Author: Richard Irvine

Welcome to sportreview.net.nz - here's a bit about the site. Here I am on Twitter, or email me at richard (at) richardirvine dot com.

L&P – doing it wrong

I got a press release from L&P’s PR agency today on their upcoming BYC cricket tournament. PR’s easy, it works like this:

  1. Get list of ‘sport blogger’ email addresses. For god’s sake don’t bother reading their site to see if they a) do this kind of thing thing or b) hate you
  2. Send out a mass emailed press release
  3. Bloggers do your job for you and send that shit ‘viral’ on the ‘internet’

Unfortunately, sportreview.net.nz’s policy is that L&P needs to eat a bag of dicks for the way they treated top blokes The Beige Brigade last year. Here’s an excerpt from the email the Ad Agency sent The Brigade when they tried to get behind last year’s tournament:

“We kinda see the Beige Brigade as high profile funny guys where as L&P is always the backseat funny guy, finding humour in little kiwi truths and not really making a fuss. We…don’t feel the fit is quite right for L&P, strategically.”

‘Kinda’. That’s awesome. This is how it’s going to go on my site:

  1. Blogger receives mass emailed press release from L&P (disclosure: blogger already thinks L&P should eat bag of dicks)
  2. Blogger responds with snarky mcsnark snark blog post

L&P has been going to the tired 70s / 80s Kiwiana well for a while now. They used to be good, but the current ads make drinking L&P seem as appealing as feeding my nuts through the electronic whiteboard. Dressing no-marks in headbands and trackies would have a lot more impact if every other hipster on K Road wasn’t dressed like that these days. The campaign’s posters stars aren’t Kiwi lads who love a game of cricket and an L&P to cool off while effortlessly embodying the brand values of being quirky, down to earth, lovable, and a dufus. They’re dicks. Exhibits A through C:

I was going out of my way to get annoyed now. The campaign’s shitty flash-based website is a content-lite shambles, a Trojan horse for lengthy terms and conditions that crashes Firefox, and leaves no Kiwiana stone unturned to flog you sugary water:

Gag me with a jandal – they’re raping buzzy bees here. For crimes against Cricket and New Zealand generally, sportreview.net.nz says no to L&P’s ad campaign, and no to unsolicited press releases. I like to drink L&P with fish and chips as much as the next man, and the BYC tournament itself is a great idea – I’m sure those that play will have a great time – but the patronising and annoying ad campaign, website and PR has to go, team.

Links on Friday: David Lloyd tribute

David ‘Bumble’ Lloyd, the Lancashire batsman, umpire, coach and pundit has an amiable, relaxed style and regularly comes up with *gems*, like ‘the fridge has opened, he’s flown like a gazelle!‘ in his broad Wallace and Grommit accent. As promised on Hadyn’s Field Theory, here’s more Bumble:

Spotting a stray heat spot

Pitch report from ‘Lords’. Listen for the dubious groundsman name

Utter gibberish. Catford?

The best one, though, is when someone nicks his lawnmower. I wouldn’t want to meet his George.

Reading list: Updike on golf

John Updike died today. As well as being a literary athlete, he was a keen amateur golfer:

“Indeed, few sights are more odious on the golf course than a sauntering, beered-up foursome obviously having a good time. Some golfers, we are told, enjoy the landscape; but properly the landscape shrivels and compresses into the grim, surrealistically vivid patch of grass directly under the golfer’s eyes as he morosely walks toward where he thinks his ball might be.”

Essay excerpt.

Reading list: Barry O’Bomber

Chuck Klosterman interviews Michelle Obama’s brother, a basketball coach.

“When I played basketball with Barack, he was quietly confident, which means he had good self-esteem without being cocky. He was certainly a team player — he wasn’t a pig, he passed when he was supposed to pass, and he cut when he was supposed to cut. To me, that speaks to a lack of selfishness. He had natural leadership ability, because he didn’t just pass me the ball because he was dating my sister.”

Links on Friday

Wussiest. Hockey Fight. Eva. This guy looks like a frickin’ Emo missing out on a Chuck Taylor sale. I thought the NHL was meant to be big tough lumberjacks and that?

I would love to see the All Blacks medics get involved like this, maybe with a ball and all tackle on the line, or some off the ball action at ruck time.

Back at work? Not happy? Skive off with a few rounds of Test Catch Cricket. It’s no penguin toss, sadly.

Bunch of hipster-types go to Austin, Texas to ride track bikes with Lance Armstrong. He kicks their arse.

Lance Armstrong new bike pics

@lancearmstrong twittered his new bike:

More here, here and here.

A new Lance Armstrong bike release is usually accompanied by the kind of fanfare and careful media management a David Beckham fart attracts in the UK. But LA has simply taken a few snaps with his Blackberry and uploaded them into cyberspace himself. Having him on Twitter is awesome, his media handlers must be having kittens.

What I learned in 2008

2008 lacked last year’s dangling carrots of World Cup glory, or the crushing, crushing disappointment. Still, with the Olympics and Euro 2008 to go with full Rugby and Cricket programmes, there was plenty to watch, write and bet online about. Here’s what I learned:

Crusaders fans threatening to support Australia against the All Blacks have very short attention spans

TV reporters going to find Crusaders fans threatening to support Australia against the All Blacks look very foolish indeed

Graham Henry and Richie McCaw are pretty good at what they do

Even that won’t get Rattue back on side

The Black Caps are an effective test cricket side like a Jelly Tip is an effective sunhat

Ricky Ponting gets pretty narky when he loses

But then Andrew Symonds, Micheal Clarke, Mike Hussey and Brett Lee aren’t as good as we thought they were. At least Ponting can bat

Australia’s fall is a god send for sports writers and columnists filling word count over the holiday break

Hayden Roulston is a shit hot cyclist on the track and the road, and is just a fucking cool guy

Lance Armstrong is on Twitter

Even the Rugby League World Cup got exciting toward the very end after all

It’s not quite the same without Flem

Juande Ramos isn’t as good as I thought

I had to re-think my dim view of Harry Redknapp

Iain O’Brien is a pretty decent cricketer and blogger

W e can win Olympic golds after all

The Tour De France reached yet another low point despite the cool bikes – roll on 2009

Just getting rid of Bracewell isn’t going to fix everything

sportreview.net.nz related learnings include:
It’s nerve-wracking but fun to sit alone in a broom-cupboard-like studio to talk on the radio. I was stoked to be asked, and with with how it came out, managing to get a few pre-rolled zingers in

Bloggers don’t get picked to coach the Black Caps too often

I enjoyed scanning old photos and writing up my fav stadiums and trips

Robbie Deans is a double agent

Even with 15 minutes’ trouble to set up a CafePress store, people don’t buy your shit

PowerPoint is still the best for making cartoons

There’s nothing like a semi-organised cartoon archive

Kids make blogging time scarce – must focus

This year I really enjoyed JRod’s blog, and Hadyn Green’s Field Theory was always good for a Friday afternoon uniform debate. I met Graeme for a beer and to talk tactics. I joined Twitter, quit, and got back on it. This was my first year on a proper domain and on wordpress, and I’m very happy with both.

Thanks to everyone that’s read, commented and linked to sportreview.net.nz  – I hope you’ve enjoyed it. Sometimes this blog feels like a ‘if a tree falls in the forrest, does anyone hear it’ situation, but I love doing it – your participation is much valued. I go by Wil Wheaton’s adage that “it doesn’t matter how many people ‘get’ your work, as long as the right people do’. You’re the right people. Ta.