Ten years have passed, 80 caps have been won, 36 international goals scored and medial and cruciate knee ligaments have been ruptured, yet Michael Owen declares himself the product of his first football experiences.

No more is he the fresh-faced 17-year-old who had Match of the Day pundits rapt for his performance in Liverpool’s 1-1 draw against Wimbledon in 1997, nor is he the tyro who swept past Josй Chamot and Roberto Ayala for that goal against Argentina in 1998. He is 27 now and much has happened in the wasted year since he hurt himself in the World Cup. Sven-Goran Eriksson has departed, David Beckham has been retired and reinstated and a hash has been made of Euro 2008 qualification.

But as supporters look for signs that the striker will be their team’s saviour when he returns to senior international football tonight, their memories will be of Owen the teenager. And they would be right to look far beyond the turbulent last 12 months because he, too, will reflect on his earliest recollections as he seeks to propel England improbably to Austria and Switzerland next summer.

“It is always important to have good first experiences in your life,” he said. “Every challenge you meet, whether your first youth game, your first reserve game, your debut or your first England game, whatever it might be, if you go and do the business in those first games then the self-belief you never lose. You never lose that ability to believe in yourself.

“I am always a great believer in that maybe I have 80% self-belief and if I am playing well then the other 20% is confidence. A lot of other players maybe have 50% self-belief and can play very average and then that confidence can sway from 50%.

“I believe I have a big base of self-belief, bigger than most, and if I am not playing great I still feel I can contribute, and if you give me a chance it does not matter if I have not had a kick because I still feel I have a chance of scoring, the same as if I was playing great. A lot of first experiences I have had have been successful and I know I can draw on them. And, no, I don’t think I can do it against Brazil or Estonia - I know I can.”

Some at Newcastle United might scoff that Owen’s unshakeable self-belief has turned to conceit, since many at his club’s training ground believe he has not shown the commitment this season that has made him England’s most successful striker since Gary Lineker. Though Owen denies any suggestion of indolence, his insistence that he had to be meticulous about his recovery from the knee- ligament problem in order to play two international matches in the space of next six days might lead his paymasters to ponder whether his priorities lie beyond St James’ Park.

“It is different to any other injury I have had,” he said. “With my foot going, the World Cup was on the horizon and I knew I could do with [hastening my return] for Newcastle not only for them but to show I was fit for England. But with this there has not been a stone unturned and I have come back as strong as I have ever been.

“People will talk about my match sharpness but I have got to get a game somewhere and I feel good and feel as fit as I have ever done. I’ve played fine for Newcastle and the B game for England.”

Though he was not talking in the context of any contrast with his experiences at Newcastle - his Football Association minder ensured questions about his club were off limits - Owen conveyed how much he thrives on the adrenaline that comes with carrying the hopes of the nation’s supporters on his shoulders. He leads us to expect vintage performances tonight and in Estonia on Wednesday, since the country’s nerves are taut after a qualification campaign that has left fourth-placed England trailing two points behind the leaders, Croatia, who along with third-placed Russia have a game in hand on Steve McClaren’s men.

“The more the pressure in the game the better for me - I love the high-stakes games,” he said. “With England comes that responsibility and, with my position and the way we play, it is even more so a responsibility to score goals. The hardest thing to do in football is to score goals, and I enjoy that responsibility. I have grown old - or been involved in the national team - with it and I would not have it any other way. I feel when you have that responsibility and people expect you to score I grow another couple of inches.”

Authorized version

Michael Owen is known for his love of racing and when asked gave Frankie Dettori’s Authorized as his tip for tomorrow’s Derby. It is hardly insider knowledge: Authorized is the hottest Derby favourite for a decade and bookies have started taking bets on his margin of victory.

Then again, the last three odds-on favourites for the Derby have been beaten and Dettori has not won it in 14 attempts.

NEW YORK: News Corp., the media company controlled by Rupert Murdoch, will sell eight of its Fox network-affiliated television stations in the U.S. to Oak Hill Capital Partners for about $1.1 billion in cash.

The sale in small markets will leave News Corp. with 27 stations in major markets including New York, Boston and Los Angeles.

The media conglomerate, which owns the New York Post, a controlling stake in BSkyB satellite TV service, and 20th Century Fox movie studio, recently closed a $5.6 billion deal to buy the Wall Street Journal publisher, Dow Jones.

The sale will probably be completed in the third quarter, News Corp. said in a statement Saturday. The purchase will help Oak Hill, the buyout firm founded two years ago by Robert Bass, a Texas oil billionaire, create a broader U.S. network. In May it paid $575 million to acquire stations in Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Iowa and Arkansas from The New York Times Co.

“It is part of News Corp.s strategic decision to shed low-growth, noncore assets,” said Richard Dorfman, managing director of the investment firm Richard Alan.

For Oak Hill, the purchase is “a classic private equity play,” Dorfman said. “Ad dollars are migrating to the Web, but its a government-licensed franchise that can throw off good cash flow and reliably service debt.”

Oak Hill will get WJW in Cleveland; KDVR in Denver; KTVI in St. Louis; WDAF in Kansas City, Missouri; WITI in Milwaukee; KSTU in Salt Lake City, Utah; WBRC in Birmingham, Alabama; and WGHP in Greensboro, North Carolina, according to the News Corp. statement confirmed by Teri Everett, a spokeswoman.

Oak Hill has expanded into leveraged buyouts, high-yield debt and hedge funds, raising more than $4.6 billion from investors, including Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft.

News Corp. hired the New York investment banking firm Allen Co. to advise it on the sale of the TV stations in June. Two months later, it agreed to buy Dow Jones, publisher of Dow Jones Newswires, Barrons and The Wall Street Journal, after months of negotiations with the controlling Bancroft family.

Murdoch plans to use the Wall Street Journal brand to attract viewers to its television networks and Internet users to Web sites.

“News Corp.s focus today is much more on Internet properties, such as MySpace, and cable,” said Dorfman. The sale of the stations “will help News Corp. raise capital. News Corp. is not walking away from the healthy broadcast world.”

December 23, 2007 — Ignore this story if you believe you didn’t pay enough to Uncle Sam this year and want to pay more taxes in 2008.

Fine, now that I have everyone’s attention consider these tax saving strategies, which must be used between now and the end of the year.

If you itemize deductions, there are ample opportunities to get some tax savings, said Anita Linn, a certified public accountant in Manhattan. While many are perennial chestnuts, they nonetheless will save you money and shouldn’t be overlooked.

“Charitable contributions made by year end are deductible even if charged to a credit card,” she said. State and local income tax payments are deductible for the 2007 tax year if made by the end of the month.

The government requires you to pay taxes on your investment gains. But don’t forget investment losses, even if you eventually want to buy back a stock, said Robert Wander, a Manhattan certified financial planner.

“If the investor is holding a stock that is down from the price it was bought, the stock can be sold, thereby generating a capital loss,” Wander said. If the investor wants to buy back the stock, it can be purchased in 31 days.

Within that 31-day period, Wander added, the proceeds of the stock sale can be put into an exchange traded or index fund so the investor isn’t out of the market during this period.

Some people don’t use this strategy because they have a difficult time admitting that they invested in a loser, said Bernard Kiely, who is both a CPA and certified financial planner in Morristown, N.J. “But it’s a strategy that makes a lot of sense,” he said.

All these tips could help you save on your 2007 tax return, and can be used again at the end of 2008. However, tax advisers warn there is one tax saving strategy that may never be available after this year: money transferred from an IRA and contributed to a qualified charity by someone age 70 or older, which currently escapes any tax.

Unfortunately, this tax break is now due to expire on Dec. 31 unless Congress resurrects it.

While it lasts, however, this tax break has benefits for both the charity and the donor, Linn said.

“These transfers count towards your minimum required distribution, which then is not taxable on your return,” Linn said.

Another tip can not only reduce your taxation, but also help your retirement savings, Kiely said. If you haven’t made the maximum contributions to your 401(k) plan this year, and thereby not received the maximum tax deduction, check if you can make it up with one big contribution.