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News Headlines on Inspiration FM

Northampton Saints win Challenge Cup, 23 May 2009 Northampton Saints won the European Challenge Cup last night with a 15-3 victory over Bourgoin. The Saints controlled the match throughout both halves in front of a crowd of some 9,000 Northampton fans, scoring all their points by the boot of Stephen Myler. This is Northampton's second major trophy and qualifies them for next season's Heineken Cup which they won back in 2000 with a 9-8 victory over Munster.

Fairytale wins Eurovision Song Contest, 17 May 2009 Norway won the Eurovision Song Contest final of 2009, held yesterday evening at the Olimpiysky Arena in Moscow, by the greatest landslide ever, with an entry entitled "Fairytale", which sounded like it had emerged from a time warp from the days of "Puppet On A String", "Boom Bang A Bang", "Congratulations" and "Save All Your Kisses For Me" mixed with traditional Norwegian violin. The inclusion of the virtuoso performance on the instrument is probably what won the composer and performer Alexander Rybak his votes, since his vocals clearly weren't up to the same standard as Jade Ewen's who put in a good performance which secured her fifth place. Political voting may not have affected the United Kingdom this year, mainly because Jade travelled around Europe promoting the song, which was not done in previous years, but it certainly affected Spain which finished second from bottom even though the song it entered was no worse than the entry from Azerbaijan which came third, beating Turkey and Greece for the best dance track of the night, and if this was a serious contest about choosing the best pop-song should have been the real winner overall. Iceland won the vote for the best ballad, beating all the competition, including Denmark's entry written by Ronan Keating and Chiara from Malta, by a mile and gaining second place. The UK entry, "My Time" composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Diane Warren didn't really belong to this category. Most critics thought it was a weak song, and given the reality that the style of the pop music scene in Europe is represented by Sakis Rouvas of Greece who was second favourite, "My Time" can be seen as nothing more than a novelty act just like Norway, not a serious pop song, which gained the majority of the theatrical and classical music vote beating opera singer come pop diva Melena Emman from Sweden by a landslide. Estonia was the country which benefited most this year from the Slavic block vote but the overall winner was decided well in advance of the competition by the bookies and the media. Eurovision has once again lived up to its reputation of being a popularity contest rather than a serious competition to find the best pop-song in Europe, and has been let down as always by the judging despite the majority of the entries being very good compared to other years. The final positions were; 1. Norway, 2. Iceland, 3. Azerbaijan, 4. Turkey, 5. United Kingdom, 6. Estonia, 7. Greece, 8. France, 9. Bosnia & Herzegovina, 10. Armenia, 11. Russia, 12. Ukraine, 13. Denmark, 14. Moldova, 15. Portugal, 16. Israel, 17. Albania, 18. Croatia. 19. Romania, 20. German, 21. Sweden, 22. Malta, 23. Lithuania, 24. Spain, 25. Finland. review by DJ Aggie, who presents The Mediterranean Mix, on Inspiration FM

President Obama sworn in, 20 January 2009 At 12pm EST this morning, Barack Hussein Obama was sworn in as America's forty fourth president, and became the nations's first ever African-American Commander in Chief. President Obama closed a lack lustre inauguration speech echoing the words of Thomas Paine, one of the fathers of the American revolution. "Let it be said by our children's children, that when we were tested, we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back, nor did we falter, and with eyes fixed on the horizon, and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom, and delivered it safely to future generations. Thank you, God bless you and God bless the United States of America." After the ceremony the new president travelled to the White House, getting out of his armoured limousine on a couple of occasions to walk part of the way, and wave to some of the estimated 2 million onlookers, with his wife Michelle beside him. Now it remains to history to see whether or not he will carry out his promises and reforms and live up to people's expectations.

Northampton's Matt Smith is the new Doctor, 3 January 2009 Northampton born actor Matt Smith who first got into acting at Northampton School for Boys after a serious back injury prevented him from becoming a professional footballer, has been chosen to play the eleventh incarnation of the Time Lord known as the Doctor, in the popular BBC TV series Doctor Who which as been running for over 45 years. Matt Smith's first major TV role was as Jim Taylor along side actress Billie Piper who played the Doctor's former assistant Rose Tyler, in the Sally Lockhart adventures The Ruby in the Smoke and The Shadow in the North which were screened on BBC1 in 2006 and 2007.