Posts by Charles Mabbett
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And the Wellington Phoenix are battling along okay too. Not over promising but not disappointing either.
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Which begs the question: Does my hubris look big in this??
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Thanks for putting that up, Giovanni. That's a direct and honest response from Chris Rattue.
But there really was such a lot of hubris being spun about the ABs' chances. I know hindsight is 20/20 but the danger of being so dismissive about the opposition is that sometimes it comes back to bite you in the arse with big teeth.
I wouldn't accuse the ABs of that but certainly many of our sports commentators fall into that category.
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FYI - for posterity's sake, here's how Fairfax sports journos called it on Friday. Note Greg Ford's reference to the French as 'Cheese eating surrender monkeys', a Homer Simpson-ism for French lack of enthusiasm for a war in Iraq.
Now where's that white flag got to?
Jim Kayes: Forget '99, the last four years are what matters. The All Blacks are too quick, too strong, to skilful, too good. France has forgotten how to play French rugby. No scrum and little flair, they will rely heavily on a kicking game.
Marc Hinton: Everybody keeps saying that the French have a big one in them, a la '99. I don't see it. This is an average Les Bleus side and Bernard Laporte's selection gambles are nothing but last rolls of the dice. The All Blacks have been waiting a long time for a significant test at this tournament, and I fully expect them to be magnifique.
Tony Smith: The moment of reckoning. Now is the hour to justify the All Blacks' billing as world No 1. France can't beat them - they can only beat themselves. This is one of France's worst World Cup squads. Where are the backline Serges? Bernard Laporte has chosen robots as backs.
Greg Ford: Kip time is over lads. Time to earn your pay by bludgeoning France into submission and then by flaying them some more just for kicks. The tabloids in the UK call the French Cheese-Eating-Surrender-Monkeys. Could not have said it better myself. They'll roll up the white flag.
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Ha! Bring back John Mitchell AKA The Communicator!
Go the Boks! You know if Rokocoko and Sivivatu had played for Fiji instead of NZ, they might have beaten South Africa. And who knows, the All Blacks might have beaten France with a couple of other wings. Both were extremely disappointing in yesterday's test.
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yes, it does look like a magnificent bridge. I guess it says something of New Zealand that we chose to build Te Papa at the arse end of the last century.
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Another pet hate of mine - the sports media's habit of using 'passion' (technically a noun) as a verb as in "out-passioned". Check out the Stuff website.
The picture of Richie McCaw at the media conference is heart rending. Poor guy. He's given the game and the public as much as he's got to give and it wasn't enough today.
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Nice one Robyn. If one were to believe Deaker, since 1987 we have had as many national disasters as Indonesia and strangely they seem to happen in four year cycles.
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oh an another thing - am I right in saying that there was more support in the Millennium Stadium for the French? There was audible support for the All Blacks but neutrals seemed to favour France. Is that a fair assessment? It would be good to hear from someone who was actually there.
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Look at this from the ABC website:
"Prominent New Zealand radio commentator Murray Deaker described the result as nothing short of a national disaster.
"Sadly we are a dumb rugby nation, we don't play the big matches well," he said.
"We play them in a boofhead way. We were a bunch of boofheads playing out there tonight against a French side that isn't that good. On the big occasions we choke.""
It is this kind of thing that gets my goat - "a national disaster" - talk about putting things in the right perspective.