"If you ever go to Britain"
I have been there and actually I quite liked both lager and ale. Still, in Prague ...

If MNb is right, then the "connoisseurs" are mostly limiting themselves to a particular type of beer (lager) made (unless they are importing their ingredients) from only a few varieties of hops.  This is rather like saying that wine connoisseurs only drink sauvignon blanc from New Zealand or pinot noir from Burgundy.

MNb, 

That's absolute malarkey.

Connoisseurs of beer can find great beer anywhere from Oregon to Japan!  Ok, the French don't make good beer, but their cider and wines are fantastic.  If you ever go to Britain (and I'm sure you've been there), just go pubbing whereever you go.  You'll find some phenomenal house brews.  

Heck, even here in Colorado, there's a brewery three blocks away that makes some fine beer. There are several excellent breweries in the state, and none are owned by Pete Coors!  The great thing about being a beer connoisseur is that you don't have to be a snob, like so many sommelier-wanna-bees.

On the beer issue: lager is quite big over here but we still drink ale as well.

There are some 'real ale' snobs who won't countenance lager as an alternative.  I am not among them and very much enjoy a pint of lager on a hot day (and, as the Australians say, I've never been cold in my life ...).  We have even started to brew our own lager.  In fact quite a lot of the 'foreign' lager served here is already brewed here under licence, but I am referring to small-scale,usually organic breweries producing specialised lagers with a more distinctive flavour.

Having said that, I do prefer a good pint of real ale.  However, the idea that it should be served warm is wrong, wrong, wrong.  It was very unfortunate that this myth was reinforced by a speech given by our last Prime Minister (John Major).

What is correct is that ale is fermented at a higher temperature than lager using a yeast that forms a thick head on top of the beer (as opposed to lager, which uses a bottom-fermenting yeast i.e. one which sinks to the bottom of the beer).

Real ale (as opposed to keg beer - another thing entirely) then undergoes a secondary fermentation in the cask, which should ideally be stored in a cold dark cellar.  The beer should then be served at cellar (not room) temperature, i.e. cool, but not cold).

Another key point is that no additional gas should be introduced, either to 'preserve' the beer in the cask or in serving it.

More info for those with an interest here: http://www.camra.org.uk/SHWebClass.ASP?WCI=ShowDoc&DocID=2243

I guess is not lager (foreigners and others) but that warm stuff called ale! (Brown ale, & others).

I am curious about this 'dirty tricks' stuff. Do you know it first hand, or is just a nice story that goes round?

I played squash in Britain in Spain. There was a difference...

Suffice it to say that my head is a little sore this morning

A fantastic atmosphere round the ground afterwards (my office is about 15 minutes' walk from the Oval so I popped down after work) and the Aussies here being very sporting about it all, as they were after the Rugby World Cup back in 2003.

My overriding feeling is relief - not so much at the result as at no longer having to: explain to my bemused flatmates (neither of whom know anything about the game) why another England batsman can't have been lbw because the ball struck him outside the line and he was clearly offering a stroke, even though his bat is tucked away behind his pads; drum home the point that Shane Warne is the greatest bowler of all time and so getting out to him is not necessarily a sign of rank incompetence; or come up with reasons why it's OK to have a South African in our team

Well, the last morning is here ... despite a first innings lead and all the delays yesterday, I am still a bit nervous.  Warne is getting the ball to turn prodigiously and I am certain that the seamers will have something to say too.

A lot depends on Vaughan and Trescothick staying together.  After that the batting starts to get a bit worrisome - you can forget about Bell (Thorpe should have played throughout the series imho) and while Pietersen, Flintoff, Collingwood and Jones can all bat, they tend to play very aggressively - which makes it likely they will get out.

On the other hand, all it takes is for one of them to 'fire' and they might put enough runs on the board to make it impossible for Australia to reach the target in time ...

Thank goodness I am at work today and can't spend the day fretting in front of the TV!  Will have to make do with updates from cricinfo.com (and the all-important wicket alert!).