Sport Mirrors Business

I love my sport. Whether playing or watching there is almost none of them I can't enjoy on some level.

While football has always been my number one love I really don’t think there is a sporting event I enjoy more than the Ryder Cup. For minute by minute drama, where every single shot feels like it could make a difference to the outcome, I just can't be beaten. I take it over The Olympics and even The World Cup. So like many of you I'm sure, my weekend was spent glued to the box till late in to the night biting nails and hoping that the Americans would crumble at some point. Sadly it didn’t happen and I was left rather childishly wondering what goes through the head of a new parent when naming their offspring 'Hunter', 'Chad' or 'Boo'. Sour grapes I know.

The roller coaster of emotion that tournament puts its players and supporters through was mirrored in the financial world again this week. Share tumbling then rising with extraordinary peaks and troughs and some of  the banks that we always believed to be impregnable disappearing almost overnight. It has been forcing the average man in the street to really discover more about how the world of finance works. What struck me particularly was that there were a real parallels one could draw between the sporting and business events I was watching unfold.

Most notably; Momentum and Confidence. Whether it be with you or against you the tide of positive or negative confidence, with any sort of momentum behind it, is almost impossible to stop. In fact, from what I am witnessing it needs to run out of steam rather than be stopped. You could apply the same logic to the housing market undoubtedly.

As a footnote;, I honestly don't begrudge a sportsperson, having dedicated their life to be one the finest exponents of their art in the world and providing me and millions of others entertainment in the process, a penny of the fabulous fortune their talent brings them. However, how the city spivs have been able to plunder ludicrous bonuses for so many years, apparently with little regard to success or failure, without some sort of regulation and control staggers me.