Cristiano Ronaldo wins 2013 Ballon d'Or award

Portugal football star Cristiano Ronaldo ended the four-year reign by Lionel Messi when he was awarded the 2013 FIFA Ballon d'Or in Zurich on Monday.

The tearful 28-year-old Real Madrid star, who won the award in 2008, had been the overwhelming favourite to pip Barcelona and Argentina wonder Lionel Messi, winner of the previous four years, and France's Franck Ribery, who claimed the treble with Bayern Munich in 2013.

Ronaldo won with 27.99% of the votes ahead of Messi (24.72%) while Ribery was third (23.36%) according to France Football, co-organisers of the award with FIFA.

Ronaldo, who was widely expected to win after news spread on social media earlier in the day that seven members of his family were joining him in Zurich and his club Real were transmitting the award ceremony live on their official television channel in a change to the programmed schedule, broke down in tears on stage during his victory speech.

Ribery, who won the Champions League, Bundesliga and German Cup with Bayern last season, before adding the European Supercup and Club World Cup before the turn of the year, had been the early front-runner.

With 66 goals in 56 matches this year, more than Messi and Ribery's combined 65, no-one could deny Ronaldo was a worthy winner.

It is the second time he has picked up the award and comes in a season in which he won nothing with either club or country, an unusual situation for a Ballon d'Or winner. 

Nelson Mandela, dies at 95

Former South African President Nelson Mandela died peacefully at his Johannesburg home on Thursday after a prolonged lung infection, President Jacob Zuma said. He was 95. In a nationally televised address, Zuma said South Africa’s first black president would be accorded a full state funeral. He ordered flags to be flown at half mast. Nelson Mandela guided South Africa from the shackles of apartheid to multi-racial democracy, as an icon of peace and reconciliation who came to embody the struggle for justice around the world. Imprisoned for nearly three decades for his fight against white minority rule, Mandela emerged determined to use his prestige and charisma to bring down apartheid while avoiding a civil war.

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was born on July 18, 1918, destined to lead as the son of the chief councillor to the paramount chief of the Thembu people in Transkei. He chose to devote his life to the fight against white domination. He studied at Fort Hare University, an elite black college, but left in 1940 short of completing his studies and became involved with the African National Congress (ANC), founding its Youth League in 1944 with Oliver Tambo and Walter Sisulu. Mandela worked as a law clerk then became a lawyer who ran one of the few practices that served blacks. In 1952 he and others were charged for violating the Suppression of Communism Act but their nine-month sentence was suspended for two years. Mandela was among the first to advocate armed resistance to apartheid, going underground in 1961 to form the ANC’s armed wing, Umkhonto weSizwe, or ‘Spear of the Nation’ in Zulu. He left South Africa and travelled the continent and Europe, studying guerrilla warfare and building support for the ANC. After his return in 1962, Mandela was arrested and sentenced to five years for incitement and illegally leaving the country. While serving that sentence, he was charged with sabotage and plotting to overthrow the government along with other anti-apartheid leaders in the Rivonia Trial. Branded a terrorist by his enemies, Mandela was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964, isolated from millions of his countrymen as they suffered oppression, violence and forced resettlement under the apartheid regime of racial segregation. He was incarcerated on Robben Island, a penal colony off Cape Town, where he would spend the next 18 years before being moved to mainland prisons. He was behind bars when an uprising broke out in the huge township of Soweto in 1976 and when others erupted in violence in the 1980s. But when the regime realised it was time to negotiate, it was Mandela to whom it turned. In his later years in prison, he met President PW Botha and his successor de Klerk. When he was released on February 11, 1990, walking away from the Victor Verster prison hand-in-hand with his wife Winnie, the event was watched live by television viewers across the world. “As I finally walked through those gates … I felt even at the age of 71 that my life was beginning anew. My 10,000 days of imprisonment were at last over,” Mandela wrote of that day.

Rafael Nadal voted the greatest ever Spanish sports personality

Tennis ace Rafael Nadal was voted the greatest Spanish sports person in history Tuesday by readers of a Spanish sports daily.

The current Tennis World number 1 and the winner of 13 Grand Slam's received the award at the Gala for the 75th anniversary of the Spanish sports paper Diario Marca, reported Xinhua.

The Spanish player was voted for by readers of the paper ahead of five times Tour de France winner, Miguel Indurain and basketball star, Pau Gasol, who is without doubt the greatest Spanish basketball player of all time.

Nadal's feats had been recognised by Diario Marca's readers in 2007 when he won the Marca Legend award.

The tennis ace has enjoyed a fantastic 2013, coming back from a career threatening knee injury to win events such as the French Open, as well as claiming his 25th and 26th ATP Masters 1000 titles in Montreal and Cincinnati, before then winning the US Open, beating Novak Djokovic in the final.

Djokovic would have his revenge by beating Nadal in the China Open, but the fact he reached the final of the event meant Nadal ends 2013 back at the top of the world rankings once again.

Apart from the special award for Nadal, the Marca gala also recognised the performances of many other Spanish sports stars, such as Formula 1 driver, Fernando Alonso and rally driver, Carlos Sainz, Gasol and the former captain on the Spanish women's national team, Amaya Valdemoro, cyclist Alberto Contador, Spanish national football team coach, Vicente dl Bosque and Real Madrid goalkeeper, Iker Casillas, among many others.

There was also time to remember some of the stars who no longer alive, such as golfer Severiano Ballasteros, footballers, Ricardo Zamora and Telmo Zarra and former basketball coach Antonio Diaz Miguel.

Arrambam Movie Review

Arrambam has got a flying start at the Box Office with advance booking getting massive response from the audience. The movie has opened up to packed houses in the majority of theatres in Chennai and abroad.

The movie opens up with Mumbai witnessing a series of bomb explosions. AK alias Ashok Kumar (Ajith) is the man behind it. Soon he kidnaps Arya, a hacker, and includes him in his larger plan. A flashback is revealed, where we are told about Maya (Nayantara), Anitha (Taapsee Pannu), who is the girlfriend of Arya and an aspiring TV journalist. Ajith threatens to kill Anitha in order to make Arya to work for him. They successfully hack and bring down the server of a media company. Honest cop played by Kishore catches them and another flashback takes us to Ajith Kumar's past life in ATS (Anti Terrorist Squad) along with Sanjay (Rana Daggubati).

There are also shades of Hollywood movie Sword Fish. Nevertheless, it has been tuned to suit the Tamil audience. Arrambam is about the nexuses between politics and media, in which a cop becomes a victim. The base of the story is a bullet proof jacket scam and the script is well-crafted by Vishnuvardhan and SuBha.

There are interesting twists and turns, which come as a surprise to the audience, from the word go. The first half puts a perfect foundation for the movie to make the second half an interesting affair. Most part of the movie is engaging sans well-written comedy scenes. Arrambam is a serious movie and the comedy part has taken a backseat in the script.

People would have enjoyed the movie, if it had a lot of comedy scenes considering the serious nature of Arrambam. Arrambam is not crisp and it is one of the drawbacks of the flick. In the second half, the story becomes predictable to some extent after the motive behind Ashok Kumar's revenge is revealed.

Coming to performances, Ajith Kumar has given his best. Let me warn you, Arrambam doesn't project Ajith Kumar like a superhero. 

Please don't visit the theatres thinking that you will see a Billa in Arrambam. The director has not exaggerated the heroism of Ajith's character in the flick. This has to be praised.

Thala Ajith's Arrambam Movie Review

Arrambam has got a flying start at the Box Office with advance booking getting massive response from the audience. The movie has opened up to packed houses in the majority of theatres in Chennai and abroad.

The movie opens up with Mumbai witnessing a series of bomb explosions. AK alias Ashok Kumar (Ajith) is the man behind it. Soon he kidnaps Arya, a hacker, and includes him in his larger plan. A flashback is revealed, where we are told about Maya (Nayantara), Anitha (Taapsee Pannu), who is the girlfriend of Arya and an aspiring TV journalist. Ajith threatens to kill Anitha in order to make Arya to work for him. They successfully hack and bring down the server of a media company. Honest cop played by Kishore catches them and another flashback takes us to Ajith Kumar's past life in ATS (Anti Terrorist Squad) along with Sanjay (Rana Daggubati).

There are also shades of Hollywood movie Sword Fish. Nevertheless, it has been tuned to suit the Tamil audience. Arrambam is about the nexuses between politics and media, in which a cop becomes a victim. The base of the story is a bullet proof jacket scam and the script is well-crafted by Vishnuvardhan and SuBha.

There are interesting twists and turns, which come as a surprise to the audience, from the word go. The first half puts a perfect foundation for the movie to make the second half an interesting affair. Most part of the movie is engaging sans well-written comedy scenes. Arrambam is a serious movie and the comedy part has taken a backseat in the script.

People would have enjoyed the movie, if it had a lot of comedy scenes considering the serious nature of Arrambam. Arrambam is not crisp and it is one of the drawbacks of the flick. In the second half, the story becomes predictable to some extent after the motive behind Ashok Kumar's revenge is revealed.

Coming to performances, Ajith Kumar has given his best. Let me warn you, Arrambam doesn't project Ajith Kumar like a superhero. 

Please don't visit the theatres thinking that you will see a Billa in Arrambam. The director has not exaggerated the heroism of Ajith's character in the flick. This has to be praised.