In their infinite wisdom, World Rugby chose to schedule the World Cup in a country that is prone to typhoons at this time of year, and to make absolutely no contingency plans should a typhoon threaten.
In a development that appears to have taken the organisers completely by surprise, there is a typhoon headed in Japan’s direction, and two matches have been cancelled, with Japan v Scotland still in doubt.
France will miss out on the possibility of beating England to top their group, and Italy will miss out on a historic chance to beat the All-Blacks and progress to the quarter-finals for the first time.
All right, nobody thinks that Italy would have beaten New Zealand, but it’s a funny old game and a couple of red cards, or another sneaky peek at the rule-book, could have produced the upset of the century. Apparently we’ll never know.
As Parisse said:
“It is ridiculous that a decision of this nature has been made because it isn’t like the fans arrived yesterday. It is ridiculous that there was no plan B, because it isn’t news that typhoons hit Japan.
“Sure everyone might think that Italy versus New Zealand being cancelled counts for nothing because we’d have lost anyway, but we deserved to be respected as a team. We had the chance to play in a big stadium, against a great team.
“The alternative is plan B. When you organise a World Cup you should have one in place.”
Should the Japan v Scotland match be cancelled, all three teams in Pool A contention will have reason to feel aggrieved also: Scotland for obvious reasons, Japan because it is not the way you’d want to go through, and Ireland because they miss the chance to top the pool (that being in Scotland’s gift, rather than Ireland’s hands, of course).
Quite frankly, World Cup should be handed a red card for bringing the game into disrepute. Players and fans alike (and no doubt the sponsors too) are rightly furious.
These matches should be rescheduled in alternative locations.
Last weekend’s rugby
For a rundown on the state of play as of 07/10, please see Deebee’s excellent synopsis.
On the telly this week … or not
Friday 11th October
| Australia 27 – 8 Georgia | 11:15 | ITV4 |
| Cheetahs 40 – 16 Munster | 17:15 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Dragons 14 – 38 Connacht | 19:35 | Premier Sports 2 / TG4 / S4C |
| Leinster 40 – 14 Edinburgh | 19:35 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Gloucester 24 – 26 Bath | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
Saturday 12th October
| New Zealand v Italy | 05:45 | CANCELLED |
| England v France | 09:15 | CANCELLED |
| Ireland 47 – 5 Samoa | 11:45 | ITV |
| Kings 17 – 42 Ulster | 15:00 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Scarlets 54 – 10 Zebre | 15:00 | Freesports |
| Ospreys v Treviso | 19:35 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Glasgow v Cardiff | 19:35 | Premier Sports 1 |
Sunday 13th October
| Namibia v Canada | 04:15 | ITV |
| USA v Tonga | 06:45 | ITV |
| Wales v Uruguay | 09:10 | ITV / S4C |
| Japan v Scotland | 11:45 | ITV |
” Gonna hack chimpie’s washing. Gonna make it waash his clothes with half cooked cheese on toast.”
My two-year-old can already do this. They get tech-savvy so young these days…
LikeLike
@chimpie
reduce the price range to less than £250. No internet options then.
LikeLike
Still can’t like comments.
LikeLiked by 4 people
Not even my own.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Re usable nappies….
Worse than Yharnam.
LikeLike
@Avs – one’ll come along eventually that you can.
LikeLike
“Not even my own.”
I can understand that.
LikeLiked by 2 people
“Worse than Yharnam.”
You want to buy some?
LikeLike
Our heating is internet connected.
I was skeptical, but it has been quite useful.
LikeLike
If only Tim Berners-Lee could have foreseen the internet of pish.
LikeLike
CMW – I can see reusable nappies being a consumable item in Bloodborne 2.
LikeLike
@Craigs – there is a bit of crossover I suppose. I’m pretty sure people who use reusable nappies are more likely to be the types who take their placentas home with them and all that sort of thing.
LikeLike
Did the reusable nappy thing with no. 1. That was a pretty minging and water intensive experience
Decided not to with no. 2.
LikeLike
Thought about reusable nappies. For about 3 seconds then decided life’s too short.
LikeLike
@Cat – that was true, but now your washing machine can be connected to the internet…
LikeLike
One big advantage of the things is that with the child being able to feel that they are sitting in their own piss and shit it can be easier to persuade them to start using the toilet.
LikeLike
Watching the game from earlier. Don’t think I’ve seen an Australia team spend so long in the opposition’s 22 without scoring tries since those games they lost to Scotland.
LikeLike
One big advantage of the things is that with the child being able to feel that they are sitting in their own piss and shit it can be easier to persuade them to start using the toilet.
Think it’ll work for uni students?
LikeLiked by 1 person
No need for any technology to make your domestic life easier when you can teach the dog new skillz.
https://wagwalking.com/training/pick-up-laundry
LikeLike
@Deebee – not sure the assumptions underpinning the theory would still hold.
LikeLike
Wonder if reusable nappies are on the Internet of pish.
LikeLike
Dogs that do your laundry certainly are.
LikeLike
Jeebus fucking christ: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2019/oct/11/world-rugby-contingency-plan-typhoon-hagibis-england-france-scotland-japan-cup
LikeLike
The key paragraph:
LikeLike
‘Robust Contingency Plans’, eh.
LikeLike
If your going to fuck up your back-up plan, may as well go full stupid.
LikeLike
“you’re” editing like a DBWR contingency plan planner.
LikeLike
This has left a big 9:00 am hole in my schedule tomorrow. Will probably have to do something useful.
LikeLike
Watch this:
LikeLike
Or this 1985 Japanese movie – Taifu Kaubu:
LikeLike
Taifu Kurabu. My fingers ain’t firing today.
LikeLike
“Need a new washing machine. Been looking”
Aye, we too. I turned a dinosaur’s eye to the App option For just those reasons.
Our tumble dryer was stacked on top of the old washing machine so the delivery ladz had to lift it down and back up again during installation. One day later dryer packs up as well.
There goes the holiday savings. Marvellous.
LikeLike
The Cheetahs hooker is terrific
LikeLiked by 1 person
Our dishwasher packed up hours before we had to leave for Turkey in the middle of the night.
As we were letting the house out on Air B&B I had to wash an entire load by hand at 3am just before leaving for the airport.
LikeLike
@CMW – did you ever consider that the Great Nappy Burning might be the climate change tipping point that sends us all into oblivion?
LikeLike
Cheetahs next home game is in February!
LikeLike
There’s that coming round the back of the maul again
LikeLike
14 miles? Amazing.
LikeLike
Big Ox, get in.
I have to support Cheetahs here, we won’t get anything in Dublin tonight
LikeLike
14 miles sounds like the maximum amount of inconvenience a rugby blazer is prepared to tolerate.
LikeLiked by 1 person
“14 miles sounds like the maximum amount of inconvenience a rugby blazer is prepared to tolerate.”
Is that when the ice in the G&T starts to melt?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Seems to me as though the whole concept of ‘contingency planning’ was daft from the off.
Massive tropical storms that kill people and cause serious damage to infrastructure doesn’t strike me as an event that leaves much scope for rearranging important sporting fixtures,
I think it was more a case of dishonestly saying a plan was in place and then hoping for the best.
LikeLike
Munster tighthead, every maul he comes round to the Cheetahs side
LikeLike
“Ox Nche was complaining that he was blown last week”
Not sure that is something to complain about
LikeLike
*Dinosaur Update*
I won’t bore you with the details, but have spent the last week trying to rectify a problem connecting my music to my ‘stereo’ which is now entirely digital using iTunes and Apple’s home sharing doo dah. Nothing was in my control to solve it.
Call me mad, but after seeing how untrustworthy the US can be under Trump, I really worry about giving so much control over to their technology corporations. There are basic assumptions about trust being torn apart, and it gives me the existential shudders.
LikeLike
Tyler Durden is having a good game
LikeLike
Can your washing machine not stream itunes, Iks?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bloody nora, Cheetahs have gone all runny, Munster defence is suffocating them
LikeLike
@Avs, regarding the ‘like’ function.
I also had that problem. I worked around it by logging in to my WordPress account before trying to do anything else, and turning off my ghostery and adblock on this site.
LikeLike
@Iks – I’ve got a used trombone here if that’ll help?
LikeLike