Sunday 10 September 2017

Plastic Brit Chris Froome

Bearing in mind that until today no Briton has ever won Spain's Grand Tour and it took 110 years for the first Briton to win a Tour de France, you'd expect the man who then wins four to be the most loved and admired sportsmen of this or any other era, unless it's Chris Froome that is.
I really don't like to see sportsmen and women who wrap themselves in the Union Flag and declare themselves British when they were born elsewhere and should be running, jumping, cycling or hitting people under the flag of their own country.
It is especially prolific in athletics, Somalian born Mo Farah would make sure that he squeezed into every interview how proud he was to be British and we recently had tennis player Johanna Konta who represented Australia until 2012 when she suddenly remembered oops, i'm actually British.
Before her we had Greg Rudseski and Lennox Lewis announcing in broad Canadian accents that they were as English as fish and chips and during the apartheid years the England cricket team had as many South Africans putting on the pads as English.
Our very own Bradley Wiggins is Belgian and it is cycling where our latest 'Great Brit' has covered himself in the flag and did it for Blightly, Saint George and the Queen, ladies and gentlemen, Chris Froome.
That would be the Chris Froome who was born in Nairobi, Kenya, was raised in South Africa and rode for Kenya before discovering his British passport and going to live in the quintessentially British town of Monaco in France.
Yes winning cycling races is a great feat and congratulations but don't try and kid us that you did it for Britain, a country that you have never even lived in.

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