Wallabies, Wales and a new superstition is born

 
The Crowd Roar Pro

By Eljay, 5 Dec 2009 The Crowd is a Roar Pro

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Am I an idiot, or a masochist, or both? It is 3:20 last Sunday morning when my alarm goes off. I am going to get up and watch the Wallabies play Wales.

I must be mad. The last two games have been hell. I mean, especially losing to Scotland for God’s sake. But hope, like insanity, springs eternal.

At this time of the year, it’s cold on some nights in Adelaide. And so it was last Sunday morning.

Still half-asleep, I make a big decision and pull on my moth eaten track suit. No, I am not going to wear the Wallaby jumper this time. It has been an omen of monstrous bad luck far too often for me to trust it in recent seasons.

Things need to change. Try something new, Eljay.

I’ve started wearing sandals again because it’s meant to be summer here. However, it is cold and I start eyeing off my thick woolly blue socks near my boots. Seriously I have never worn socks with my sandals, ever, ever.

The only people I know who do that sort of ridiculous thing are European males, usually Dutch. I assume it has something to do with wearing socks with their clogs back in Holland; which is perfectly understandable, given that hard wood and bare flesh may not exactly get on.

But wearing socks with sandals here in clog-less Australia? Get thee behind them, Satan!

I spy my imitation Crocs in the corner. Hmmm… they almost look like shoes, so maybe I can break the rule. Besides no-one will see me – which at that time of the morning is mostly a very good thing. Perhaps this radical, bold departure will bring the Wallabies a rare change of fortune.

Do I look like a Dutchman though? With all due respect to them, I do not want to look like a Dutchman-in-sandals at 3.15 in the morning. I don’t care who isn’t watching. However, my feet are cold and if I really think about it, wearing sandals without socks all my life hasn’t exactly brought me a great deal of luck. In fact, quite the reverse.

On go the socks, on go the Crocs.

The boys are almost ready to take the field in Cardiff. In my mind – or what is left of it – I can see them huddled tensely in the sheds, the sweet, trusting, hope-filled face of St Robbie Deans watching on.

I send them a message by telepathy: ‘There’s an old fat guy 12,000 miles away who’s made sacrifices by wearing his trakkies and Crocs-with-socks especially for you. Get out there and beat leek, you buggers!’

I defied the rugby gods by drinking wine during the Ireland and Scotland games – only because there’s something very unnatural about waking up so early and necking a beer – and paid the price.

I’ll drink coffee this time and see if it helps. Break the mould, Eljay; rage, rail against your filthy luck!

I turn on Channel Ten while the kettle boils. There’s a bleary-eyed Ben Tune and another bloke who looks as though he’s just had to shoot his best dog telling me they’re about to cross to Millennium Stadium.

Back to the kitchen. Which coffee mug? There’s a black one and a white one. I stare at them with rheumy eyes and then it hits me: the white mug represents purity and innocent hope, while the black one stands for . . . All Blacks!

I quickly fill the white mug, head for the lounge and fearfully begin watching.

Oh my God! Successful long range penalties! Precise running rugby! Real tries!

I’m on my knees worshipping the television set, coffee spilled over the table. I’m choking with joy – and relief. There are tears in my poor old, red-rimmed eyes.

This is sweet, cool water for a man who has crawled naked and humiliated for several seasons across the vast, sunbaked, hideous Desert of Wallaby Failure.

I know it now, the power of changing things. The formula is simple: take a daggy old tracksuit; one pair of woolly socks; one pair of fake Crocs and a white coffee mug .

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