World Cup fever now all better

A rare foray outside my comfort zone today, with an entry which attempts to convey my experience of the Rugby World Cup in New Zealand, or lack thereof, despite much marketing on the BBC website, from Guinness and from a NZ wine company that used that irritating piano-led diddly diddly dee song by an American named after a Vauxhall saloon. I managed to miss about 40 days worth of rugby due to commitments such as work, sleep and a beautiful baby boy, and frankly, didn’t feel left out or unduly upset by missing such entertaining contests as South Africa 87 - 0 Namibia or New Zealand 83 - 7 Japan. What Namibia can take from such a series of beatings is beyond me, and even if Japan can manage a creditable draw with a below par Canada they surely won’t be chucking up rugby union stadia with the same demented fervour that they prepared the country for their football World Cup bow. Nonetheless, infected by the rabid jingoism of friends, co-workers (both current and erstwhile) and random tweeters, I did manage to pull it together to watch Wales’ undoing at the hands of a French side bereft of attacking intent, their subsequent travails against the hard-hitting Aussies, and the damp squib (despite vested marital interest in the outcome) that was the Gold Medal match, or whatever they call it these days.

Marc Lievremont

A member of the FLN

I can’t remember if it was Lauro De-la-la-llaglio or his bland ITV colleague who said it, but during the body-shaking, mud-churning assaults on the half-way line in Auckland, one of them did reminisce wistfully that he had never seen an entertaining Rugby World Cup Final (engaging, certainly, but for all out flair and end-to-end try-scoring, sadly, 24 years – but only 6 finals - of blanks). My theory is as follows: only the players capable of playing with injuries make it to the final, and so we get teams made up of hard-cases with no attacking flair, and third- or fourth-choice backs better suited to toiling in the mud at Ebbw Vale than gracing the turf at the World’s greatest stadia.

Consider the evidence: New Zealand went through 4 outside halves to get to the final – Donald was fishing for white bait until two weeks ago and his new English club Bath may be slightly miffed that his summer of rest was interrupted rudely by the call to arms; Wales lost any attacking cohesion they may have possessed when Priestland buggered his shoulder, and left the tournament with only one serious rugby scalp – that of the surprisingly ambivalent Irish; and if any (and I mean any) of the kicks missed by Wales and France stand-ins Hook, Halfpenny and Parra had gone over, then we could have been looking at a first crown for the Welsh or French. In fact, thanks to Dan Carter’s injury, if Piri Weepu had been less inclined to go punching Maxime Mermoz in the ear and more focused on kicking the funny shaped ball between the really tall white sticks, the Kiwis could have spanked the trousers off Les Bleus and there wouldn’t be quite so many nervously exhausted rugby fans found littering Wellington streets on Monday morning. I remember Five Nations past, when the world bemoaned boring boring Rob Andrews for kicking everything. What price a similarly metronomic kicker in any of the semi final teams? So we’re left with final teams willing to butt heads rather than break tackles; for all their pace and power, Nonu and Jane were stifled by tenacious tackling; the French front row were as impermeable to assault as the Maginot line; and the only NZ try came from Old Reliable Tony Woodcock. And as final nails go, NZ stalwart and captain McCaw played with an injury he carried from day one and was more than happy to “win ugly”.

In conclusion then, is there a case to answer for less of the third world’s punching bags to be included, and have fewer games so that those whom the world would pay to see are available to play in the showcase final? I suspect that the money men, the advertisers and the diddly diddly dee woman would strenuously object. So much for a spectator sport – perhaps regular work-a-day fans should be excluded and tickets only sold to corporate sponsors, a bit more like the English Premier League. 

As an aside, Marc Lievremont’s resemblance to an guerilla soldier from the Algerian National Liberation Front, thanks in large part to his ridiculous pencil moustache, provided ample comic relief, as did his ability to annoy the shit out of his own players. My Dad suggested his approach to rugby coaching was to make himself so unpopular that his team perform to spite him, rather than please him.  I half expected a Gallic shrug and for the prison-issue rolled cigarette I can’t help but imagine dangling, spit-adhered, from his lower lip to jump as he says “Pah” at each reversal of fortune, rather than the explosions of anger witnessed in the coaches’ box.  And does anyone else find Piri Weepu’s name hilarious? No? Just me and my one-year-old then.