Imagine, if you can, being an English Cricketer right now today and knowing that in around 20 minutes, you're strolling out on the pitch to play Pakistan ................................... after the Pakistan Cricket Board Chairman just said that England deliberatly lost their last game .............. more match fixing, cheating, etc. etc.
Its all looking a bit mucky right now really. Allegations, News of the World entrapment, throwing games, dropping balls, cheating, players being sent home, talk of "life bans". The English captain Andrew Strauss was, and i quote "outraged" by the allegations made against his team. Everyone has been wading in this morning, sports commentators and presenters, ex-players, existing players - non stop outrage and shock.
Give me a break! Did everyone forget about Hansie Cronje already?
Ian Botham calls for Pakistan to be banned from the game - permanently I wonder? While a fabulous cricketer, in fact one of the best, he's hardly one of the "good guys" of sport and has quite a history of pushing the boundries. He's right about the ICC getting their finger out and getting their hands dirty here tho!
Someone commented this morning that just because the players are English, they shouldn't automatically be presumed innocent! That's quite rough - does that mean they should automatically be presumed guilty? How does that work - doesn't sound sporting or legal from where i'm sitting ............. but at the same time, the indignant outrage and ranting and raving and "how dare they's" is a little premature - please, the English are incapable of cheating or being paid large sums for fixing odds? Right - that's more than a little funny guys, really!!
I for one will have the game on in the background today ............ if only to watch the crowd rip into the players, the bowlers rip into the batsmen and the desperate diving all over the place "not to drop any balls" and prove the rumours true ...................... from either side. I think it'll be a VERY good day at Lords today ............ or at least a very interesting one.
Testosterone fest perhaps !!
Over & Out
PS - Just under the radar - Ryan Sidebottom just retired from International Cricket today and Jimmy Anderson posed nude for a Gay Magazine - both brave moves really !!
Monday, September 20, 2010
Sunday, September 19, 2010
This is how it ACTUALLY is
So, on reflection of much and discussion today ................ after at least a gallon of red wine, The Blog should be:
Shorter
Sweeter
AS or MORE controversial
Definitely funnier
Less ranting
Less personal
More marketable - wider audience
GET ON WITH IT
So here it is and there's more coming ...............
Over and 'working on it'
NBB
Shorter
Sweeter
AS or MORE controversial
Definitely funnier
Less ranting
Less personal
More marketable - wider audience
GET ON WITH IT
So here it is and there's more coming ...............
Over and 'working on it'
NBB
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
The Rise & Fall of Sport
What’s with sport and cheats ? Or should that read Sportsmen & women and cheating?
Let’s start with “The Nike Curse”. Originally a phrase coined about a fantastical Nike Ad starring some of the sporting worlds’ biggest names & building the anticipation for the 2010 FIFA World Cup which, after their bad form, injuries or similar seemed doomed or cursed. The Ad featured the likes of Christiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney, Didier Drogba, Roger Federer, Kobe Bryant and even Homer Simpson. Tiger Woods wasn’t in it and of course not all of the participants have had their worlds come crashing down around their ears, but it’s a good starting point.
I don’t need to say much about Tiger Woods except that WOW, how the mighty have fallen!! I would have confined that to his private life, but just watching his golf scores and his competition form, I'm afraid not! It may have started out that way but, hmmmmm……. Tiger = zero.
And so on to Rooney. Oh deary me. Well, it’s sordid and it’s mucky and to be completely fair – it has NOTHING to do with his football. Or at least it didn’t until Alex Ferguson left him out of the team playing Everton on Saturday (he’s originally a blue and in fact made the error as a teen of wearing a t-shirt saying he’d be blue forever). Everton fans have always had a go at him but I do concur that this weekend would have been a blood-bath had he played. Sadly for Man U, that meant a draw with Everton which won’t sit well with the Manu U fans. Especially since Everton scored 2 goals in extra time to draw. Ouch! Rooney = zero.
Here’s a conspiracy theory for you ! Nike is big business, very big wealthy business. Perhaps there’s a rival business out there muddying up the ether and creating the environment for Nike’s great stars to revert to type to ……………………………. (a) Cause Nike to draw negative press and so weaken their foot-hold; or (b) cause Nike to ditch said “stars” to be snaffled by rival business. Interesting trying to figure the brand that wants a star after their dirty laundry is washed, aired, ironed and re-aired in public …………. Insurance perhaps ?!
And what is it with the so called “gentlemans sports?” Cricket ??? Rugby ???
Cricket is about to undergo a make-over with all the match-fixing, dropped balls, no balls, etc. etc. I’m sure everyone remembers the Hansie Cronje classic ………”The devil made me do it!” moment. Essentially, the betting, scamming, cheating and dodgy-ness has been around in cricket for absolutely ages. Prior to Hansie-gate and clearly post Hansie-gate. Now there is apparently a list floating around through the corridors of cricket power which includes the names of a whole load of dodgy moments and potentially dodgy cricketers all tied in with the IPL played in South Africa earlier this year. The newspaper reckons that will never become public but if Nasser Hussein has his way………………….. Well, lets just say he’s all for the airing of dirty laundry here again!
If you wanted a fall from grace story to compare here with the others then all I need say is Kevin Pietersen! His form is dreadful and for a while there, he didn’t have a county to crawl back to in the hope of getting it back. Seems he’s now with Surrey until the end of the 2010 season and there’s a story about that he’s heading back to Natal for a couple of games before the Ashes next year …………… intriguing! His tweets of irritation at being dropped for the Twenty20 series got him fined and chastised, yet again. I personally think KP is an Ass – but there you go. How rapid the backward slide as everything keeps going wrong! He might still regret those lions he had tattooed on his person if England do decide that between his foreignness (trust me, as a fellow South African, they find him foreign) and his bad form, he can sit out the Ashes and worse!
And then the much filmed pantomime of Rugby “blood-gate”. The basic principal of 'we need to get this idiot off the field, fake an injury or something please, because we need ……….. on as replacement, quick quick!' Best idea between jocks was - take a blood capsule out of your sock, bite hard and leave the field looking like you’ve ripped the head off a vampire bat , add a quick wink to fellow conspirators , and then get the good team doctor to cut the lip to cover the ass ! Classic! We all know that rugby = blood = rugby, but the moment you add the “joke shop”, it all becomes a bit Ozzfest really. There are other corkers in rugby including players for Bath admitting to and/or avoiding urine testing for Cocaine. I kid you not. Cocaine + Rugby = ………………… one can only wonder. Now Steroids + Rugby = Obvious really, judging by the size of some of them, but that’s a WHOLE other blogging moment.
And there’s swimmers and cyclists and track athletes and Formula 1 – each story and each moment similar in that there’s a human sports person attached and …………………… MONEY.
I suppose that’s where this ends really. Sport + Money = TABLOID HEADLINES. That might be a bit simplistic and more than a bit unfair to all sportsmen out there who aren’t basically dreadful people, or naturally dishonest, or naïve, or stupid, or common, but the reality is that Business + Sports = Vulgar Money + dodgy sportman = CHEATING! Oh, and don’t forget THE NEWS OF THE WORLD – sordid entrapment specialists that they are and BAM – you have The Rise and Fall of Sports and Sportspersons.
Don’t know if I’m appalled or waiting for the next mucky episode.
Over and never “down” or out.
Let’s start with “The Nike Curse”. Originally a phrase coined about a fantastical Nike Ad starring some of the sporting worlds’ biggest names & building the anticipation for the 2010 FIFA World Cup which, after their bad form, injuries or similar seemed doomed or cursed. The Ad featured the likes of Christiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney, Didier Drogba, Roger Federer, Kobe Bryant and even Homer Simpson. Tiger Woods wasn’t in it and of course not all of the participants have had their worlds come crashing down around their ears, but it’s a good starting point.
I don’t need to say much about Tiger Woods except that WOW, how the mighty have fallen!! I would have confined that to his private life, but just watching his golf scores and his competition form, I'm afraid not! It may have started out that way but, hmmmmm……. Tiger = zero.
And so on to Rooney. Oh deary me. Well, it’s sordid and it’s mucky and to be completely fair – it has NOTHING to do with his football. Or at least it didn’t until Alex Ferguson left him out of the team playing Everton on Saturday (he’s originally a blue and in fact made the error as a teen of wearing a t-shirt saying he’d be blue forever). Everton fans have always had a go at him but I do concur that this weekend would have been a blood-bath had he played. Sadly for Man U, that meant a draw with Everton which won’t sit well with the Manu U fans. Especially since Everton scored 2 goals in extra time to draw. Ouch! Rooney = zero.
Here’s a conspiracy theory for you ! Nike is big business, very big wealthy business. Perhaps there’s a rival business out there muddying up the ether and creating the environment for Nike’s great stars to revert to type to ……………………………. (a) Cause Nike to draw negative press and so weaken their foot-hold; or (b) cause Nike to ditch said “stars” to be snaffled by rival business. Interesting trying to figure the brand that wants a star after their dirty laundry is washed, aired, ironed and re-aired in public …………. Insurance perhaps ?!
And what is it with the so called “gentlemans sports?” Cricket ??? Rugby ???
Cricket is about to undergo a make-over with all the match-fixing, dropped balls, no balls, etc. etc. I’m sure everyone remembers the Hansie Cronje classic ………”The devil made me do it!” moment. Essentially, the betting, scamming, cheating and dodgy-ness has been around in cricket for absolutely ages. Prior to Hansie-gate and clearly post Hansie-gate. Now there is apparently a list floating around through the corridors of cricket power which includes the names of a whole load of dodgy moments and potentially dodgy cricketers all tied in with the IPL played in South Africa earlier this year. The newspaper reckons that will never become public but if Nasser Hussein has his way………………….. Well, lets just say he’s all for the airing of dirty laundry here again!
If you wanted a fall from grace story to compare here with the others then all I need say is Kevin Pietersen! His form is dreadful and for a while there, he didn’t have a county to crawl back to in the hope of getting it back. Seems he’s now with Surrey until the end of the 2010 season and there’s a story about that he’s heading back to Natal for a couple of games before the Ashes next year …………… intriguing! His tweets of irritation at being dropped for the Twenty20 series got him fined and chastised, yet again. I personally think KP is an Ass – but there you go. How rapid the backward slide as everything keeps going wrong! He might still regret those lions he had tattooed on his person if England do decide that between his foreignness (trust me, as a fellow South African, they find him foreign) and his bad form, he can sit out the Ashes and worse!
And then the much filmed pantomime of Rugby “blood-gate”. The basic principal of 'we need to get this idiot off the field, fake an injury or something please, because we need ……….. on as replacement, quick quick!' Best idea between jocks was - take a blood capsule out of your sock, bite hard and leave the field looking like you’ve ripped the head off a vampire bat , add a quick wink to fellow conspirators , and then get the good team doctor to cut the lip to cover the ass ! Classic! We all know that rugby = blood = rugby, but the moment you add the “joke shop”, it all becomes a bit Ozzfest really. There are other corkers in rugby including players for Bath admitting to and/or avoiding urine testing for Cocaine. I kid you not. Cocaine + Rugby = ………………… one can only wonder. Now Steroids + Rugby = Obvious really, judging by the size of some of them, but that’s a WHOLE other blogging moment.
And there’s swimmers and cyclists and track athletes and Formula 1 – each story and each moment similar in that there’s a human sports person attached and …………………… MONEY.
I suppose that’s where this ends really. Sport + Money = TABLOID HEADLINES. That might be a bit simplistic and more than a bit unfair to all sportsmen out there who aren’t basically dreadful people, or naturally dishonest, or naïve, or stupid, or common, but the reality is that Business + Sports = Vulgar Money + dodgy sportman = CHEATING! Oh, and don’t forget THE NEWS OF THE WORLD – sordid entrapment specialists that they are and BAM – you have The Rise and Fall of Sports and Sportspersons.
Don’t know if I’m appalled or waiting for the next mucky episode.
Over and never “down” or out.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Religion it all its glory
Today, just as I was about to burst with the frustration of NOT venting my opinion, my rage, my indignation and my bile at the stupid stupid neverendingly stupid quasi-religious people in this world ……………………….
A rainbow of wisdom and a personal hero of mine posted onto his Facebook page calm and gentle words of such love that I am once again humbled and seeing straight!
The short story here and I’ll really try to stick to the short version is ……………
The International News this week has been filled with organised religion, at every level, going off the deep end and reminding me, and I suspect not exclusively me, that I am vehemently against organised religion because of the dreadful nature of so many people involved in and around it.
The Pope is coming to England. Now I, for one am NOT Catholic. Nor am I a fan of the Pope, the Catholic Church, its doctrine and or anything related to it. To avoid a rant I will just say that the child abuse scandals, anti abortion stance, anti-condom / birth-control stance of a church now crusading through Africa as well as a few other DEAL BREAKERS make me less than a fan. Now at the same time, tax-payers all over the country are or will be receiving letters, just before Christmas, letting them know they owe additional tax “because of a Government calculation error” – I mean GIVE ME A BREAK – but the Catholic Church is NOT paying for the Pontiff’s visit ………………. the tax-payer is - OUTRAGEOUS.
2nd - we have the not so rational or calm debate about a Mosque being erected on or near the 9/11 site. I’m not American, nor am I a New Yorker and we’ve already established that I’m not a Christian. I am also not necessarily pro or anti the Mosque being built, but discussions include a Greek Orthodox Church that was destroyed which may now not be rebuilt ………. Because of the Mosque, and there are many outraged people who think “Sod it, why should a Mosque go up on a site essentially cleared and created by Muslim Radicals” and there are others who want the Mosque there to appease an already angry radical Muslim faction who are not viewing this as a capitulation, and……….. and ………….. and its not fair!!
NEWSFLASH PEOPLE ………….. Life is NOT fair. Just look at Haiti, Pakistan, Niger, Zimbabwe, North Korea ………… I could go on and on (and I haven’t left anyone or any country off on purpose – the list is endless). Hell, even Donald Trump has waded into this debacle – I hope his hairpiece is glued on tight ‘cos its going to be a very bumpy ride.
Create a gentle welcoming natural green area with trees and flowers and grass and wildlife ………………. God knows we’ve destroyed enough of that worldwide to warrant it!!
And then ……….. The Piece de Resistance ………….Pastor Kooky in Florida who wants to burn The Koran and is blackmailing the US Government and every REAL Christian, REAL Muslim and REAL spiritual soul ……….. not to mention writers, publishers and book-lovers worldwide. Who burns books? I’m not even going to answer that, I can’t, it's too desperately stupid and heart-breaking! The whole world watches with bated breath on interviews where “Its on! “ “It’s off!” “It’s on!” “It’s off!”. Someone died today in a violent protest in Afghanistan based on this trippy, sad, self-promotion media circus. It’s sickening and heartbreaking and defies all boundaries of anything spiritual.
I’m sorry, I tried to avoid the rant, but I’m really an under-developed spirit, clearly with MUCH still to learn.
And so the rainbow of wisdom from a beautiful wonderful soul as quoted directly from his Facebook page today – Thank you your Holiness for putting it all into perspective so beautifully and as always, for your gentle guidance !
As quoted on the Facebook page of the office of his Holiness, the 14th Dalai Lama
Friday 10th September 2010
"The kind of behavior that really is spiritual practice consists of refraining from falsehood and abiding by the truth, neither humliating nor mocking others, being humble, and having a good heart and helping others."
www.facebook.com/DalaiLama
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