 Top Goalscorer, Emmanuel Emenike claims to have been abandoned by the NFF and Super Eagles technical team soon after the nations cup; my first reaction was "Here We Go Again".

Followers of Nigerian football will agree with me that if there is one major error that the successive boards of the NFF have always made - it is the issue of welfare for Nigerian palyers.

From Emanuel Amunike, Daniel Amokachi, Nduka Ugbade, Julius Aghahowa, Femi Opabunmi, Obasi Ogbuke, and the list goes on. The complaint of Nigerian players has always remained the same especially when injured.

That of Emenike was more shocking because it happens just a few months ago and for a player that was very instrumental to the success of a team that even the NFF has long lost faith in.

Chief Coach Stephen Keshi

Although the Super Eagles media officer has tried to shield the Chief Coach, Stephen Keshi from any blame; it is imperative to state that at the level of the national team, Keshi's job is more of management than coaching. Players must believe that they have a manager; who is ready to stick it out with them all the time. Considering how far Keshi himself had to go to earn respect of the NFF board makes this even more important.

NFF and the technical crew must accept that they have erred and that Emenike has every reason to be angry. They need to prove to him and all other Nigerian players that they care about there welfare.

To Emenike, I say the point has been made and duly noted. It's time to move on even as I wish him a quick recovery.
 

NFF Rejects Emenike Claims

SPORT: Football

SA 2013 Golden Ball Winner, Emmanuel Emenike

  

Super Eagles media officer, Benjamin Alaya has refuted claims by Spartak Moscow of Russia striker, Emmanuel Emenike that he has been abandoned soon after the African Cup of Nations held in South Africa earlier this year.

Alaye denied claims by the player that no official of the NFF or the technical crew had call him to know the state of his health after copping a hamstring injury in the semi final match against Mali is South Africa.

"The problem is that Emenike changed his line without informing us. The coach and even myself have tried to contact him but we have not been able to reach him"  Alaya said during a live radio interview in Lagos.

When asked why they did not take the option of reaching him through his Russian club, Alaya said: 

"Emenike is first a Nigerian. Our first option is to first reach him through the phone line he gave us. But the way things are turning out now, we might need to look at the option of the club".

Emenike had last week through a website lashed out at the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) and the Super Eagles technical crew led by Stephen Keshi for abandoning him to his fate after helping the country to her first AFCON title in nineteen years.

The bullish striker had not played since the semi final match at the African Cup of Nations against Mali and he is set to miss out of this weekend's World Cup qualifier against the Harambee Stars of Kenya.

Pope Francis Faces First Allegation, Vatican Reacts

 SOCIETY:

The Vatican has denied that Pope Francis failed to speak out against human rights abuses during military rule in his native Argentina. 

"There has never been a credible, concrete accusation against him," said Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi, adding he had never been charged.

The spokesman blamed the accusations on "anti-clerical left-wing elements that are used to attack the Church".

One allegation concerns the abduction in 1976 of two Jesuits by Argentina's military government, suspicious of their work among slum-dwellers.

As the priests' provincial superior at the time, Jorge Bergoglio was accused by some of having failed to shield them from arrest - a charge his office flatly denied.

Judges investigating the arrest and torture of the two men - who were freed after five months - questioned Cardinal Bergoglio as a witness in 2010.

Another accusation levelled against him from the Dirty War era is that he failed to follow up a request to help find the baby of a woman kidnapped when five months' pregnant pregnant and killed in 1977. It is believed the baby was illegally adopted.

The cardinal testified in 2010 that he had not known about baby thefts until well after the junta fell - a claim relatives dispute.

Source: BBC

No Classico For UCL Quarter Final

 Sports: Football

 

Spanish giants, FC Barcelona, who overhauled a 2-0 first leg deficit to beat AC Milan in the last 16 of the Champions League this week, avoided local rivals Real Madrid in the quarter finals.

The La liga runaway leaders will face rising force PSG with the first leg to be played at Stade De France.

PSG's former Barca frontman Zlatan Ibrahimovic will miss the first leg through suspension.

The french leaders sports director; Leonardo told TV channel BeIN Sport: "We are going to play against the best team - not just because of what they did this week, but because of what they have been doing in the past years.

Meanwhile, Nine-times winners Real Madrid will take on Galatasaray in a tie which pits Jose Mourinho, against his former Chelsea player Didier Drogba. The first leg will be played at the Bernabeu in Spain.

The Turkish champions overcame Schalke 04 of Germany 4-3 on aggregate in the last 16.

Bundesliga champions Borussia Dortmund were drawn against Champions League newcomers Malaga in another quarter-final tie with the Spaniards at home in the first leg.

The final match of the round will see four-times winners Bayern Munich face a resurgent Juventus in the pick of the quarter-finals draw.

Bayern, beaten finalists last season when Chelsea lifted the trophy, will first host the Serie A champions who are back in the quarter-finals after a seven-year absence.

Bayern chief executive Karl-Heinz Rummenigge told reporters after the draw that pitch his team against the twice European champions.

 "Statistically we have not had good experiences with Juventus. It will be difficult and we will need to have two good days against them to reach the semis." 

Juve director Pavel Nedved said: "Bayern are one of the hardest teams that we could have faced. We have to approach the tie positively. I'm proud that Juve are among the top eight sides in Europe and the only Italian side in the draw."

The first legs will be played on April 2 or 3 and the second legs on April 9 or 10.

Draw for the Champions League quarterfinals:

Malaga v Borussia Dortmund

Real Madrid v Galatasaray

Paris St Germain v Barcelona

Bayern Munich v Juventus

Revealed: Why Pope Francis Only Has One Lung

SOCIETY:
 
Pope Francis is a pioneering pontiff in many ways — he’s the first to take the name of Francis, the first pope from South America, and the first to don the papal robes with one lung.

According to the Associated Press, the new Pope had one of his organs removed as a teenager, presumably after a bout with an infection. At that time, it’s possible that antibiotic treatments that are commonly used today to treat such infections were not as available, and to protect patients from further health problems doctors removed the lung as way to stop the infection from spreading. 

“It was probably a pretty bad infection, and maybe even an abscess, that might have caused him to bleed,” says Dr. John Belperio, association professor of pulmonary and critical care medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California Los Angeles. “If he were bleeding a lot in the lung, the only thing to do is to resect the lung, take it out, to stop the bleeding.”

Most bacterial infections wouldn’t cause such serious damage to the lung tissue, but, says Dr. Ronald Crystal, professor of medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, some strains, such as staphylococci, are more destructive and could eat away at the delicate organ, leaving doctors with no choice but to remove the affected tissue to prevent more widespread health problems.

Anything from pneumonia to a fungus or even tuberculosis could have caused the initial infection, which, if it wasn’t controlled properly, would have resulted in removal of the lung.

Other possible reasons for the surgery include a birth defect that caused an abnormality in the lung tissue, or an unusual growth of blood vessels into the air sacs that would obstruct normal breathing.

Fortunately, the lungs are a redundant system, and losing one lung doesn’t seriously compromise health. The only concern Pope Francis faced, and will continue to face, is that he has less respiratory reserve than someone with two intact lungs. That means he may be at slightly higher risk of complications from influenza or more vulnerable to succumbing to pneumonia. But, says Belperio, the fact that the 76-year old has lived a relatively healthy life so far demonstrates that his surgery did little to hamper his ability to live a full and active life.

In fact, animal studies suggest that the lung has a remarkable ability to regenerate, and some preliminary work in young children shows that they may be able to regrow some amount of lost lung tissue as well.

As long as the Pope takes extra precautions to protect against infection — including getting vaccinated against pneumonia and having a flu shot every year — there’s no reason to believe the health of the Church’s 266th pontiff will be an issue. “He’ll do fine,” says Crystal.

SOURCE: Yahoo.com