CHANTS of ‘YOO ESS A’ must have boomed out of San Francisco and been heard in New York in the wondrous wake of the home nation’s astounding America’s Cup conquest.

From a near hopeless position of trailing 8-1 to New Zealand, the crew of the American Team Oracle – with no less than the best British sailor since Admiral Nelson himself, Sir Ben Ainslie, on board as tactician – roared back to win 9-8.

It was a victory as unexpected as it was supremely hailed in that unique full-throated “yor-der-man”

way that only rampant Americans can do.

But was it the greatest comeback since Lazarus shook his head, rose from his bed and said: “Jeez, I could murder a fry-up”?

There are many other contenders in the world of sport, one not that far away from York. In 1981, Yorkshire’s Headingley headquarters was the venue for cricket’s greatest ever drama.

Botham’s Ashes – so called because of the Somerset allrounder’s titanic efforts with bat and ball, eagerly supplemented by the bowling of the bouncy-haired Bob Willis – turned the game on its head from Australia’s mighty grip to an England triumph. So off the mark were England that bookmakers were offering 500-1 on a home success.

More than a decade later football provided one of the most unlikely revivals.

May 25, 2005 – the venue was Istanbul, the occasion the European final between Liverpool and AC Milan.

Liverpool had ridden a huge red wave of luck to reach the showdown, but their good fortune utterly vanished in the balmy Turkish air.

By half-time AC Milan led 3-0.

Thousands of diehard Reds fans were just praying for damage limitation, and the legions in the stadium still belting out “You’ll Never Walk Alone” were carousing as much in desperation as inspiration.

But cue a re-shuffle, a Red tide and a 3-3 score-line as a prelude to a nail-gnawed penalty shoot-out win for the Scouse club.

Even more recent, indeed just last autumn, Europe’s golfers produced the miracle at Medinah to silence those ubiquitous ‘YOO ESS A’ hoots and hollers.

The Ryder Cup was deemed America-bound, the USA 10-6 up going into the final day’s singles.

But what was this? The Europeans yanked the trophy out of their mitts winning no fewer than eight of the 12 singles duels and halving the other to consign a home nation into sheer despondency.

All those aforementioned adversity- defying feats rank as pulse-quickening comebacks of the highest order.

But I venture there is still one yet more impressive and it occurred in the steam of a tropical African capital nearly four decades ago.

It was the heavyweight boxing duel between champion George Foreman and one-time king Muhammad Ali in Zaire in 1974.

Dubbed “The Rumble in the Jungle” the clash between the thunder- punching Texas totem-pole Foreman against the mercurial, but veteran, Ali out-lived its billing.

This was no rumble. This was seismic.

Foreman had come into the fight after two-round demolitions of no less a duo than Ken Norton, the man who broke Ali’s jaw, and Joe Frazier, the only warrior who came close to breaking Ali’s indomitable will.

Ali said he had devised a special plan for Foreman, which he initiated after he dominated the champion in a fevered first round.

To observers around the ring and around the globe, Ali’s tactic of regular retreat to almost permanent residence on the ropes was madness.

He was now marooned as a hit-me target for the crunching swats, swipes and swishes of the lethalfisted younger champion.

The punches rained in like a tropical monsoon, Ali’s upper body and head-protecting arms bludgeoned, battered and bruised.

But the “rope-a-dope” ploy worked.

In the eighth round, Ali floored a spent Foreman to further underpin his status as The Greatest. Not even Lazarus could match that.

This is a capital offence

SOMETIMES I think we Brits are more stupid than a parade of palookas.

Just look at this photograph – Regent Street in London festooned with a flag-fest of commemoration of America’s gridiron game.

Apparently it’s all to do with a traffic-free NFL event – they call it the National Football League – going on in the famous thoroughfare in the capital this weekend as a prelude to more gridiron grunge at Wembley.

In a year when the FA is celebrating its 150th anniversary and the Football League its 125th birthday, I cannot recall any other London street being so liberally bedecked. Yet as soon as the Nomark Fractured-by-ads League arrives, then we limeys literally put the flags out.

Do you think any of our football games would be accorded the same kow-towing treatment if shipped across the Atlantic? No sirree.

Yet another case of over-hyped, over-driven and over bloody here.