OvallyBalls Inbox
To: OvallyBalls BTL
Subject: Top Secret World Cup Despatch – FOR YOUR ACTION
Clearance Level: Errr, top secret
Hi All,
OvallyBalls’ spies* in Japan managed to obtain a recording of a conversation between four, as yet unknown, rugby coaches. Top brass have not been able to identify the voices and are relying on you to identify them. We believe this to be a unique opportunity to learn the tactics and mind games elite-level coaches play against each other. As our highest-performing analysts, please read the transcript below and send us your opinions by 1900 hrs.
In Sag’s service.
Regards,
OvallyBalls Top Brass
* Unfortunately OvallyBalls’ performance-related bonuses have been cancelled this year due to the unforeseen high cost of kimonos and treatment for stomach-related illnesses suffered by our spies whilst in the field.
Transcript begins:
Voice 1: You know mate, sometimes being a head coach of a tier-one nation is just a case of chasing the laws of the game and nothing else, mate. How can we be expected to know what’s going on when changes are made literally every year?
You know we found out that those Poms have known about lifting in lineouts for over a decade? And those Saffas don’t even teach their props to take the hit in the scrum. How can we possibly compete? Our captain’s a good bloke and everything – tries his bloody guts out – but he’s thick as shit, mate. Keeps making these suggestions about how the pass is backwards even when it goes forwards when you are running or some bullshit I can’t work out. I just pat him on the head and keep going.
Voice 2: You know, ah agree with you. For us it iz like propping has gone out of fashion. It seemz like everyzing changes. Before you av a simple yet effective strategy. You find ze two most enormousse men in ze country. Zen afteur 30 minutes you replace zem with ze two second most enormousse men in ze country. Zen you hope for uncontested scrums after 65 minutes. But now ze way ze clubs play av changed.
Voice 3: *cackles*
Voice 1: Yeah, mate. No wonder our scrum couldn’t push over a dingo, mate. Makes me blood boil. That Mario actually fuckin knew what he was talking about, mate, when he said that. It’s like I’ve got to bloody Google this. Who bloody tells you these things, mate? No point in even engaging with the ref anymore. I doubt they even know.
Another thing, we bloody lost to the Welsh AGAIN. It’s like the world’s turned upside down, mate. Australia don’t lose to Wales. Not bloody normal, mate. I blame the players.
Voice 2: My playeurs are like chiildren! Zey always complain and moan about ow ah am not giving zem any structuure. Ah tell zem just to play, play, play like ah diid in ze good old days but zey don’t seem to understand.
Zey switch off in matches too. Ah think that they do not like ze wine I give zem with the oranges. Zey tell me that ze claret belongs on the field but I don’t know ze reference. You must worry zat zey cannot make decisions.
Voice 4: Look, mate, I’m not worried. I just let the core group of players set the tone, decide the plays, pick the squad, decide substitutions, identify loopholes in the laws, flight schedules; that sort of thing. They’ve been taught everything at school. I just bring that extra bit of magic, poker face and humbleness….
Voices 1 and 2: WHAT THE FUCK?!!!!
Voice 4: Look guys, I’m more of a delegator here. We’ve had this set-up since the early 90s. Just sometimes it hasn’t always worked, so I’m here to add value, and culture, say some nice things after we win and all that motivational shit.
Voice 3: That why you guys have gone stale? Getting fucked by that loser’s team?
Voice 1: Hey….
Voice 3: Shut up, loser. You guys are worse than the bloody Scots….
Voices 1/2/4: Wait? What?…
Voice 3: Nah, mate, you guys have got it all wrong. You don’t need players, you need machines. I’ve got a team of hit men who are coming after you. I’ve got some bloody Godzillas to flatten the rucks, mate. No more standing in front of our scrummy like a fucking parma fucking ham, mate. We’re playing in Japan, mate, so guys better tell your teams to take cover because we’re gonna fucking wreck you with kamikaze pilots. We’ve got bloody ninjas coming at you….
At this point voice 3 becomes muffled as the speaker appears to be ranting more to himself than the other coaches.
Voice 4: That synt isn’t going to win.
Voice 1: I thought you were as humble as a spider’s bollock, mate.
Voice 4: That’s the thing, mate, he needs to be more humble. All that ranting about ninjas and godzillas. What does it mean?
Voice 1: I don’t know. I just wash his clothes and do other odd jobs….
Voice 4: Thought that was a rumour….
Voice 1: Nah, why would it be a rumour?
Voice 4: Aaahhh … mmm.
Voice 1: It’s since Randwick, mate. Club pecking order never dies, right?
Voice 4: Riiight…
…
Voice 2: Well, you know, ah still think we av a chance. We av our backs to ze wall. You know what we can do when we av no chance. Ah might just put an extra prop on ze wing just to fuck us harder. Four flankerrz in ze finisseurs. When everyone writes us off zats when we become a team oo can really play! You know what ah mean?
Voice 1: Nah, mate.
Voice 4: …Er … nah, sure. We’ll be fine. ‘Cos we’re humble. We’re not scared though. It’s different.
Voice 2: You know what we can do….
Voice 3: *fast, shallow breathing* We’ll be fine, we’ll be fine, we’ll be fine, we’ll be…fine.
Voice 1: Anyway, arseholes, I’ve got to check that my boys have brushed their teeth and are in bed.
Voice 3: *stops rambling* Just don’t be late with my breakfast tomorrow. Cat uterus sashimi on toast with smashed avocado, warm water with a slice of lemon and a bowl of cocoa pops.
Voice 1: No, sure thing, boss. I mean, mate. Sure thing, mate.
Voice 3: *cackles into silence*
Transcript ends.
As transcribed by OvallyBalls operative Craigsman.
Further reading
In case you missed them, you can also read Yosoy’s summary of the pool stages, Utnapistm’s predictions for this weekend, or Deebee’s musically-heretical predictions.
On the telly this week
Friday 18th October
| Bristol v Bath | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
Saturday 19th October
| England v Australia | 08:15 | ITV |
| The Black Death v Our Heroes | 11:15 | ITV |
| Saracens v Northampton | 15:00 | BT Sport 2 |
Sunday 20th October
| Wales v France | 08:15 | ITV / S4C |
| Japan v South Africa | 11:15 | ITV |
| Wasps v London Irish | 15:00 | BT Sport 1 |
Ovally Balls 
AoD lives!
*Throws blossoms at Craigs and self at the feet of Thauma*
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Oh, do get up. You can grovel when* we’ve beaten the All-Blacks.
* [*cough* HACK *gasp*]
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Brilliant stuff Craigs! And Thauma for making it happen!
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Which of us gets to wear green in the Final, Thauma? Do we toss a coin for it?
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Deebee – shurely the wearin’ o’ the green is beyond debate?
You can wear gold. (And pretend you’re Australian? Naaah.)
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Aha! But who is who I wonder?
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No idea oo zat Voice number too iz.
Ozers very eazy too identify.
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Flair – could be one of two people I guess.
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And pretend you’re Australian?
Most offensive thing ever.
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I’m ignoring that flat, Craigs. One little extended post with ABBA references and the wrath is upon me.
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Never mind Deebs, he just wants to thank you for the music.
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Very good, C-Dawg.
(It’s a blessing Scotland didn’t qualify. Christ knows what Craigs would have come up with for Hoots Mon Gregor.)
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Ha , good job Craigs.
With apologies to Ticht,BB and Chimpie, met a Saffa nursie friend today, commiserated with her for upcoming loss to Japan at the weekend. Pulled out her phone to show me this:-
A Scotsman walks into an empty bar………
because the Englishman, the Irishman and the Welshman are still in Japan.
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And says, “Great, all the more booze for me then, and I don’t have to listen to those other 3 moany buggers.”
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The joke’s based on a false premise. Any true Scot’d be at home, doing the tiling.
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Possibly new favourite football team is the Equatorial Guinean Premier League side Leones Vegetarianos.
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Tomp – whilst eating salty porridge?
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Oh dear. I call a Karl on the photo and caption at the top of this article: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/oct/17/boris-johnson-leads-weary-people-unpromised-land-brexit-deal
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Some bread and cheese based dish, according to most recent research on lifestyles of indigenous Scottish people.
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2 minutes 28 till the relevant part, but its well worth it:)
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“In the game now, everyone is expected to do everything,” says Underhill. “The traditional roles when you have a specialist seven or blindside or eight … people have still got their strengths in certain areas but you have to be able to do everything. Even as a seven you’re expected to be carrying, good at set-piece, good in defence and at the breakdown. That’s probably why you see more sides picking two sevens because sevens can now do more, just as your sixes and eights can do.”
Hmmmm, a bit like League then.
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Cheers, Craigs, or I should say “words”
I watched that press conference with Bojo and Juncker earlier, The Clown was talking about strong partnerships and how much Europe was valued by the “British” etc etc. The wearyness on Juncker’s face made me almost tear up, he just said he was made sad by the whole affair.
Still, hopefully Scotland will chart its own course now, a European one
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If Wales don’t win on Sunday I’m going to bin my lucky Chinese cat.
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[video src="https://i.imgur.com/vC5iuXE.mp4" /]
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Yos – will fire be involved?
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@Iks -“And one of their hookers was cited after the Wales game. Lapwings my eye!”
Peewits.
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@craigs
He’s solar powered so I don’t want to encourage him.
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peewits are who?
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Fire him into the sun, Yos
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Peewits are Lapwings.
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Yeah, it was a poor attempt at a tawit tawoo/ peewits are who onomatopoeia – it’s all burds, innit?
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“Honourable mention for Murray and Sexton, they now surpass Peter Stringer and Lions Great Ronan O’Gara as the most capped half-back pairing for Ireland at 56.”
They’ve done well to achieve that at such a young age, especially when you consider that Stringer and O’Gara went on into their seventies. What is the record by the way?
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Sorry Ticht, you had me fooled thinking you were a non-burder.
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CMW, I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m a non-burder, I have my favourites, Red Kites and most burds of prey for example, and seaburds of all sorts have always been part of my life – it was a big day when I saw a Sea Eagle flying above Barra, but it’s something I’ve never pursued, so I never reached Twitcher status
I saw a buzzard sitting inna tree about ten feet from where I stood, that was great, another time when I was driving inna Pyrenees an unidentifed large burd of prey flew along side me – I was driving onna mountain road with a huge sheer drop off to my right and the burd just coasted along with me for a few minutes – that was the best
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Get quite a few owls where I live. Occasionally stood on a fencepost or flying in front of the car.
Taaaaweeet taaawooooo!!!
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Been drinking…
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I had a read-back and wasn’t quite sure what I read… Were people dissing cheese on toast?? Cheese on toast is the greatest snack lunch in existence. Shirley that is universally understood?
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Ah, but this is CHIMPIE’S cheese on toast. In Chimpie-land, nothing is quite what it seems…..
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@BB as long as he’s not using Primula nothing can go wrong?
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Don’t tempt him!
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“as long as he’s not using Primula nothing can go wrong?”
DAB, you need to sit down because what you’re about to hear …
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I may have dreamt it OT, but wasn’t there an episode when he said ‘I was pissing by the window’?
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Likewise I remember waking up and stumbling to my hotel window to watch an owl flying over a cityscape, perhaps in Lisbon or Las Palmas. To this day I have no idea if it was a dream or real.
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Well I was close:
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Worried about the France game. Have been thinking for some time that Wales will eventually come unstuck in one of these games in which they get a decent lead and then just tackle for the rest of the match. This is the last really obvious opportunity what with just getting beaten from start to finish being increasingly likely if they manage to progress.
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@Ticht – Red Kites haven’t been the same since you no longer have to go to Mid-Wales to see them. Used to get the odd one land on our garage roof back when there were only about 100 in the country. Good that you picked a Welsh Burd though.
Your Sea Eagle is quite something in flight, big wings on those things. Must go to Mull again some time soon.
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Dab – cheese on toast is indeed awesome. Chimpie’s version sucks baws.
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Can’t remember if the Chimpie’s cheese on toast gags were on Deebee’s list. They can go there for me.
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Please enlighten me! How does one fuck up cheese on toast? Have I missed it in the last thread? If so I’ll go back…
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