Those Sporting Cats Trivia Quiz

Answer: Tiger Woods

Born Eldrick, but called Tiger by his father from a young age, Woods was marked for greatness almost from birth. An appearance on US television alongside Bob Hope came at just two years of age, and he began winning tournaments aimed at players older than him from the moment he was old enough to enter them.

An impressive amateur was followed by a stellar professional career that saw him rapidly rise to the top of the game. In 1997, one year after turning pro, he won his first major, the US Masters. In doing so, he became the youngest winner of the tournament, and set new records for lowest score (-18) and biggest winning margin (12 shots) for the tournaments.

Just over three years later, at the age of 24, Woods completed his career slam. Victory in the 1999 US PGA Championship was followed in 2000 by victories in The US and British Opens.

Answer: Cameroon

Cameroon first qualified for the FIFA World Cup in 1982 when the tournament was held in Spain. They were eliminated in the first round, despite not losing any of their three games, which included a 1-1 draw against eventual winners, Italy.

In 1990, Cameroon shot into the public eye with a stunning and unexpected 1-0 victory over reigning champions, Argentina, in the competition's opening game. This victory was achieved despite Cameroon ending the game with only nine men, after two of the players were red-carded. A further victory over Romania meant that Cameroon qualified for the second round. There, they met Colombia and, with two goals from their new world superstar, 38-year old Roger Milla, they prevailed to set up a quarterfinal meeting with England.

Many observers suggested that Cameroon was unfortunate to lose the match, having played better than England for large portions of the game. However, despite leading 2-1 with less than ten minutes to play, Cameroon were to give away two penalties, both scored by Gary Lineker, to be knocked out of the competition.

In 2000, Cameroon became the first African nation to win gold in the Olympic football competition.

Answer: Miloslav Mecir

Mecir was twice a finalist in a Grand Slam competition, at the 1986 US Open and the 1989 Australian Open, losing both finals to Ivan Lendl. He reached the semi-final of both the other Slam competitions and came close to reaching the final at Wimbledon in 1988 when, after holding a two-set lead he was beaten by eventual winner, Stefan Edberg.

He gained revenge over Edberg in a similarly entertaining game at the semifinal stage of the Seoul Olympics tennis competition later that same year. His victory in five sets led to a final meeting with Tim Mayotte of the United States, which Mecir won in four sets. Mecir also claimed bronze in the men's doubles at the same Games.

Answer: Carolina Panthers

Carolina became the first new team to be accepted into the NFL for almost 20 years when they were announced admission to the NFC West in 1995. Their bid for inclusion had been boosted by the remarkable backing of 40,000 fans who bought permanent seat licenses in their new stadium within a day of them being put on sale.

Carolina topped the NFC West in their second season, eventually reaching the conference championship game were they were defeated by Green Bay. After such a strong start, the Panthers suffered several losing seasons before they reached the playoffs again in the 2003 season. Victories over the Dallas Cowboys and the St Louis Rams took them to the championship game for a second time. This time, they were victorious, beating the Philadelphia Eagles 29-23 in overtime.

Super Bowl XXXVIII was held in Houston in February 2004. The Panthers pushed the Patriots all the way in the game before falling to a field goal with just four seconds left on the clock that gave New England a 32-29 win.

Answer: Phil Tufnell

Whilst Tufnell infuriated successive England coaches and captains with his relaxed, jovial attitude he was often called upon whenever it looked like a turning pitch. He earned the epithet of "the best English spinner of his generation" with his career stats, which saw him take more than 1000 wickets, a feat rarely achieved by players of his era.

His unpopularity with those in charge of the England team was not mirrored by the English fans, or indeed the opposition's fans, who enjoyed his on-field antics.

Answer: Argentina

Argentina's third place performance at the 2007 World Cup bettered their previous best performance in the competition, which was a quarterfinal appearance in 1999 where they had been defeated by France.

Their success in 2007 began with the opening match of the tournament in which they claimed the first of their two victories over France, who were hosting the tournament. That 17-12 win was followed by three more victories in the first round pool games that left Argentina at the top of the group. Their reward was a quarterfinal against Scotland, a team they had beaten in every meeting since 1990. A 19-13 victory took them to a first ever semifinal in which they were heavily beaten by eventual winners South Africa. The third/fourth place play-off saw Argentina victorious over France for a second time in the tournament, this time by a more comfortable margin of 34-10.

Answer: Manx Missile

He also has the nicknamed the "Manx Express". Cavendish had a very successful amateur career on the track before he took to professional road racing. He won gold at the World Track Championships of 2005 in the Madison competition, a victory that he repeated in 2008 after he had turned professional. He also claimed gold for the Isle of Man at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in the scratch race.

A Manx cat is a breed of domesticated cat that has no tail.

Answer: Eusebio

Eusebio joined Benfica in 1960, moving from his native Mozambique, then known as Portuguese East Africa. In his 15 years at the club he scored more than 300 goals and appeared in four European Cup finals, winning the first of them. His tremendous success at the 1966 World Cup finals, when Portugal finished third, was never to be repeated as, sadly, Portugal never again qualified for the finals during Eusebio's playing career.

As part of FIFA's 100-year anniversary celebrations, Eusebio was named amongst the greatest living footballers. He was also named as Portugal's greatest player of the previous 50 years.

Answer: Jaguar Racing

Jaguar Cars began life as the Swallow Sidecar Company in 1922 making, perhaps unsurprisingly, motorcycle sidecars. The Jaguar brand was launched as SS Jaguar in 1935 and the SS was dropped during World War II due to the association of those letters with Nazi Germany. Ford acquired the Jaguar company in 1989 and ran the business as a subsidiary for 19 years before selling to Tata Motors in 2008.

Jaguar as a racing marque is perhaps best associated with Le Mans, where in the 1950s the Jaguar C-type and D-type notched up five wins between them. Jaguar Racing had considerably less success in Formula One. Five years of racing produced only two podium finishes, both third places for Eddie Irvine in 2001 at Monaco and at the 2002 Italian Grand Prix. Ford's Jaguar Racing enterprise was sold to Red Bull Racing at the end of the 2004 season.

Answer: Tommie Smith & John Carlos

Often forgotten in the controversy over the medal ceremony is the fact that Tommie Smith's winning run in the final was the first time that an athlete had completed the 200m in under 20 seconds. Smith's winning time was an impressive 19.83s, a time that was to remain unbeaten for eleven years.

Both Smith and Carlos suffered for their stand. Both were banned from the US team, who bowed to the demands and threats of IOC president Avery Brundage. Another to suffer the consequences was silver medalist, Peter Norman of Australia. He supported the actions of his fellow medalists and donned the badge of the Olympic Project for Human Rights during the ceremony to demonstrate this. On his return to Australia, he too was ostracised and was never picked for another Australian Olympic team.

Bob Beamon and Ralph Boston won gold and bronze in the men's long jump in Mexico City, Hines and Greene won gold and bronze in the men's 100m and Evans and Freeman claimed gold and bronze in the men's 400m. All three gold medalists also claimed new world records.