Radar Opinion
It’s like this… Bill Borrows
Flats on Friday
David Lyttleton
E
Ignore fair-weather bores
A
nd so the fixtures for the 2015 Rugby World Cup have been announced, with the astounding revelation that 37 of the 48 matches are to be played below the Watford Gap. So that leaves five in the Midlands, and six to be shared by the major conurbations of Manchester, Leeds and Newcastle. “We have taken the game to the whole country,” boasted Debbie Jevans, chief executive of England Rugby 2015 – a touch disingenuously – when the host stadiums were announced back in May. “It’s disgraceful,” thundered Roger Bowen, chairman of Sale Sharks Supporters Club in The Daily Telegraph, before adding enigmatically. “They’re talking with a forked tongue.” Unusually, you might suppose, I have some sympathy for Ms Jevans. An even geographical spread would be financial suicide, and I’m glad there are only a few games in the north. Events like these, suddenly shoving a sport into the national consciousness, produce a certain kind of pop-up fan. And, to paraphrase Morrissey, it’s worse if they’re northern. This has nothing to do with rugby union. I toured South Africa with the Lions as a journalist in 1997 and loved every minute, interviewed Martin Johnson on the eve of the 2003 World Cup and even tried to persuade my ex-wife to “hang on for a bit” as she went into labour before the start of the 2007 final. She refused. We lost.
14 | December 6 2013 |
It’s any sport that leaps from the back pages to a lead item on the evening news, and it almost made London 2012 unbearable. Ben Ainslie? “Yep, that’s four consecutive Olympic golds,” the pop-ups would announce like they had been following his career since he first pulled on a lifejacket. Don’t even get me started on what they thought they knew about Sir Bradley Wiggins or the Paralympians, and have since forgotten. It’s all talk. They drop these learned-by-rote facts at dinner parties or in the boozer in an effort to sound au courant. Rarely will you find them at an actual event – unless it’s a hot corporate ticket and they’re depriving a real fan of a place. And so that’s why Ms Jevans has got it about right. First of all, the core support in the south should get the tickets, but they’re also welcome to the battalions of bar-room bores who will suddenly know the second line to Swing Low Sweet Chariot. Generally speaking, we don’t dig fake in the north. @billborrows
Plank of the week
Dave Whelan, Wigan You sacked Owen Coyle because Wigan fans weren’t happy about losing three games at home in a week? Had they beaten Derby, they would be in contention for a playoff place. Be careful what you wish for.
veryone knows that the margins in elite sport are incredibly fine. While not always the case, opportunities at the top tend to arrive and vanish in what seems like an instant. I remember being told I needed to play well in a Heineken Cup game by the England coaches, as Trevor Woodman was putting serious pressure on my place in the squad. We travelled to Ulster and, as so few teams manage to do, beat them in reasonable style. I wasn’t smiling in the showers, though, partly because I was conducting my ablutions next to the unarguably more physically impressive Richard Hill – but primarily because I knew I had blown it. During the first half, we lost a scrappy lineout and their openside flanker scooped up the ball and began running at a natural hole in our defensive line. I tackled him – but only after hesitating and, assuming the man next to me would hit him, missing the opportunity to smash a bloke backwards before he achieved total balance. Two seconds – moment gone. And in the second half I received an impromptu pass from Kyran Bracken from a turnover, and froze a bit. I wasn’t sure whether I should charge the ball up or spin it wide, so I stood still – for roughly a second. “F***ing run, man!” shouted skipper Francois Pienaar, and I did, but that split second of doubt did the damage. They were my two shots at making an impact away from the tight phases, and I ballsed them up. I still don’t know why. The only thing that makes this memory bearable is that no third party was involved; I made the mistakes, so I can live with them. I wonder how George Groves feels this week as he reflects on what was, bizarrely, his finest yet most disastrous moment in boxing. In terms of preparation, he looked in a different league to Carl Froch, the defending world champion and certified tough hombre. Round after round, Groves took Froch apart, and it was mesmerising to watch. Then, in the ninth round – after being floored and, frankly, battered by the challenger, Froch saw an opportunity. How, after such a hammering, he managed to take that opportunity, I do not know. The mental toughness he holds in reserve is, I feel comfortable enough to profess, what sees him sat atop the tree. Groves, now, will reveal what reserves he has. He saw his dream taken away not by his opponent or his own errors, but by a referee who stopped the fight way, way too early. Groves was in trouble, no doubt – but nothing like the trouble into which he had thumped Froch in the preceding rounds – yet he was not given anywhere near the same chance to dig in as his more decorated opponent. So he finds himself praying for a rematch, relying on Froch to do the right thing and not dodge it. And he has to get over the referee’s premature annihilation of his dreams. It’s all out of his hands. Tell you what, though. I’ll fight anyone for a ticket when the time comes. No referees allowed. @davidflatman