(b) A 'holla'
(c) An 'Oscars speech'
(d) A 'metric shitload'
Proper Engrish usage notwithstanding we gots lots of shout-outs to give this Weak, so share the love and witness tha fitness.
Big ups to the following upstanding lot of good bastards:
The North Sydney Bearitohs
So Manly, having made the NRL Grand Final, are now expecting the city of Sydney and the state of New South Wales to forgive and forget generations of entirely justified toxicity and get in behind the Sea Uglies for their Sunday night clash with the News Limited Storm. Because all that 'I support two teams, mine and whoever's playing Manly' carry-on is soooo pre-Super League. Manly's new generation of stars, including the likes of Anthony 'AVO' Watmough (thanks v. much HG Nelson) and fullback Brett Stewart, allegedly the Sexiest Man In League (who the fuck voted? His mum?) have declared the old ways dead, claiming that kids these days just didn't hate Manly the way they used to, and were even many young fans' second favourite team these days.
Arsebiscuits.
Manly may have had a wee bit of a struggle-wuggle since the Super League war, the only positive of which being the end to their mid-90s dominance, but we still remember enough of the dim distant past to know you lot are a bunch of cunts. We remember the 'bought' premierships, the lopsided penalty counts week-in week-out, the rorted administration of the league with Sea Eagle stalwarts like Ken 'Arko' Arthurson in charge. And we remember the North Sydney Bears. We have to remember them because they don't fucking exist any more, because you fucked them over, shotgun-marriage preceding gold-digging divorce settlement which gave you the entire North Shore and them a future in football oblivion.
Well, actually, not quite.
For in the Premier League Grand Final, curtain-raiser to the Big One at the Grand Old Girl, fighting from the red and black corner, give it up for the North Sydney Bears!
The mere presence of the Bears on the last Sunday in September would be reason enough for celebratory shout-outedness, but add to that the Bears' partnership with Southern neighbours the Rabbitohs, owned by little-known former Neighbours actor Rusty Crowe, and it all summates to an unlikely continuation of the Bunnies' Cinderella season after its untimely demise at the hands of the wicked hermaphroditic stepsister from the northern beaches. Half the Bunnies' regular squad are still eligible for Bears jumpers and have starred in their Grand Final run, including departing halfback Joe Williams, stoopid-good midget dummy half Eddie Paea and legendary rangy fullback David Peachey, who might even get the premiership sendoff he deserves in retirement.
Peach put in for the cause in the quarter-final against Penrith, pulling off a try-saving tackle in the last minute to keep the final score at 24-20. They went on to turn Balmain over 22-16 in the semi-final.
Wow, almost like a real sports report and stuff.
Up against the Bears are the Eels, who came within 15 points of getting all three sides into Grand Final action - their Flegg kiddies are going around against Penrith, their reserve graders ('Premier League' my arse) will be trying to poo on Norths' parade the same way they did to Newtown last year, and their NRL side will be... drunk at PJ Gallaghers and wondering what might have been.
Casey Stoner and the good offices of Ducati Team Corse
Stoner is the first Strayan to win the title since Mad Mick Doohan, he of the five-consecutive-world-titles and more recently nuding-up-in-Darwin-stripjoints; Ducati are the first non-Japanese manufacturer to win the title since MV Agusta in 1974. There's not much more that you can say about Stoner that hasn't been said already. He's six foot eleven, has a third nipple and can play the bagpipes underwater - that's not been said already.
And yes, that sponsors' logo in the background is two people rooting.
Special commendation: in the spirit in which the MotoGP season was fought (i.e. the polar opposite of Formula One, with fairness, decency and a delightful lack of British tabloid bullshit infecting proceedings), a marginally smaller but no-less-worthy shout-out to Stoner's graciously vanquished rival Vale Rossi, for dedicating his ballsy Portuguese GP win the weekend prior to the memory of Colin McRae. Which brings us to:
Colin McRae
A legend and a hero, sadly missed. That 'McCrash' sobriquet doesn't get any less apposite though does it?
Henry Lawson
As in the former Australian and NSW fast bowler, Sydney optometrist and now Pakistan cricket coach rather than the rather dead bush poet, for turning what looked like the shitfight to rule them all into an almost-arsey-win over the Auld Enemy in the World Twenty20 final. Despite Henry's fine work, all is not well; as a result of the win, in much the same manner as the bridge-flag-flying bets between Premier Pete and Bob 'I don't drive a' Carr over the results of Origin games, India now own full rights over Kashmir. The remaining members of Led Zeppelin are said to be considering their legal options.
Including finally catching up with this bloke and legally beating the piss out of him for defiling their song for a movie about a giant radioactive lizard.
Yeah. Uh huh.
Berrick Barnes
No relation of Jimmy, though this workin' class man and had the driving wheels to have the Welsh crying 'Lay down your guns, I surrender' in their recent France 2007 World Cup clash held in an unfashionable outer suburb of Paris called Cardiff. (On a related topic, what the hell was Barnesey The Elder up to with all that cheap wine and that three-day goat?) The stupid-haired twiglet is likely to see an arseload more game-time now that Stephen Larkham is crocked for the tournament with MRSA of the kneecap (exhibiting the sort of familial timing which saw his cousin, former V8 racer Mark Larkham, amount to bugger all in the sport other than a Formula Ford title in the '80s and a Bathurst pole in '99). Here the World of Bollocks would normally warn of the folly of putting too much faith in anyone with two surnames and no first name, but we choose to rescind such sentiments on the basis that Berrick is a pretty dumb surname and noone famous enough to be in Wikipedia has it, so it's a moot point, as well as being a shit one.
The Special One
Finally, English football is a little bit more shitbox this week for the loss of Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho, who was levered out of his position by delusional megalomaniac club owner Roman Avanadashityabitch in order to give his off-sider Avram Grant a gig. Mourinho was sardonic, sarcastic, cynical, mercurial and arrogant, and those were his redeeming qualities. He will be missed by Chelsea players and fans alike, none of whom now stand a chance of winning much more than the club meat raffle on Thursday night, and the British media, who will now have to find their quotable quotes elsewhere.
Meanwhile, on a tacky game show set somewhere inside FIA headquarters...
The Doctor is OUT like McLaren from the constructors' points table.
