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Consistently inconsistent

If you look at Sunderland's start to the season - WLWLWLWDWL - it looks vaguely impressive. An away win at Bolton on the opening day of the season looked to be a sign of things to come. Sunderland normally find...

Posted by Mike Grady on October 26, 2009 1:50 PM

Rivals reunited

A Jon McCarthy lookalike Bluenose and a rippling hulk of a Villa supporter commentate on the Second City derby for Sky's Fanzone....

Posted by Mat Kendrick on September 14, 2009 12:57 PM

Avatar preview in Birmingham fails to live up to the hype

Just back from the 15-minute sneak preview of James Cameron's CGI fest at Birmingham's Cineworld Broad Street. So does sci-fi adventure Avatar live up to all the hype about its ground-breaking 3D and special effects surrounds? In a word,...

Posted by Paul Cole on August 21, 2009 7:49 PM

Watchmen artist Dave Gibbons on way to Birmingham IMAX

Great news for Watchmen fans. Word is that Birmingham's blockbuster IMAX cinema is lining up a special showing of the anti-hero movie in September. What's more, Watchmen artist Dave Gibbons will be on hand to do a Q&A session...

Posted by Paul Cole on June 20, 2009 6:47 PM

Star Trek : see the movie at IMAX

Just back from a sneak preview of the new Star Trek movie at Birmingham IMAX. It's a BIG movie - but it's even bigger on the giant screen. So whatever you do, get down to Thinktank for the full Federation...

Posted by Paul Cole on May 5, 2009 7:41 PM

High note for Highwood

Congratulations to Solihull licensee Dave Hunt, who made it into the final four contenders for this year's Publican Awards. Dave's run The Highwood in Solihull for the past decade, recently switching from manager to leaseholder. Full marks, also, to: The...

Posted by Steve Green on April 2, 2009 9:10 PM

Springtime in Solihull

Solihull CAMRA has unveiled its spring schedule (for further information on local activities, check out the branch's award-winning website): 20 March: Beer and balti at the Anchor, Bristol Road, Birmingham, 8:00pm. 19 April: Earlswood ramble and pub crawl, starting at...

Posted by Steve Green on March 3, 2009 8:45 PM

The League of Champions!!!!

So last night, instead of going on my weekly snowboarding jaunt to Tamworth Snowdome, I instead settled in for a night of Champions League action. The sad part was I was watching in bed as I had to get up...

Posted by Luke Wilkins on February 25, 2009 6:35 AM

Hiddink deflates Villa, Wolves & Blues stutter, and Tigers show their claws!

Well I hyped it up on Friday as the game that would act as a yard stick to see how far Villa had come and unfortunately for Martin O'Neill's men, while they have made great strides, the early kick off...

Posted by Luke Wilkins on February 23, 2009 7:13 PM

Football returns and its the "BIG ONE" for Villa!

So as the 6 nations sides take a well earned break this week once more all eyes turn to the Premiership, and what a game we have in store for us at 12.45pm when 3rd plays 4th at Villa Park,...

Posted by Luke Wilkins on February 20, 2009 2:06 PM

Birmingham: The home of invention!

BIRMINGHAM might be classed as Britain's number one regional city. But its achievements are frequently overlooked and character belittled by outsiders. They mock our Midland accents, they sneer at our concrete constructions and cringe at our to glam rock...

Posted by Fionnuala Bourke on September 16, 2008 2:31 PM

The Who's Who of brew

Rather like the minor celebrities and second-rank aristocrats who scurry to pick up each year's edition of Who's Who to see if they've merited a mention, arguably the major publishing event on the beerhunter's calendar is the release of the...

Posted by Steve Green on September 15, 2008 5:45 PM

Closing Time

I just returned home from watching the scary thriller The Strangers at the Cineworld on Birmingham's Broad Street. But for all that movie's chills and blood spills, the evening's most horrific moments look place a few hundred yards away in...

Posted by Steve Green on September 2, 2008 12:10 AM

Glynn Purnell : my pride and baby joy

I love my city. But yesterday I was horrified. During the Friday evening service, the restaurant was full of chattering happy customers enjoying my culinary delight and my front of house team gliding across my new heavily polished slate floor....

Posted by Glynn Purnell on August 23, 2008 7:27 PM

BRAT club

No, its not a club for annoying adolescents - its Birmingham Running and Triathlon Club And after five weeks of training on my own I thought I would give it a go. I joined them on one of their 'gentler'...

Posted by Paul Bradley on July 30, 2008 9:59 PM

Batman breaks Brum records

The Dark Knight has set a new box office record at Birmingham's IMAX cinema. More than 6,000 tickets have already been snapped up to see Batman on the five-storey high screen. And that smashes Harry Potter out of sight...

Posted by Paul Cole on July 24, 2008 12:20 PM

Priceless

I've just been totting up how much this running lark is costing me...and this is just after four weeks! New running shoes = £45 New MP3 player = £35 New shorts = £5 New running vests = £10 Race fee...

Posted by Paul Bradley on July 21, 2008 2:58 PM

Taste of Birmingham show leaves sour taste in my mouth

Once again the Taste of Birmingham has arrived. Yippee.... (!) I know that this event is meant to be great for Birmingham but personally I find it irritating. This is purely because it is supposed to be about Birmingham and...

Posted by Glynn Purnell on July 11, 2008 10:37 AM

What's Happened to New Style?

It was a very warm afternoon way back in August 2002 and yours truly had just finished interviewing cricket legend Sir Viv Richards for BBC Midlands Today. As I prepared to do my piece-to-camera, I reckoned that Birmingham was...

Posted by Veron Graham on May 26, 2008 8:49 AM

New boy Prica gives Birmingham the Blues

SUNDERLAND 2 BIRMINGHAM CITY 0 Rade Prica came off the bench to score on his debut as Sunderland climbed out of the bottom three with a win over relegation rivals Birmingham. Sunderland were already leading thanks to Daryl Murphy's 15th...

Posted by James Hunter on January 30, 2008 12:01 AM