Outside Edge

When the New York Mets baseball team's website asked fans to vote for a new theme song, they probably didn't expect the winner to be fortysomething Brit Rick Astley's 1987 chartbuster 'Never Gonna Give You Up'. But it was duly played at Shea Stadium on Tuesday, to widespread apathy, before the Mets realised they had been "rickrolled", a web prank dedicated to getting the ditty played as often as possible. Astley, on the comeback trail, says he finds the phenomenon "a bit spooky"; others suspect an inspired marketing campaign. But while motorsport's spanker-in-chief Max Mosley could do with some positive spin at present, perhaps Astley's PR, Natasha Nazi-Angileh, is not the girl for him.

18

Number of holes-in-one achieved at the Masters before Ian Poulter's at the 16th on Thursday. Number of bleached-blond Englishmen with a curious dress sense who have won the Masters: 0.

Male cheerleaders of the week

Unusual marketing tactics at another baseball club, the Florida Marlins, who unveiled a new all-male cheerleading group, the Manatees, at this season's opening game. Politely described as "plus-size", the Manatees weigh in at between 225 and 435 pounds apiece, with an age range veering into the sixties. So no gimmick there, then. The name was presumably chosen to chime with the aquatic theme of the other cheerleaders, the female Mermaids and the junior Minnows, but it still seems a trifle harsh; manatees are large, blubbery dozy-looking sea mammals. Couldn't they have chosen something a bit more showbizzy – the Marlin Brandos, perhaps?

Good week for

Ottis Gibson, West Indian pace bowler, named as one of Wisden's Cricketers of the Year at 39... Newcastle Eagles, took the British Basketball League title in overtime... Sarah Ayton, Sarah Webb and Pippa Wilson, British sailors, won the Yngling European Championship... and Cardiff's Swalec Stadium, chosen to host the First Test inthe 2009 Ashes series.

Bad week for

Petr Cech, Chelsea goalkeeper, needed 50 stitches in facial wound after colliding with a team-mate in training... Lewis Hamilton, made several errors during the Bahrain GP and finished 13th... Karren Brady and David Sullivan, managing director and co-owner of Birmingham City, arrested during investigation into false accounting and conspiracy to defraud... and the Olympic torch, extinguished three times during protests over Tibet.

Loyal supporter of the week

Foreign owners, foreign directors, foreign players; the Premier League can be mighty confusing these days. And no one seems more confused than Sasin Monvoisin, a Thai businesswoman appointed as a director of Manchester City following Thaksin Shinawatra's takeover. After City's home defeat by Chelsea last weekend she was spotted outside the Chelsea dressing room asking the visitors to autograph her shirt. Her Chelsea shirt. Still, nobody can accuse her of not being Blue through and through.

s.redfern@independent.co.uk