French Open beginzzzzz......

The annual snooze-fest known to tennis tragics as the French Open commenced today with the amusing sight of players who aren’t Spanish, South American or Roger Federer, stepping tentatively out onto the surface of red clay like soldiers onto a field of land mines.

The American men, like the proverbial ‘lapins’ in the headlights, were all eliminated in the first round, thereby allowing themselves extra sight-seeing time in Paris.

Lleyton ‘Chuckles’ Hewitt performed his traditional escape act coming from two sets down against former winner Gaston Gaudio to win in five but failed to complete the job in the press conference, graciously praising Gaudio as “an outstanding shotmaker” to the astonishment of the assembled media.

The usual roll call of Robredos, Ferrers, Ferreros, Chelas, Almagros and Monacos have begun their steady, unspectacular and serve/volley-free march through the tournament, though requests from spectators and sponsors to simply play 14 consecutive Federer v Nadal matches over the two weeks were refused by organisers.

Tim Henman, cleverly using the French Open as a warm up to another sustained run to the second round at Wimbledon, found the overwhelming skill of Ernests Gulbis (from noted tennis powerhouse Latvia) too much and lost in straight sets.

In the women’s draw … Henin, Sharapova … a Williams or two, Russians, blah, blah, blah …. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Wimbledon starts on June 25.

Matthews turns to children's lit to improve Lions reading standards

Brisbane Lions coach Leigh Matthews today turned to a classic of children’s literature in a bid to turn around his team’s woeful form and also teach Jonathan Brown how to read.

Referring to AA Milne’s well known stories about a mischievous bear, Matthews spoke in language that would be accessible to his players rather than the usual fire and brimstone laced with profanities.

"We are having an anti-Eeyore week this week," he said.

"You know Eeyore out of Pooh bear - 'Ooooh it's a sad day'. So we are having an anti-Eeyore week."

Making strange references to the Gabba as "The Hundred Acre Wood" and labelling star midfielder Luke Power "poor little Piglet", Matthews seemed optimistic looking ahead to this week’s match against "the Tiggers".

"Apart from Richo, I don’t think they have any horrible Heffalumps playing for them", he said. “So we’re going to be focused on getting our share of the honeypot this week and then running like Rabbits”.

Asked to comment on Matthews unorthodox comments, burly forward Brown adjusted the bolts in his neck and said, “Books … good, pictures … good,” before lumbering off the training track with an illustrated copy of The Wind In The Willows tucked into his shorts.