Cricket for Dummies: Why I love the game I know little about
As a rugby writer, cricket season is my hiatus for the year, because (as I revealed guiltily to Vinay Verma in vino veritas at…
Expert
Joined May 2007
651k
Views
154
Published
121
Comments
Published
Comments
As a rugby writer, cricket season is my hiatus for the year, because (as I revealed guiltily to Vinay Verma in vino veritas at…
How in the world to start talking about this Test match? Perhaps the best way is to start with a little cricket story, after…
It’s tempting to get sucked into the vortex of pessimism surrounding the Wallabies at the moment, particularly when all anyone can talk about seems…
For those who came in late… The bruised and battered Wallaby Justice League (WJL), bleeding from their latest gruelling encounter with the Springbok Injustice…
According to the universally accepted principles upon which the universe operates, the Wallabies most recent loss to the Springboks in Pretoria was always going…
Those of you who are regular readers of my Roar columns will know that I am pretty much rusted-on when it comes to rugby,…
What characters there are in rugby. Drunks, geniuses, wordsmiths, shining stars and grizzled anvils, all thrown together by the love of chasing a pigskin…
[caption id="attachment_30171" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Queensland Reds players Quade Cooper (l) and Peter Hynes (r) jubilate during the Reds win over the Bulls during the…
[caption id="attachment_29983" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Waratahs celebrate a try - AAP Image"][/caption] As part of a desperate bid to reel in the leader George Gregan…
[caption id="attachment_29416" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Georgia's Goderdzi Shvelidze, center, is tackled by Romania's Cristian Petre. AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda"][/caption] So I say “Georgia”, and you say,…
[caption id="attachment_28653" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Reds Quade Cooper is tackled by Chiefs Brendon Leonard in a Super 14 Rugby match, Waikato Stadium, Hamilton, New Zealand,…
[caption id="attachment_28881" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="The Waratahs Berrick Barnes kicks the ball against the Sharks during their Super 14 rugby match in Sydney on Saturday,…
After watching the Waratahs last week, I was forced to check my tea for random hallucinogens that might have drifted in on the wind…
Queensland rugby going broke. Melbourne struggling to find players. The ARU hemming and hawing over requests for the Force to bring in replacements for…
Australian rugby could find itself with nothing to celebrate this weekend as its Super rugby teams head for a clean sweep of losses heading…
The new interpretation of the breakdown laws promises to rewind Super Rugby back to the days when tries were the norm, rather than the…
[caption id="attachment_27130" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Legendary radio broadcaster Bill McLaren, left. AP Photo/John Cogill"][/caption] In Sydney yesterday, it was a balmy summer day with a…
Surfers worldwide are nervously watching their mobiles and inboxes waiting for the magical sms and email alert which simply says “The Eddie is on!”…
[caption id="attachment_24859" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Australia's Wallabies captain Rocky Elsom, cenetr, along with his teammates take a short break during the team's practice session at…
Did I say 19 points? Oh ho ho! What a chuckle. The only people laughing louder than me (and probably AT me too), are…
Nick, it was a long involved saga involving a couple of trips to North Sydney police station and a bit of a kip on the floor with a pillow I found in a cupboard. But that’s another story!
Snix degrees of separation makes rugby unique
You know me Casho…..an old jersey tugger from way back.
Snix degrees of separation makes rugby unique
100% nickoldschool……my dad used to wake me up every year for the FA Cup final and we would watch it together with hot chocolate that my mum left out in a thermos. All time!
To: The Wallabies, c/o Twickenham
Sheek….I was tossing up this week about whether to write up the “Pulver/Hawker shouldn’t get too worked up if Wallabies win etc” because clearly Cheika has led the revival, not the board. I decided that it wasn’t the time or the place….but I will be onto it next week or the week after.
If Pulver or Hawker take one iota of credit for the Wallabies performance, I will go postal. The only thing that can be said for them is that they were lucky enough to have Cheika available after the McKenzie trainwreck over which they presided.
Nothing has changed at the top….as you so rightly point out.
Cheers…
To: The Wallabies, c/o Twickenham
“The other thing I would say is that players make dozens of mistakes every game, knock ons, poor passes, poor kicks, not rolling away, crooked throws. Referees make very few mistakes compared to players.”
Bushranger – amen to that.
Rugby care factor? Unreasonably high
Ahhhh Harry…..yes I have that moment sometimes, but I like the comment above about the joy of congratulating friends when their team wins. It is a joy, and we should do more of it.
You have reminded me of a comment from a teammate when we were playing in the Hong Kong Tens prior to the Sevens a few years ago. We were sitting in the rugby club at Happy Valley having a few cold ones, and he leaned back in his chair, stretched luxuriously and said “You know what Loges?….Rugby touring is the highest form of living”. I found it hard to disagree!
Rugby care factor? Unreasonably high
England beat NZ on 19th Nov 1983 at Twickenham by 15-9.
Prior to that they beat them 16-10 in 1973 in Auckland, and before that, only the 13-0 win in 1936.
England won 3 from 13 between 1936 and 1983.
Rugby care factor? Unreasonably high
Thanks Yogi. I was amazed at the time that people took that line – it never entered my head at all. But that is the thing about language, it is interpreted differently by everyone, and different people see different things. Just read the threads above for evidence! Cheers…
All Blacks too complete for flaky France
GeoffBrizvegas…..I can say with absolute certainty that had it been Pocock or Hooper on the end of that same incident, I would have shrugged it off. Read what I said carefully….”the fact is that there was nothing in it on either side”. There was hardly anything from McCaw to warrant a penalty….and nothing from Picamoles to warrant changing it. It just shouldn’t have even come up for discussion. Certainly Picamoles should have known he’d probably get pulled up for it, but at worst the referee should have just said “No more” and then on with the game.
My biggest problem with that sort of thing is that it will happen in the 72nd minute of a close final and will decide a match. It is not a significant event in the course of the game, but a jumpy referee will make it one.
All Blacks too complete for flaky France
ebop….you’ve missed the point. I love the All Blacks and I admire their rugby. I simply think it’s a shame how much of their identity is now driven by marketing imperatives.
All Blacks too complete for flaky France
Jokerman…..tell me which of the following phrases didn’t meet your fancy….I’ll gladly change them.
“All Blacks too complete for flaky France
Every All Black can tackle, can run, can pass, can contest the ball on the ground…
…teams playing the All Blacks have to be at their peak for 80 minutes just to compete…
The All Blacks are masters at the turnover-and-two-quick-passes Sevens play…
Read is the best 8 in the world…
…with their excellent catch and pass skills, the try is usually a formality…
They are undoubtedly the best team in the world…
So how good was this All Blacks performance really? Well, the answer still has to be that they were pretty damn good…
It was an utterly complete performance….
New Zealand are the best prepared side in world rugby and current world champions….
The high scores speak less to the poor quality of other teams, and more to the All Blacks’ ability to meet whatever challenge comes their way….
They will continue to lift and other teams must go with them.”
All Blacks too complete for flaky France
My phrase was “anything approaching regularity”, which means “not regular”, but Howi has it right. Regularity is the wrong word. The point is that France, England and Wales (in the 70’s) are the only northern teams who have actually beaten the All Blacks more than a handful of times. Ireland and Argentina are yet to beat them ever if my memory is right. So the only teams with a realistic chance of beating NZ are SA and Aus.
All Blacks too complete for flaky France
Chooka…..I think this is how Salman Rushdie felt.
Any colour you want, as long as it's All Black
Lordy….loving your work my old Sportsline mate 😉 However, I genuinely believe that Cheika made a smart decision with his Eden Park selections. He had proved the point against the AB’s in Sydney, why give them another look at his best combination at Eden Park? Also, why risk the self-belief that his first team had built up in that win?
Having sent his second-stringers to the slaughter in Auckland, he has achieved two goals. One, his first string still believe they can beat the All Blacks. And two, the All Blacks know that the Wallabies first string can beat them.
I truly believe it is all part of a massive Cheika mind-game and long-term plan. If we make the final against the AB’s (a long way to go I know!), then we are level pegging psychologically.
What is the Cheika way?
nickoldschool……I said many times to anyone who would listen in the leadup that the Cup would be won in the 12 inches immediately over the top of the ball. That England went into the tournament apparently disdainful of that fact when it had been proven several times in the Rugby Championship and the 6 Nations, just amazed me. They paid the price. Armitage would have made a difference.
The harder the Wallabies work, the luckier they get
I think Cheika has shown that he wants form players on the paddock and that he is not afraid to back young guys. McMahon is more hard shouldered than McCalman, but both are equally hard workers and it could go either way. If I was MC, I would start Pocock, aim to get ascendancy and then run McCalman on at 8 around the 45-50 minute mark. But anyone who says they know what Michael Cheika will do is full of it – he is full of surprises!
The harder the Wallabies work, the luckier they get
Sheek…..as always you are my benchmark. If you liked it….I’m happy!
The harder the Wallabies work, the luckier they get
Harry……the unofficial transcript was pure gold….”His girlfriend was the daughter of the former Prime Minister of Australia. She liked him. She never saw him do anything untoward. If he had, she would have told her father.” Just one of the gems.
The harder the Wallabies work, the luckier they get
Paul….I don’t blame the referee….I blame World Rugby for taking away any power the referee might have to make a decision within the context of the match. Clearly the referee in this case made the only decision he was able to make, at least if he wanted to keep his job and have a chance at refereeing the final.
My argument in the case of Warburton, is that the referee should be entitled to make a decision himself, taking into account the context of the situation. Weighing up the fact that it is early in the match, that it is a World Cup semi-final and a highly emotional match, that the player was not injured and continued the game, that Warburton was the captain, that Warburton has a sterling reputation for fairness, that Wales up to that point had played highly disciplined rugby…..and so on.
I believe that the exact skill of a good referee is to make good decisions within the context of the game. Any robot can follow a directive, and more often than not, a sterile directive clashes with the rich context.
I am certain that no referee left to his own judgement would have pulled the red card in that situation.
It was only the right call because it adhered to the World Rugby directive.
Wales can't take a World Cup trick
NOS…..I think the problem was twofold 1) it was a clear IRB (now World Rugby) directive; and 2) it was a semi final.
Every referee wants to ref the final, so no ref would ever go against an IRB directive in the semi when it might cost him a shot at refereeing the final.
This is the problem with modern refereeing, that it is far too heavily influenced by directives and efforts at consistency. This would be fine if it was played in a perfectly consistent environment by two perfectly matched teams of perfectly uniform-size players.
Obviously this is not the case. Weather, pitch conditions, player size and strength, occasion….all these things come into it and the job of the referee should be to make good decisions within the context of a match. Indeed, the skill of a top referee should be precisely this, to make good decisions within the context of a match – not to blindly follow a directive regardless of context.
Wales can't take a World Cup trick
Yes Will you’ve nailed it – I thought the same! What a lemon of a miracle. And as some other wag put it, it’s not like there was a shortage of mountains in that part of Wales anyway…..
Wales can't take a World Cup trick
Well done Onside – I wondered who would get it.
Hayne at sixes and sevens in rugby's short form