Something resembling first-choice teams have been named. Let’s hope they all survive the weekend.
International rugby on the telly this weekend
Friday 6th September
| Scotland v Georgia | 19:30 | Premier Sports 1 |
| England v Italy | 19:45 | Sky Sports Action / Sky Sports Main Event |
Saturday 7th September
| New Zealand v Tonga | 3:35 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Australia v Samoa | 10:30 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Ireland v Wales | 14:00 | Channel 4 / RTÉ Two |
Ovally Balls 
I’ve got a Shakhtar scarf thanks to a kind lady from Ukraine who was the girlfriend of a Juve supporter I’m a friend of. There’s quite a specific historical reason why I have a fancy for them. The lady told me some of the history of the club. Including the assassination of the then owner who was killed in a bomb attack during a match in the 1990s
Top fact: Shakhtar means “miner” in English. Another team with a similar name is Gornik Zabrze of Poland. Gornik in that case.
Here’s a video of the incomparable Gwyn Alf Williams descending into a mine in Donetsk:
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bale denied a highlights reel goal, even for him, as the ball just about brushed his hand 🤚 before he hit it
Paris leading RM 2-0
LikeLike
Kieron Trippier’s Atletico Madrid holding Aaron Ramsay’s Juventus to a 0-0 draw so far.
LikeLike
TomP – did you ever hear the Public Service Broadcasting’s album about the Welsh coal mines? Every Valley it’s called and it is excellent.
A wee documentary on it below:
LikeLike
Good hit by Cuadrado.
LikeLike
Cheers, BB. Will listen to it later.
LikeLike
Juve! Juve! Juve!
Another excellent breakaway goal!
LikeLike
Justin Webb with tiresome article that appears far too often:
https://unherd.com/2019/09/how-could-anyone-prefer-football-to-rugby/?=sideshare
LikeLike
Ja – lovely ladz, great singers -pan and Scot – don’t let me down with this bet ladz – land to get out of the group.
Ireland? No excuse for this disaster: https://www.denny.ie/news/2019/09/11/bacon-cheese-rugby-ball/
LikeLike
Bugger, Atletico get two late goals to draw.
Cracking game though, especially the second half.
LikeLike
Tomp – it starts well…
My mother, a Quaker Maoist, wanted to ban football.
LikeLike
All Blacks team to face the Springboks:
15. Beauden Barrett
14. Sevu Reece
13. Anton Lienert-Brown
12. Ryan Crotty
11. George Bridge
10. Richie Mo’unga
9. Aaron Smith
8. Kieran Read
7. Sam Cane
6. Ardie Savea
5. Sam Whitelock
4. Scott Barrett
3. Nepo Laulala
2. Dane Coles
1. Joe Moody
16. Codie Taylor
17. Ofa Tuungafasi
18. Angus Ta’avao
19. Patrick Tuipulotu
20. Shannon Frizell
21. TJ Perenara
22. Sonny Bill Williams
23. Ben Smith
LikeLike
Hang on to those glory daze DeeBee. You are going to need them.
I’m hanging on. I’m clinging on. I’m in a state of near-euphoric dread, panic, excitement and bewilderment all in one. I want this show to hit the road now. I want RUGBY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
LikeLike
Ticht, that time lapse thingy was stunning!
LikeLike
That’s the strongest side the All Blacks have put out this year by some distance. Only possible weakness is the goal kicking department, with neither Beaudy nor Richie out of the top bracket. Richie is good though. Backline scares me if we aren’t watertight on defence. Sevu Reece has the potential to wreak havoc down Mapimpi’s wing, George Bridge has been in excellent form and the centres are beautifully balanced.
I’d also say their pack is about as good as it’ll get prior to Retallick getting back, although I fancy that our reserve forwards are better. It’s apparently going to bucket it down, which may just about negate the Kiwi backs, but don’t count on it! Boks will really need to get them into an arm wrestle and slow their ball down big time. Huge roles for PS du Toit, Franco Mostert, Vermeulen and Marx in terms of both tackle count and turnovers. Kolisi to snaffle, bust tackles and link efectively to get us on the front foot. Faf needs his box kicking to be pinpoint, Pollard needs to kick accurately out of hand and at posts and our back three need to counter with pace, pace, pace!
All that said, I can see a lot of big bombs being used if the weather is as bad as they say it’s going to be.
Tick, Tock.
LikeLike
Australian side to face Fiji:
15-Kurtley Beale, 14-Reece Hodge, 13-James O’Connor, 12-Samu Kerevi, 11-Marika Koroibete, 10-Christian Leali’ifano, 9-Nic White, 8-Isi Naisarani, 7-Michael Hooper (captain), 6-David Pocock, 5-Rory Arnold, 4-Izack Rodda, 3-Allan Alaalatoa, 2-Tolu Latu, 1-Scott Sio
Replacements:
16-Jordan Uelese, 17-James Slipper, 18-Sekope Kepu, 19-Adam Coleman, 20-Lukhan Salakaia-Loto, 21-Will Genia, 22-Matt Toomua, 23-Dane Haylett-Petty
Nic White preferred at 9 and Pooper back in tandem, although as the two flanks, rather than 7 and 8. O’Connor at 13 an interesting call too.
LikeLike
It’s like team sheet Christmas:
Médard – Penaud, Fickou, Vakatawa, Huget – (o) Ntamack, (m) Dupont – Ollivon, Alldritt, Lauret – Vahaamahina, Iturria – Slimani, Guirado (cap.), Poirot.
Remplaçants : Chat, Baille, Bamba, Le Roux, Picamoles, Machenaud, Lopez, Ramos.
LikeLike
@Deebee – I see Kyle Abbott just recorded the best first-class match figures (17/86) since Jim Laker. Will probably mean Somerset lose out in the County Championship to Essex who are top largely thanks to another South African Simon Harmer who took another seven-for yesterday. I suspect he’ll end up turning out for England at some point. Yorkshire’s title ambitions were finished last week by Somerset, but had been kept in the hunt for a while by Maharaj so there’s a bit of a theme here.
To provide a bit of contrast this week Yorkshire are being thrashed almost single-handedly (not quite as Billings got two centuries as well) by a 43 year old man who isn’t South African.
LikeLike
Harmer’s played tests for SA I think. Could England pick him in that case?
LikeLike
@TomP- don’t know. I’m sure I’ve read speculation about when he would qualify, but it could have been tongue-in-cheek for all I know. He does seem to be the best spinner in County Cricket though.
Looks like Wales won’t make it into Division One as their challenge has tailed off a bit since their South African was called up by Australia. Still got an outside chance though.
LikeLike
@tomp
I have a theory that RL took hold more strongly in mining towns than mill towns for reasons I have yet to invent.
For example Widnes, St Helens, Wigan, Leigh, Salford all strong mining areas. Oldham and Rochdale are mill towns with strong RL presence but Bolton, Bury, Ashton under Lyne, Stalybridge etc don’t have much in the way of a RL tradition. I would also argue Rochdale is probably as much of a RU town as a RL town, from my experience.
I haven’t gone into how it is distributed in Yorkshire as that might disprove the hypothesis,
LikeLike
Vakatawa at 12. Get the popcorn ready
LikeLike
He’s a Pretorian. Played for High School Old Boys, one of the rivals to “my” club there.
LikeLike
CMW – might daughter met Sam billings when he came to open the nets at her school. I think she quite likes cricket because she is good at taking catches. And likes doing cartwheels at the boundary.
LikeLike
Miners are tough as nails while mill workers are dilletantes and/or milquetoasts seems the only plausible explanation, OT.
Also works for their families and ancestors.
LikeLike
Ha ha – Craigs – I can remember going along to watch and support my younger brother play his first ‘proper’ cricket match in high school. After bowling waywardly for a couple of overs he was banished to the outfield, where he spent most of his time shadow boxing and doing cartwheels. He was crap at both.
LikeLike
More work needed to see if it holds for descendants too.
LikeLike
CMW, my dad was at a memorial service a couple of weeks back for a friend of the family. The guy had been a top rugby player. He was from Cornwall and turned out for the county team over 20 times. Also played for Bristol and Coventry back in the day. A really good bloke to have a pint and a chat with.
Anyway, one of this fella’s sons ended up playing cricket for Glamorgan for donkeys years. And played outside half to my scrum half for our school under 14s through under 16s. I was very pleased that I’d batted above him in the order at school but he told me a few years later that he was quite possibly the worst batsman in pro cricket.
LikeLike
Deebs – well, my daughter is 9 so she gets a bit of leeway there. Plus, she’s pretty good at one armed cartwheels. Makes me feel as old as fuck.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Seriously, these ‘best of the 21st century’ lists in the graun are fucking annoying. Check out the computer game one. No strategy games, Bloodborne not the top 5, TLOU half way up, minecraft the winner. Ffs.
Also, Tina Fey best comedienne of the 21st century. Glad I don’t pay for this shit.
LikeLike
There was a neat joke putting Stewart Lee ar 41st in the funny people list.
I don’t play computer games but Minecraft’s a proper cultural phenom so must be high up. Likewise, Tina Fey has Mean Girls, 30 Rock and the Palin impression. Big impact.
LikeLike
@OT
“I have a theory that RL took hold more strongly in mining towns than mill towns for reasons I have yet to invent”
Isn’t it the case that west Yorkshire is more heavily RL (Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield, Halifax, Batley, Dewsbury) but south Yorks took up soccer? (Sheffield, Rotherham, etc)
Granted there’s both codes in all these places but my impression is that west is RL country (eg there’s Leeds United but 3 RL teams)
LikeLike
Afternoon, TompP……………………
…………………….and f*** you re mill workers!
LikeLike
TompP…………..
In other news, the last (but one) European evening I attended at Old Trafford was decades ago against Gornik………cold misty and wet.
United won 6 – 0 iirc and Denis Violet got 3 (?tbc)………………………….
LikeLike
Scottish news…………..
Sam Skinner to have hamstring surgery – not good in a big athletic lad – perhaps why Exeter signed Vermeulen – “like for like” as it were……………..
LikeLike
Tomp – minecraft is high up. But it’s not number 1.
LikeLike
……………………and most mill workers were female anyway.
LikeLike
@slade
This is the bit a lot of people forget in the social history of the UK. My father-in-law is from the east end of London and will often say “it’s different these days with women going to work and all that” and I point out both my grandmothers always worked, as did their mothers and so on. That’s why the mills had nurseries:
LikeLiked by 4 people
If someone does a racist thing 3 times almost 20 years ago, seemingly out of ignorance whilst still at school, and has demonstrably changed since, should they be raked over the coals for it now?
LikeLike
@craigs
He is very quick to judge and condemn others. If photos appeared of a blacked up Pierre Poilievre from 20 years ago I doubt Justin would be as understanding as he is asking others to be.
He plays the political game so can’t moan when he becomes the target.
LikeLike
OT – does he? OK, didn’t know that.
LikeLike
Wot a choob
LikeLike
At least he didn’t root a deid pig
LikeLiked by 1 person
Did have to laugh yesterday at our PM being captured onna press camera saying ‘there are no press here’
LikeLike
going to miss the WC opener tomorrow. Boo.
LikeLike
Ticht’s boy:
LikeLike
@OT that is a brilliant clip. The patronising voiceover captures in a moment how people were and are looked down on because of class and location, even if it was meant to be a fillip.
Call me barmy but I think it captures something about Brexit, and how people can be exploited and manipulated by a posh voice praising their sacrifice and stoicism in the context of a greater good, or patriotic duty.
LikeLike
O’Connor at 13 anticipates Oz dominating the game and scoring tries against weaker opposition.
LikeLike
This Trudeau thing is complete cock. I really don’t get why the so called liberal press would lash to the mast someone who is clearly not a racist but a champion of equal rights just because he fancy-dressed in his teen years.
The Graun really needs to snap out of it and get a grip. The true racists wouldn’t go any where near dressing up as a sexy Sheik or a cheeky slave.
LikeLike
*wonders which one iks dresses up as*
LikeLike