Sport

Somebody just emailed me this link. When I first saw these pictures a few months back I thought they were photoshopped but perhaps they weren’t.

I think this guy is very confused, he had no option but to live under the old flag, neither did his parents or those he claimed weren’t rascists or oppressors. Oh well, the world is full of mixed up people, the joy of living in a democracy is that you are allowed to be!

Just a quick update on the fishing front. Myself Eugene and Manus, went fishing again on Sunday but this time with success! Both myself and Manus managed to land a decent sized rainbow trout each whilst I also achieved what in flyfishing terms is considered the ultimate and bagged a beautiful brown trout on dry fly in a stream above the dam. We spent a peaceful day at the dam only interupted by a relaxing sortie down to the local village pub for lunch and a few pints.

So that was sunday, move forward a day to Monday, and a quick conclusion to an early afternoon meeting in Ascot resulted in a little evening trip back to the same dam for a spot of Monday Night Fishing. Yet again I had success and, although it was raining and the fish only succumbed to my fly at about 8pm, I thoroughly enjoyed my evening in the quiet countryside of secluded Surrey. Watch this space for further flyishing tales as this weekend plans are afoot to explore new waters in Hampshire.

After spending over 2 years in London I finally decided to get off my arse and go and buy myself a decent flyfishing outfit. After all I am living in the home of trout flyfishing. Well London is not exactly the home of it all, but certainly Britain is. I mentioned a little while back about meeting Gavin from Farlows. Well, it didn’t take me long, a few phone calls here and there and then a little visit to the HRH outfitters and Gavin had hooked me up with an awesome Redington (top of the range, lifetime guarantee) rod and an assortment of necessary kit to go with it. All my stuff is still back in SA and probably looking quite tired now after many years of useage, so completely new tackle was definitely required.

First day on the water was this weekend when myself and two “seereus” romans (Eugene and Manus) ventured into the green belt of Surrey for a spot of flyfishing. This is a rather snooty, traditional, english sport and the old geezers you meet flyfishing take a very traditional view on the “old boy” style of fishing. So when two novice dutchmen, with the casting finesse of a giant panda, walk down to the water you can be certain the response from the “fellows” down on the water is less than warm! We had a great day though, unfortunately we didn’t catch anything, probably a good thing because Manus’ method for killing a fish he caught was to “heet it on de head wif my vist”.

This weekend it looks like we’ll be returning to Albury Estates to catch that 15lb fish that eluded me on Sunday. Weather report is good and I’ll be in high spirits after we thrash the Aussies on Saturday.

To those outside London who didn’t receive the email (published later in the aritcle) I have planned a trip to Paris for the South Africa vs France game in November. We will leave London on Friday and return on Sunday evening only after we have spent two raucous nights in Paris knocking seven bells of you know what out of their rugby team and national beer (and wine I suppose) supply.

The trip has turned out to be relatively cheap in comparison to the current packages on the market, but I am trying to reduce costs by booking tickets and hotels direct. If you are keen to join the weekend rugby trip of a lifetime, then drop me a line asap. There are a few places left but they’re unlikely to be there long.

Howzit Boys

France vs The Mighty Springboks - 26 November 2005, Stade de France, Paris.

Pencil it in your diary right now, for this will be the greatest, most enjoyable day of your life. You have the opportunity to

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The Mighty Springboks walked away from their first Tri-Nations game against New Zealand with a comfortable win. It never looked like we’d lose and I never thought we would either! People in the UK are in total shock, they can’t believe the All Blacks lost. The British Lions were crushed 3-0 in New Zealand and since then the All Blacks have been heralded by everybody here as the greatest side ever to play rugby. NO, the lions were just shite, and the Kiwis aren’t that great. As I said before, they are there for the taking and thats exactly what Sout Africa did!

Big day for us, it has taken about a year but we have finally clawed our way back to the pinnacle of world rugby and resumed our status as the worlds toughest team. I liked this quote from Pat, who incidentally was at the game:

Saturday’s game was brilliant and, like I said, I’ve never seen Newlands that way before: a sea of optimistic, always noisy – to say the very least – fans. But a strange after-match atmosphere, which it took me some time to understand. I expected screaming hordes of arm-in-arm supporters running amok around Cape Town, but it was all way more civil than that. If it was a closer-fought match, where the lead was passed back and forth, the fans would probably have been more hectic afterwards. But the fact that we led the whole way, meant that everybody was quite chilled after the game – serene and quiet, rather than manic and elated. And then I realised that everyone looked proud more than anything else.

Some of you may have forgotten about the Olympic gold medal winning 4×100m mens swimming team. Well Roland Schoeman one of the stars of the Olympics has been at it again, this time at the World Swimming Championship. He broke the world record twice in 24 hours to win the 50 metres butterfly then added the 50 freestyle title to enhance his claims as the world’s fastest man in water! His recorded time for the 50m freestyle was the second fastest time in history!

This weekend is the big one. Its the Mighty Springboks up against the current world #1 the All Blacks. Thats South Africa vs New Zealand for those of you who don’t know much about the glorious game of rugby - its the greatest traditional rivalry in world rugby. I reckon its gonna be tight, very tight but the Boks will win this one and show that this All Black side is not as awesome as everybody makes out, they are just as fragile as they are every other year in the Tri Nations.

One last thing, its is really fantastic to see John Smit playing so well lately.

The man is a true gentleman, fantastic player, inspirational captain and a role model for rugby in SA. He is THE man!

Are these guys completely crazy. Its little wonder the Aussies are gonna get thumped this weekend! Read this article posted by Mark Keohane on what the Australians call team building!?

Aussies make a meal of bonding session
July 28, 2005

A team bonding session for the Wallabies added more embarrassment to the embattled tourists when the carefree players left their notes at a restaurant in Cape Town.

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Please don’t waste your money any more with texts, phonecalls, emails etc. I am fine, naturally otherwise the previous post couldn’t have been written, just managed to miss the blasts by about 30 miles! Thanks for caring folks.

Obviously today has been a sad one, but the small matter of a MAHUSIVE 9 wicket victory by the damb squib English cricket team over the cocky Tasmanians, err sorry, Australians brought a cheeky little smile to my face.

The Australian government probably spends more money on sports/sports development/sports facilities etc than the South African government spends on healthcare. Why are the Aussies so shite then? Can somebody remind them how easily we crushed England in the 1-dayers earlier this year.

So South Africa are the Under 19 world champs, the under 21 world champs, the Tri-nations champions, holders of the Mandela Cup, Awarded Coach of the year, Player of the year and Team of the year. We have just crushed France in the second test so it wouldn’t be incorrect to say we are currently on top of the world?! Well, NO, not exactly!! Read the rest of this entry »

All right get out the granite block. I’m going to faka lo ntondo pansi and predict the Boks to win by 10 points, although hard fought, the victory will favour the home side. Then, I reckon the Lions will have the passion to rattle the overconfident Kiwis and they may well squeak a win. I can’t believe that Clive Woodwad has justified his selection of Johnny at centre by saying he hasn’t had enough game time at flyhalf - HELLO, he has had bugger all game time at centre! The Lions don’t look that strong but exactly eight years ago almost to the day they didn’t look strong against us either and try and remember what happened!

Retief what the hell happened? I cannot believe he threw a three shot lead away, he played like a chimpanzee with a cattle prod up his arse. Damn, I was so dispointed after getting off the plane to hear the score. Me and my big mouth whilst I was in the States telling anybody who would listen that Retief would do a back-to back victory! Even worse I had a £5 bet at roughly 20-1 that he would win!!

On another sporting matter, the Indianapolis Formula 1 debacle really doesn’t matter. People in the states don’t even know what F1 is, I bet you 99% of people living in the USA did not even know it was on. Nobody I spoke to did and I didn’t see it in any newspaper, TV report/news etc. Who cares anyway, F1 is sooooo boring, and if they went head to head with Champ car they’d get completely smashed. A six degree bank and the tyre bursts, what a joke!

I cannot believe it!! I have just written a really long story and I have just completely lost it because my browser crashed ! I am really mad now! I am not going to try and write it all again but I will summarise.

Last night went to dinner with Warren Ellse, Kramer and Robert Burden Read the rest of this entry »

I have been pretty slack lately with updating stories on the website, but I mustn’t forget to tell is the one about the Chelsea game. Last week Saturday, Truman and I ( Truman thanks for organising) went along to boring ole Stamford Bridge to watch Chelsea beat Charlton and then get awarded the Premiership Trophy. They haven’t won the league in 50 years (probably won’t again) so you can imagine the celebrations!! It was great to be there to witness it and especially gr8 to be sitting in the Millenium Suites. These are the boxes that Roman Abromovich sits in and trust me there is no better suite in Britain!!! I sat literally 2 boxes away from Roman who was sitting on the same row of seats as me. The noise from the crowd was deafening BUT it wasn’t nearly as loud as the next game I’m going to!!

Picture it, 72000 fans, half Man Utd and half from some other dodgy London club, it could only mean one thing, THE FA CUP FINAL. Got a call from Flan to ask me if I wanted to go…HELLO….does a one legged duck swim in circles!!!!! Of COURSE I want to go!!!

Dunno what kind of tickets they are, but for the last two years I have gone up with Flan, his family, Terry and a few others for the Charity Shield (both times Man U vs Arsenal) and he has arranged a 10 seater box. I’m not so sure we’ll be in a box this time given that this is a far bigger game and tickets are as scarce as a bikini in Mecca.
Whatever the result there’ll be a party in Cardiff this weekend and its always a great laugh when I go away with Flan and Terry.

Truman will be there as well, but this time I won’t rely on him to bring his camera, which is the main reason I don’t have any photos of Chelsea getting the trophy!!

I will try and buy a few matchday programmes, which means I can actually give one away. So post your score and the first person to guess it right wins a free FA Cup Programme. If I don’t get one or lose them then the compos off.

I have just received confirmation that I have been awarded 7 tickets to the world cup final’s in Germany. That means folks that I have a guaranteed ticket for the quarter finals, semi finals and FINAL (of course all SA’s group games are included). What a result! My credit card has already been debited so I need to pay that off now, but should England make the Final and I have a ticket, well, who’s to say I wouldn’t sell my ticket for a couple of thousand £££’s.

I went to Gary Lemkes (Sports Journalist) website the other day and answered a fairly easy question to win a pack of Wrestlemania Playing Cards……..Wooohoooo. Gary promised better prizes so the next day I went on again and answered the question correctly to win the Robert Pires autobiography. The two questions were, Pat this is your cue to stop reading:

1. Which footballer currently on Chelseas books has won a Premiership winners medal.
2. Who is the only footballer to have played for all the clubs that have won the Premier League (UK). Clue, he is still playing.

Do YOU know the answers?

Right then, do you want to join me in Germany next year for the world cup then visit this site The official site for the 2006 FIFA World Cup™ Germany and enter the ballot for world cup tickets NOW. The first ballot closes on the 31st March which only leaves you a few days to get in on the act.

I have applied for the TST 7 tickets which is a Team Specific Ticket x 7 games. This means that I will watch all the seven games of my chosen team (SA) if they make it all the way to the final! If they get knocked out at any stage I will foolow the team that knocked them out all the way to the final. So what is the cost?? Well, for a paltry 700 Euros I get world cup Final, Semi-Final, and quarter-final tickets, plus all the other games! Now if any of these games involve England, you could sell the ticket for at least 700 Euro and still watch all the other games. I reckon - and I know a few touts and guys who spend a lot of money on tickets - if England get to the Final you can expect to sell your ticket for anything upwards of £10,000 !! Just to give you an idea, our tickets to watch England in the quarters of Euro ‘04 were 500 Euro!

So why pick SA rather then England? Well, its all a game of odds, I think I have a far greater chance of getting SA tickets, and of course I’d enjoy watching them given that they are my number 1 team. I am also a member of the Elite England Fan Club so I am pretty much guaranteed at least 1 match ticket for an England game already.

Oh Yeah!! What a fantastic result! Isn’t it funny how a team who lose their coach always seem to put in a great performance the next game. Butch James, Trevor Halstead, Brent Russel, AJ Venter all appear to be returning to top form. Lets hope the Sharks can kick ass on the away leg . Read the game review on Keo, one of my favourite websites, definitely the best for rugby addicts!

Its a pity the game wasn’t on Sky, but to be fair the coverage so far has been very good. Sky broadcast an average of 2 games a weekend and 90% of the time these two games both involve SA teams. This weekend they showed the Bulls, Cats and Stormers games.

My prediction for the rest of the Super 12 is Sharks to end in 8th place with the Stormers maybe squeaking into 4th place, but given the way their backline played this weeekend they haven’t got a snowballs chance in hell!