NOW READ ON as our fearless blue-blooded hero attempts to be gracious about a Queensland Origin win...
And a comprehensive one at that, one of the more assured Origin performances of recent times with the result rarely in doubt even when the northerners were behind by a dozen at the break. In reality, this was a game that NSW should have lost by double figures and change. If any team in the broad church of Rugby Leeeeeague has ever been less deserving of an 18-6 halftime lead, it was this particular NSW Dodgy Home Loans Blues outfit. That the interval scoreline was not the exact inverse was largely down to two multiplicative factors. One: the highly interpretive whistle-blowing stylings of referee Paul Simpleton, who spent much of the game in his own wonderland - best described as Stevie Wonderland judging by his disallowal of Steve Price's first try and his even more cretinous awarding of Hindmarsh's effort (setting Anasta's forward pass aside, has anyone yet seen whether the big unit from Parra actually grounded the motherfucker?) And two: arse, and lots of it, in the form of Jarryd Hayne's stoopid-good solo effort on the halftime siren. However, arse may giveth, but arse doth assuredly taketh away, as evidenced later in proceedings when Hayne produced the royalest fuckup since Prince Harry and giftwrapped a try to Qld captain Darren Lockyer. Memo to Locky: Tommy Raudonikis wants his voice back.
As for the rest of the game itself, your mum was right: if you can't say anything nice don't say anything at all. Quite why it's up to me to let you know what your mum's up to, maybe you should be asking yourself. Still it's gotta be better than having that little shit Rove pestering you to saying hi to her for him all the time.
So that's all we are prepared to say on the topic of Origin I, other than to pose the following:
'Braith Anasta: fucking useless overrated fuck'.
Discuss.
You may use additional pages if necessary. We dare say you'll need to.
The Miracle of the Bleeding Steeden
OK, we lied. More has to be said about the story of Origin I - namely about the one glaring, gaping omission in the story of Origin I. Let's face it, the game, nay, the whole event was a hollow, shambolic farce, in the absence of probably Origin's greatest personality. Every facet of the night spoke to the emptiness that resonated from the great man's absence from the rarefied stage which he'd made his own over Origin campaign after Origin campaign. It showed in the performance of his former team in the first serious hit-out since his disappearance from the big stage. Bluntly, those who'd been picked as his replacements were barely adequate and were left to wallow in their own clueless, directionless, creativeless incompetence. Then again, to be charitable, their failure to carry their team to triumph spoke more to the greatness of the leader they'd lost, rather than necessarily their own failings.
Actually that's not really fair. HG Nelson went reasonably well without Roy Slaven, surprisingly enough. Why Rampaging took the night off we have no fucking idea, but presumably calling what amounts to the same game three times a year for umpteen years gets vaguely tedious, and it can't be as easy to come up with comedy gold now that the golden years of the Unmade Bed, the Brick With Eyes, the Pillow With Feet, Dishhead, the Prune, the Kumquat, the Quince, the Train, the Cough Drop, Back Door Benny, Three Knees Hancock, About To Cut Loose, the Boy on the Bike et al has passed us by. Signing former Blues prop and serial Godbotherer Jason 'JC' Stevens up for colour duties worked surprisingly well, at least until Jesus started taking offence at everyone slagging off his mates for being shit and overrated (case in point Anasta comma B full stop who's still yet to do anything of merit whatsofuckinever since leaving Souths Juniors aged 18 late last century). In the shouting random shit classification, generic Triple J spare part Dools tried hard and has clearly spent most of his youth listening to Roy and HG origin calls judging by his clamouring for a refereeing recall for Kelvin Jeffes (that's old skool m'niggahs) but looked short of a run and in truth wasn't up to Origin level - ironically, given he'd banged on about Mullen and Anasta being likewise all night (which is also true.) But Dools' biggest problem is that he isn't Roy, and in particular, doesn't SOUND like Roy. He sounds like a whiny little shit. To slag large leaguies off in a way that doesn't have them seeking you out to tear off your head and do number twos down your trachea, you need GRAVITAS son. Same, it has to be said, goes for Jay Whalley (credited as 'The Ancient Voice Of Rhomb' - a nice touch from HG) who tried to sub for King Wally Otto on voiceover duty but sounded arse. Now we at the World of Bollocks have long enjoyed Jay's work, and his nasal whine worked a treat out front of Rhomb and is only vaguely annoying on breakfast radio; but flat out sucked donkey balls in place of King Wally Otto. And he mispronounced Sirro (aka Paul 'The Buttocks' Sironen) which should get him beaten up next time he's anywhere near Balmain.
So, in summary, the NSW brains-trust might need to get their shit together pretty badly for Origin II - but not nearly as badly as Triple J do. Somebody at the Js needs to find Roy Slaven - shouldn't be that fucking hard, he's still turning up for the Sunday afternoon radio show - and write him a big fuck-off cheque. Now. Please. Otherwise we're all stuck listening to Phil Phucking Gould banging on with his interminable fucking shit. And, to be brutally honest, given the prospect of listening to that pug-faced, bullshit-spouting choad merchant, your correspondent would rather eat my own arse.
Award-Whinging Sports Journalism
We finish with two shiny-brand-spankers Dodgy Awards:
The Sidchrome 24PC Set of Chrome Plated Spanners for Making A Complete Tool Of Oneself
This goes to Windies deputy chief copper Mark Shields. For having to kinda sorta admit that that famous cricket coach bloke who he kinda sorta said had definitely been murdered, kinda sorta... wasn't. Look for him in a glamourous new position writing parking tickets, coming soon to a council carpark near you.
The Salim Malik Memorial Pitch Report (OK, so we're mixing our matchfixing metaphors here) for Most Pointless Act of Matchfixing, Throwing or Tanking In World Sport
For this we need to move from the State of Origin to the State of Oregon, to NBA side the Portland Trailblazers, who won the lottery which all the shit teams in the NBA go into in order to decide who gets the top picks in the upcoming draft - a big deal given that all the top college players who want to turn pro, as well as all the best European players who want to join the NBA, go into the draft, and there's a couple of guys likely to be drafted first and second (Ohio State's Greg Oden and Texas' Kevin Durant) who, ESPN hype aside, seriously look like genuine future stars of the NBA. All the teams that miss the playoffs go into the lottery, though it's weighted such that the teams that finished lowest in their conferences and had the shittest records in the NBA get more ping-pong balls in the Powerball machine. However, Portland weren't the worst team in the comp; they're actually vaguely useful and had the rookie of the year. Neither were the second-pick winners, fellow Pacific North-West side Seattle. So the Salim Malik Award doesn't actually go to Portland or Seattle. It goes to the Boston Celtics, Andrew Bogut's Milwaukee Bucks and the Memphis Grizzlies (stupid name - did Marc Cohn see any grizzlies when he was out Walking in Memphis? We would have suggested the Memphis Fat-Dead-Elvises-Stuck-On-The-Shitter) - the three teams which, recognising late in the season they were a chance to finish last in their league and get an up-to-25% chance of winning the draft lottery, started throwing games in order to have as shit a record as possible. Allegedly. (...Your Honour.) The resultant shitstorm of crap basketball tarnished reputations, got players traded and coaches fired... but what it conspicuously failed to do, it would appear, was get Greg Oden or Kevin Durant into the starting lineups of any of those three sides.
So for that, the Celtics, Bucks and Dead Elvises jointly get our Salim Malik Award for pointless matchfixing. We'd have called it the Hansie Cronje Memorial Crytowel but Hansie's idea of 'taking a dive' was a bit more dramatic than most. Namely from ten thousand feet into a mountainside in a cargo plane.
And that's the plane truth of the matter.
Urrghh.
The Doctor is OUT.
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Thursday, May 03, 2007
Confession time
Some people like cross-dressing, some people like sniffing female cyclists' bike seats. Some people even like Gretel Killeen, or what's left of her. My personal penchants are, if anything, even more embarrassing to have to admit to, I'm afraid. But here goes..
I like City-Country.
Not in that way, obviously. It's pretty hard to develop a fetish over a selection trial for representative football. Let's face it, for many of the players, much of the fans and most of the clubs, it's hard to stimulate any kind of interest whatsoever in the annual bush-vs-smoke stoush, let alone interest of the downstairs variety. But, to be honest, City-Country is probably my favourite game of the year.
And no, north-of-the-border types, it's not just because for one game out of the year, there's no fucking Queenslanders playing. In fact - stick with me here - for myself and those of my ilk, City-Country is actually our only chance to conduct ourselves like Queenslanders all year.
Whafuck? Let me explain.
Queensland has, is and remains a very balanced state, with equally massive chips on both shoulders. Some of these are self-inflicted, like voting for Joh for a hundred and thirty years or not making it compulsory for kids to be educated beyond primary school level until the '60s. But others can be chalked up to the Mexicans. The sense of superiority - cultural, social, educational, economic - that the Southerners hold over those who bend bananas is felt keenly and bitterly north of the Tweed. You would be unlikely to see NSW or Victoria attempt to rebrand themselves as 'The Smart State' in a rather sad attempt to reverse the yee-haa cronyism of the past - though UQ are obviously fairly happy with the three massive research institutes Premier Pete's funded them to knock up on campus. Off the same floor plan no less. Before Queensland's recent economic renaissance, the locals didn't have much to hold over their southern tormentors, other than winning the Origin with some bullshit last-minute try every other year.
The interesting thing about Origin is that over in New Zealand, it's not only followed very closely, but viewed with maroon-tinted glasses. Kiwis seem to predominantly empathise with the Queensland side of the Origin divide, presumably seeing themselves as fellow put-upon underdogs (with NSW, by the same In Zid logic, standing in for the Australian nation at large.) Point being, it's a lot fun to be on the belligerent, underdog, we'll-get-you-silvertail-bastards side of the battle. Win and you're a superhero; lose and, well, those over-paid, over-rated, rich prettyboys were always going to win anyway, weren't they? Fuck 'em. Why else does everyone hate Manly?... Well, apart from all THOSE reasons, of course.
Every time Queensland wins Origin it's declared to be good for the game; every time NSW wins it's the death knell. It's entirely fair to say Origin exists for the benefit of Queensland. And by the same token, it's equally fair to declare that City-Country exists for the benefit of NSW's own put-upon, disadvantaged, undereducated, underdog populous: the people of rural and regional NSW.
Of which I am fucking proud to be a member, just quietly.
So I love City vs Country. I love seeing the jumpers - real LEAGUE jumpers, old school rep footy jumpers with solid, defiant Vs (and the Queensland analogy does fit, right down to the colour of the Country jerseys) - and love seeing big stupid bastards from Casino, Lithgow and Tingha barrelling out of the gate to smash those prettyboy latte-sipping interpretive-haired tools from Paddington, Parra, Penrith and The Fucken Shire. I love seeing how a couple of thousand happy faces from some random regional centre can give better crowd than your average jaded city crowd. For them, and for their playing representatives, it's just another trial game, a chance to perform in front of the NSWRL selectors before the Origin teams are picked. But for the country boys - like for the Queenslanders at Origin time - it means a lot more than that.
Former Casino garbo Matt King went so fast on debut for Country in 2005, his afro fell off
Today a Cantab of my acquaintance asked me what City-Country meant in the grand scheme of things, whether it really mattered. I thought for a bit about how to explain what this game meant to the two million New South Welshpeople who aren't from Sydney, and aren't fuckin' interested in BEING from Sydney. After a few moments, I hit upon the perfect analogy: one which a New Zealander, particularly a South Islander (and even more particularly a parochial Cantabrian) would understand in a microsecond. "Imagine," I suggested, "if they played an 'Auckland vs the Rest' New Zealand Origin game."
The Cantab, who we'll call Hamish (as that's his name), nodded and grinned. He understood. He understood perfectly.
Go the fuckin' country bumpkins.
The Doctor is OUT.
I like City-Country.
Not in that way, obviously. It's pretty hard to develop a fetish over a selection trial for representative football. Let's face it, for many of the players, much of the fans and most of the clubs, it's hard to stimulate any kind of interest whatsoever in the annual bush-vs-smoke stoush, let alone interest of the downstairs variety. But, to be honest, City-Country is probably my favourite game of the year.
And no, north-of-the-border types, it's not just because for one game out of the year, there's no fucking Queenslanders playing. In fact - stick with me here - for myself and those of my ilk, City-Country is actually our only chance to conduct ourselves like Queenslanders all year.
Whafuck? Let me explain.
Queensland has, is and remains a very balanced state, with equally massive chips on both shoulders. Some of these are self-inflicted, like voting for Joh for a hundred and thirty years or not making it compulsory for kids to be educated beyond primary school level until the '60s. But others can be chalked up to the Mexicans. The sense of superiority - cultural, social, educational, economic - that the Southerners hold over those who bend bananas is felt keenly and bitterly north of the Tweed. You would be unlikely to see NSW or Victoria attempt to rebrand themselves as 'The Smart State' in a rather sad attempt to reverse the yee-haa cronyism of the past - though UQ are obviously fairly happy with the three massive research institutes Premier Pete's funded them to knock up on campus. Off the same floor plan no less. Before Queensland's recent economic renaissance, the locals didn't have much to hold over their southern tormentors, other than winning the Origin with some bullshit last-minute try every other year.
The interesting thing about Origin is that over in New Zealand, it's not only followed very closely, but viewed with maroon-tinted glasses. Kiwis seem to predominantly empathise with the Queensland side of the Origin divide, presumably seeing themselves as fellow put-upon underdogs (with NSW, by the same In Zid logic, standing in for the Australian nation at large.) Point being, it's a lot fun to be on the belligerent, underdog, we'll-get-you-silvertail-bastards side of the battle. Win and you're a superhero; lose and, well, those over-paid, over-rated, rich prettyboys were always going to win anyway, weren't they? Fuck 'em. Why else does everyone hate Manly?... Well, apart from all THOSE reasons, of course.
Every time Queensland wins Origin it's declared to be good for the game; every time NSW wins it's the death knell. It's entirely fair to say Origin exists for the benefit of Queensland. And by the same token, it's equally fair to declare that City-Country exists for the benefit of NSW's own put-upon, disadvantaged, undereducated, underdog populous: the people of rural and regional NSW.
Of which I am fucking proud to be a member, just quietly.
So I love City vs Country. I love seeing the jumpers - real LEAGUE jumpers, old school rep footy jumpers with solid, defiant Vs (and the Queensland analogy does fit, right down to the colour of the Country jerseys) - and love seeing big stupid bastards from Casino, Lithgow and Tingha barrelling out of the gate to smash those prettyboy latte-sipping interpretive-haired tools from Paddington, Parra, Penrith and The Fucken Shire. I love seeing how a couple of thousand happy faces from some random regional centre can give better crowd than your average jaded city crowd. For them, and for their playing representatives, it's just another trial game, a chance to perform in front of the NSWRL selectors before the Origin teams are picked. But for the country boys - like for the Queenslanders at Origin time - it means a lot more than that.
Former Casino garbo Matt King went so fast on debut for Country in 2005, his afro fell off
Today a Cantab of my acquaintance asked me what City-Country meant in the grand scheme of things, whether it really mattered. I thought for a bit about how to explain what this game meant to the two million New South Welshpeople who aren't from Sydney, and aren't fuckin' interested in BEING from Sydney. After a few moments, I hit upon the perfect analogy: one which a New Zealander, particularly a South Islander (and even more particularly a parochial Cantabrian) would understand in a microsecond. "Imagine," I suggested, "if they played an 'Auckland vs the Rest' New Zealand Origin game."
The Cantab, who we'll call Hamish (as that's his name), nodded and grinned. He understood. He understood perfectly.
Go the fuckin' country bumpkins.
The Doctor is OUT.
Theft Converters
Some people don't like stereotypes. I do. They save valuable time, and the reason they're stereotypes is very simple: they're valid. Such as the stereotype of Americans being fat. They are. Mystic Meg is at this very moment watching the Septic edition of The Fattest Loser, an episode in which they've gone trolling through school cafeterias Jamie Hideously Fat Tongue Oliver style and tried to discern between the various Unidentified Frying Objects.
Proving another cast-iron stereotype correct - namely that Scousers are world's-best-practice at nicking stuff - various media channels including SMH.com.au have reported that Liverpool FC goalkeeper Jose 'Pepe' Reina had his house broken into while he was slightly preoccupied saving his team's arse in the penalty shootout that decided Pool's Champions League semi against Chelski. There's Scouser gratitude for you. Reina returned home after one of the greatest games of his life to find his house lighter by several items of jewellery, his serious-fuck-off home theatre setup system and his Porsche Cayenne. The Cayenne was later found burnt out in another area of the city, proving the robbers at least had SOME taste. Rumours have persisted that the culprit was in fact Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard, as noone is able to vouch for his whereabouts throughout the duration of the game on Wednesday morning.
One they prepared earlier
Piling yet more ironic excellence onto the tale, this is just the latest in a long line of Merseyside footballers having their houses burgled while on the job. Pepe Reina's predecessor as Liverpool's number one, Jerzy Dudek, got cleaned out last year while on World Cup duty with Polane. The Dude also lost a Porsche and jewellery (apparently you get them as standard issue when signing for Pool) as well as his 2005 Champions League winners medal - ironically also for a bullshit Spidey-skills effort in goal in a penalty shootout. Defender Daniel Agger, subject of multitudes of appalling 'Agger Do' headlines in the Fleet Street rags, had his house broken into in September last year. Striker Peter 'At my height it's actually near impossible to' Crouch's house was targeted in the same month while he was away being rubbish for England. Meanwhile in the blue half of Merseyside, Everton winger Andy van der Meyde was burgled twice last year, including one raid in which his pedigree puppy was taken. Former Evertonian Wayne Rooney also lost a bunch of stuff, including his BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year trophy (which was being used to prop the budgie cage open) when his parents' Liverpool home was burgled in July 2006. In totally unrelated news Cash Converters have seen unprecendented levels of business in the Liverpool area, opening three new branches on Merseyside in the past 18 months.
Pepe, Shrek, the Dude and the guy who can't Crouch would be well advised to take a leaf out of the well-thumbed form guide of former Everton captain and professional Scots pisshead Duncan Ferguson. Drunken Ferguson played ten years at Everton, at least nine of them munted out of his scone, and during his time on Merseyside twice apprehended would-be robbers at his home. The first incident, involving two intruders, ended with one of them fleeing for his life (and if you've seen Dunc the Drunk in full flight you'll understeand why) while Ferguson 'restrained' (i.e. beat seven bells out of and then sat on) the other one until the police arrived. The other incident resulted in the "battered and bruised" burglar unsuccessfully attempting to sue Drunken for damages.
Duncan Ferguson, Premier League Player Of The Year 1992-2005
Somehow I ain't seeing Beckham allocating the whoop-ass in a similar fashion. You?
The Doctor is OUT.
Proving another cast-iron stereotype correct - namely that Scousers are world's-best-practice at nicking stuff - various media channels including SMH.com.au have reported that Liverpool FC goalkeeper Jose 'Pepe' Reina had his house broken into while he was slightly preoccupied saving his team's arse in the penalty shootout that decided Pool's Champions League semi against Chelski. There's Scouser gratitude for you. Reina returned home after one of the greatest games of his life to find his house lighter by several items of jewellery, his serious-fuck-off home theatre setup system and his Porsche Cayenne. The Cayenne was later found burnt out in another area of the city, proving the robbers at least had SOME taste. Rumours have persisted that the culprit was in fact Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard, as noone is able to vouch for his whereabouts throughout the duration of the game on Wednesday morning.
One they prepared earlier
Piling yet more ironic excellence onto the tale, this is just the latest in a long line of Merseyside footballers having their houses burgled while on the job. Pepe Reina's predecessor as Liverpool's number one, Jerzy Dudek, got cleaned out last year while on World Cup duty with Polane. The Dude also lost a Porsche and jewellery (apparently you get them as standard issue when signing for Pool) as well as his 2005 Champions League winners medal - ironically also for a bullshit Spidey-skills effort in goal in a penalty shootout. Defender Daniel Agger, subject of multitudes of appalling 'Agger Do' headlines in the Fleet Street rags, had his house broken into in September last year. Striker Peter 'At my height it's actually near impossible to' Crouch's house was targeted in the same month while he was away being rubbish for England. Meanwhile in the blue half of Merseyside, Everton winger Andy van der Meyde was burgled twice last year, including one raid in which his pedigree puppy was taken. Former Evertonian Wayne Rooney also lost a bunch of stuff, including his BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year trophy (which was being used to prop the budgie cage open) when his parents' Liverpool home was burgled in July 2006. In totally unrelated news Cash Converters have seen unprecendented levels of business in the Liverpool area, opening three new branches on Merseyside in the past 18 months.
Pepe, Shrek, the Dude and the guy who can't Crouch would be well advised to take a leaf out of the well-thumbed form guide of former Everton captain and professional Scots pisshead Duncan Ferguson. Drunken Ferguson played ten years at Everton, at least nine of them munted out of his scone, and during his time on Merseyside twice apprehended would-be robbers at his home. The first incident, involving two intruders, ended with one of them fleeing for his life (and if you've seen Dunc the Drunk in full flight you'll understeand why) while Ferguson 'restrained' (i.e. beat seven bells out of and then sat on) the other one until the police arrived. The other incident resulted in the "battered and bruised" burglar unsuccessfully attempting to sue Drunken for damages.
Duncan Ferguson, Premier League Player Of The Year 1992-2005
Somehow I ain't seeing Beckham allocating the whoop-ass in a similar fashion. You?
The Doctor is OUT.
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