....HEROES , JUST FOR ONE DAY

 Uh uh - here we go.....its that time of year when the footballers start stretching their legs again, only to get tired by , oh , around December or so..........so lets see........

Man City, at some £500 million by far and away the most expensively assembled football team in the UK and probably the Universe , got stuffed by United last Sunday in the Community Shield Cup, having only arrived at Wembley at 1.30pm for a 2.30pm kick-off ..........and they couldn't play their new £38 million striker Sergio Aguero as he has had trouble finding a pair of football boots to fit since arriving in the UK . Apparently his ill-fitting footwear caused blisters so painful that he was forced to remain on the bench.......thats ' remain on the bench ' as in being payed £200,000.00 per week for it. Nice work , Sergio !....earning that sort of wedge whilst sitting on your arse nursing a blister obviously beats slogging up and down alpine passes whilst carrying three fractured ribs , as the cyclist David Millar did in last years Tour.

Lets have one more look at those cyclists........

Johnny  Hoogaland , just after he was put through a barbed wire fence at about 30kph by a French tv car - having been patched up by the race doctor he got back on and rode some 40k to the end of the stage ; one rest day and thirty stitches later  he was back with his team , riding on for another two weeks through the Pyrenees and the Alps , up to the finish in Paris.....he finished 74th.

.....and Laurens Ten Dam - only ten stiches this time, after going straight into a ditch and over the handlebars.........he finished in Paris, placed 58th.

Bradley Wiggins broke his collarbone on Stage 7 : the following Monday it was plated , and by the Friday he was back on the bike . He is hoping to be back racing in time for the Vuelta a Espana , the Tour of Spain and the third big tour of the year , on August 20th......

A good domestique in a professional team - there are 18 professional teams in total competing on the Tours - will earn  between 40k - 100k , much the same as footballers ; oh , sorry , that's in a year - I forgot ; footballers earn that in a week ..........Mark Cavendish , a favorite of this blogsite , signed a three year contract in 2008 with his then current team HTC for around 40k pa.....

Still , once the Tour de France is finished for the year they can have a good long rest , not having to play week in / week out like the footballers..........or maybe not . In the five days following the finish of the Tour in Paris on the Sunday , Philippe Gilbert of Omega  Pharma-Lotto rode five Criterium , then on the Saturday rode the one day Classica de San Sebastian - which he won......and on Saturday August 20th they all meet up again fot the three week tour of Spain , the Vuelta a Espana  ........

How about a nice programmed easy lead-in to next years Olympics ?  The Tour de France will finish on the sunday in Paris , as usual ; six days later on the following Saturday it's the opening day of the Olympics and the Cycling road race . The gold medal is up for grabs, Cavendish and the rest fighting it out.

.....as Mark Cavendish says, ' Well, we are professionals - that's what we do '.

Maybe the footballers get tired just counting their money......or trying to find a pair of boots that fit.