From the Hootsmon:

An artist plotting his own “field of dreams” has won a £460,000 grant – to create a full-size football pitch in a secluded part of a Scottish woodland.


Craig Coulthard, 28, has been selected to create one of 12 artworks across the UK to help celebrate the staging of the 2012 Olympics in London.


The artist, who lives in Edinburgh, will spend the best part of 18 months creating a football pitch in the Borders – which can only be seen from the Edinburgh-London flight path. But the pitch will only be in use for one day – just before the Games – before being left to be “taken over by nature”. The games will be played by volunteers who have gained British citizenship since the last Olympics.


Mr Coulthard said: “It’s not the kind of project you do without a substantial grant or subsidy, so I was delighted to hear I’d won.


Other winning entries include: three 30ft hand-crocheted lions, which will be displayed in a huge case in Nottingham; an environmentally-sustainable watermill to float on the River Tyne, and the recreation of Coventry icon Lady Godiva as a giant human puppet, who will lead a cast of thousands in a processional performance.

Glad to see that Olympic money isn’t being wasted, and is going towards sustainable and beneficial projects that for decades to come will….argh…todos somos condenados.