Author: Richard Irvine

2007 All Blacks 30 year reunion dinner runsheet, with notes

1700 Guests arrive at Hotel / Greeted in foyer / Welcome nibbles, champagne, beer, wine served
1702 Was that Stu Wilson pan handling outside?
1723 Fuck this, is there any scotch?
1724 Doug Howlett cut off from further alcohol
1755 Guests ushered to ballroom by nervous staff. That floor has only just been resurfaced, do you realise?
1800 Pre speech ‘energisers’ with Darren Shand
1804 First bread roll thrown
1805 Speech: “Reminiscing – bonded brothers bleeding on the battlefield” with Anton Oliver
1807 First fork thrown
2030 Speech: “I was wrong, very wrong, where I went wrong, Oh how I loathe the very ground I walk on everyday” – self flagellation and spiritual cleansing session with top referee Wayne Barnes
2200 Jordan Luck takes the stage
2218 Aaron Mauger’s wife injured while loitering in Jordan Luck’s path to the lavatory
2245 Is that stores? Get me another case of Johnny Walker, NOW! What? Get down to LiquorLand in a cab, then! For the love of god..
2305 You’re me best mate. You fucker.
0012 Searching for a cab, racked with sobs

Links on Friday

– Sebastian Chabal steals a dog’s lunch – magic. Why is the dog called ‘Springboks’ though?
– Golf has a new hero – check out Woody Austin as he bends his putter on his head in frustration. I’ve done that with a keyboard a few times, alright. Bonus – Woody Austin falls in the water. Nice one, bruv
– Top 50 football kits – I want one of them Dukla Prague kits and all
– Matt le Tissier free kick – cool as you like

World Cup reading list

If you’ve not actually moved from the couch since final whistle, and are starting to contemplate brightening up your pit of despair with a fridge, toaster, and large plastic tub to catch the dribble, then here’s all the interweb action you’ve missed

– Stephen Jones responds to readers letters – Jaysus. Stephen Jones is either the bastard child of Margret Thatcher and a dashing young Clive Woodward, or John Clarke’s greatest ever creation

– NZ’s own Jed Thian writes in the Guardian (the GUARDIAN!) on the pain – heh, yes the poms at work had a field day on Monday. Nice croissants, though

– Bart from The Silver Fern on why we lost and the reconditioning programme – some well considered points from a smart rugby guy

– Inky on his primal response to Sunday’s loss, ie going out and getting covered in blood and guts. I’ve only just started reading Inky, the archives are highly recommended

– Public Address System gets it out of their system – Following Russell Brown’s thoughtful post, there’s a mammoth thread really worth reading, and watch the youtube vid of the Paris Rugby ball..

Office voice of doom really looking forward to work on Monday

SRNZPA: Christchurch product manager Tom Hopping spent Sunday planning his Monday morning at work, following the All Blacks’ shock World Cup exit. “I knew all along we’d lose – now is my time”.

“First off, I hope I run into number one Graham Henry fanboy Dan from accounts in the car park, I wanna get stuck into him about the rotation thing” said Hopping. “Then, I’ll make coffee really slowly in the kitchen just to pick the sales team off with a few ‘I told you so’s’. I’ll get straight on the email after that, I can cover a lot of ground fairly quickly that way”.

Hopping has maintained the All Blacks would fail to break the 20 year World Cup hoodoo since 2004. “I was packing myself after the Lions tour, we were looking pretty sharp for a while there. I’m rapt everyone’s dreams are shattered now”.

The water dispenser or the photocopier were both candidates for morning tea from 10.45 to 11.00am. “At the water dispenser, people would have to listen to me for, I’m guessing, about 30 seconds on average. I can’t get that kind of time at the printer, unless there’s a paper jam. That could buy me a good couple of minutes. I’ll just have to make that call on the day”.

‘Heads will roll’, ‘Gutless wonders’, ‘It’s ’99 all over again’, along with strangled choking noises will form the basis of Hopping’s Monday morning arsenal. “So many people are wrong, and I’m right. Monday’s going to be the best day ever. I hope no-ones away sick, but I ‘spose I could clean them up Tuesday or Wednesday”.

Lunchtime would signal the peak of Hopping’s cavalcade of vindication – “I’m going to get a phone card and give Millsy a bell on his mobile, he’ll be just getting off a plane in Paris. Hopefully he hasn’t heard, and I can break it to him myself, that’d be the icing on the cake. Isn’t it great to be alive”?

Je suis coeur brisé

My heart started really thumping with twenty to go – but hang on, wasn’t this meant to be the ‘sit back and enjoy the ride’ cup, as we took everyone to bits with this fantastic team that’d reconditioned, formed leadership groups with itself, and beaten all comers in the last four years? No worries, right? As Bob Howitt, a proper rugby Journo, reassured John Campbell on Thursday night, we have the best prop, openside, first five and full back, overseen by the most meticulous coach. There was no WAY we’d lose.

While alternate realities are pretty appealing right now, we are indeed out in the quarters. We still have wall to wall All Blacks flogging us phones, Weet Bix and Fords on the telly like some kind of sick joke, but they’ll be watching the rest of the World Cup from the couch like the rest of us (if we bother). The All Blacks never get to play with the underdog spirit, that devil may care, nothing to lose attitude the French do so well (and nope, we won’t get to do that in 2011 either). We’ve got more than anyone to lose, Christmas only comes every four years for Kiwis – Gregan’s ‘four more years, boys’ sledge was a deadly accurate bulls-eye on our national psyche.

Maybe we should just get over it. Watching the sub’s faces, they looked bloody terrified. For all the training and preparation this group has done, nothing can take away the knowledge that 3 million people in their pajamas are watching you like a hawk, ready to jump on your back if you miss that line out take, or drop that pass – it must be bone chilling. The defeat hurts, a lot, and today I’ve found myself drifting into silence and staring off into space a lot – maybe, as a nation, we should all take up a new hobby.

Other stuff –
– Don’t I look like a dick? This was foolish, too. This smart-arse bloggery is not going to be as much fun for a little while, but if ever a country needed to take itself less seriously, now is the time, team
– Hope the fans in Cardiff and the Mums and Dads having to traipse to the Semi and Final keep their good humor – the bad tempered impression a mob of sullen chip-shouldered rugby fans leave with the world could take Peter Jackson years to undo. If you’re going to be a misery guts, flog your ticket for pounds, and make the most of a European mini-break
– Hopefully now TV news will now feature more news and less cheer-leading based content
– Spare a thought for me mate Mike who was there last night, and there in ’99.
– Ok, THAT BLOOODY PASS WAS A MILE FORWARD!

Links on Friday

– No Police Report Can Truly Capture My Love Of Drunk Driving – Har. Those Onion guys are actually funny
– Zero punctuation – the best video console review you’ll see on this blog today
– Steve Vai lays down some gnarly licks – this give hope to bedroom shredders everywhere
– Simpsons’ movie references – woah. There’s LOADS here, and I bet it’s only scratching the surface. They’re bloody clever, those goshdarn Simpsons

Steve Hansen tells press conference the usual bag of shit

SRNZPA: Assistant All Black coach Steve Hansen reached deep into his cliche supply this morning (NZ time), telling a packed press conference “France could be the surprise package of the quarter finals”, while rolling his eyes. “They’ll have that extra motivation playing away from home, it could relieve the pressure they face in Paris” he expanded, giggling a little. “We’re not fooled by their slow start – anything can happen, just look at ’99”, trying to disguise a laughing fit as coughing. He went on to add “They’re well coached and LaPorte will’ve been studied the tapes all night. As a panel, we greatly respect his innovative and astute tactical approach”, while merrily making the ‘wanker’ sign with his wrist and hand.

“I mean, you could say we’ve been number one for three years at least, we’ve thrashed them over here and at home recently, they couldn’t even get it together to beat Argentina in their own back yard, still don’t know who their best team is, and we’re playing them in Wales. That’s all very well, but I’m not going to sit here and say “we’re going to thrash them” said Hansen, while nodding vigorously and mouthing “Yes, yes we are”.

England commentator’s partner utterly sick of England’s magnificence

SRNZPA: Kate Harris, partner of UKTV Rugby commentator Alan Brampton is sick to the back teeth of the indomitable spirit of the men in white. “People at home might think he only goes on and on about England during the game, even if they’re being totally shafted. The thing is, he’s like that the WHOLE time. Superb England this, lionheated bravery that. Jesus wept.”

While impossibly blinkered cheer leading with little connection to actual events on the pitch may endear Brampton to ITV audiences, Harris feels it’s a sticking point in forming adult relationships. “He’s impossible. Alan’s got to be the only man in Britain with a framed photo of fucking Clive Woodward beside his bed. That’s just not right, is it? I’m not telling you what he says about Martin Johnson when we make love”.

While Harris has learned to cope with Bramptons’ harping on by tuning right out, social situations are a potential mine field. “You just can’t have a conversation. We had some old university friends of mine over for dinner, my god, it was a disaster. Toby asked Alan what he made of Gordon Brown, and he started going on about a stirring effort from the World Champions that should put the game beyond the grasp of the valiant but limited Italians. I mean, what the ruddy hell is that? Toby and Jemimah just looked at each other like ‘what the…?!?’. I just knew Jemimah got on the phone to our friends as soon as they left to laugh about me. I wanted to die”.

In hindsight, Harris feels the warning signs were there from the very start of the 18 month long relationship. “I met him in a rugby club, the fact his last wife left him just after the World Cup in 2003 should have been a big, big red flag”. Harris maintains the outlook for their relationship is not great “It’s the total lack of touch with reality that gets me. Let’s face it, England are fairly crap, aren’t they?”