ITALY bade arrivederci to an increasingly bitter America’s Cup in Auckland yesterday as holders Team New Zealand (TNZ) accused its challengers of cheating by copying a revolutionary boat design.

THE BOATS, if these computer-sculpted splinters can be called watercraft at all, are utterly charmless.

IT used to be the sea breezes on distant tree boughs that gave the first clues of impending drama at the America’s Cup, but now the early excitement comes from the competitors’ efforts to peek under their rivals’ skirts.