At last, a Premier League football manager has gone public and given voice to a dark suspicion that thousands of us fans have harboured for a long time now. Roberto Mancini, may his name be blessed, says that teams facing the Mighty Manchester United are infected with a fatal lack of belief which amounts a lot of the time to actual fear.

Andy Murray won the first set of the 2013 Australian Open, but then went on to lose the final to Novak Djokovic. The match demonstrates that at this level of the game, it is mental toughness which determines the victor, not superior technical skill.

This is going to sound weird, but for many of our Olympic athletes, the best thing they can do right now is forget about it all for a while and have a good laugh with friends. Hang out, go to the movies, go sightseeing in London... anything to take their mind off the fact they've spent their entire lives preparing for this moment.