NPR

Gumboot wrote: ↑Sun Oct 08, 2023 3:33 am I can't decide what to wear this week, a crescendo of doom and gloom, or hysterical wailing and gnashing of teeth from the get-go.

Guy Smiley wrote: ↑Sun Oct 08, 2023 12:55 am This thread is best thread.

I think the ABs experience under pressure at RWC will be the telling factor and they’ll romp home against an overawed and shell shocked Irish team unable to stop falling over their own feet.



Maybe.

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 10:28 am Ireland to win well on the back of breakdown speed and aggression.

AB's to go fully headless chicken with BB bring out his basement best kicking game.

Also think there is going to be a card that benefits Ireland.

TBF - AB's don't deserve to beat Ireland in this World Cup - Ireland have been a better brand of rugby for a number of seasons now - better coach, better tactics, better players.

My biggest issue will be having to watch the game with one of the most aggressive Irish supporters I have ever met - proper screaming in your face when Ireland score. It's a lot.

PornDog wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:08 am

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 10:28 am Ireland to win well on the back of breakdown speed and aggression.

AB's to go fully headless chicken with BB bring out his basement best kicking game.

Also think there is going to be a card that benefits Ireland.

TBF - AB's don't deserve to beat Ireland in this World Cup - Ireland have been a better brand of rugby for a number of seasons now - better coach, better tactics, better players.

My biggest issue will be having to watch the game with one of the most aggressive Irish supporters I have ever met - proper screaming in your face when Ireland score. It's a lot.

Jesus man, you need better Irish friends, he sounds like the wrong sort all together.

Guy Smiley wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:48 am No-one has to watch a game with an idiot like that...

so don't. You have no obligation to feed this guy's need for whatever it is he's after. Find better company and enjoy some banter.... he doesn't deserve it.

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 12:01 pm

Guy Smiley wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:48 am No-one has to watch a game with an idiot like that...

so don't. You have no obligation to feed this guy's need for whatever it is he's after. Find better company and enjoy some banter.... he doesn't deserve it.

Tricky for my mate as he is the next door neighbour - so I'll just have to suck it up and take my lumps if the result goes the way many are thinking it will.

Bloutoria wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 12:07 pm

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 12:01 pm

Guy Smiley wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:48 am No-one has to watch a game with an idiot like that...

so don't. You have no obligation to feed this guy's need for whatever it is he's after. Find better company and enjoy some banter.... he doesn't deserve it.

Tricky for my mate as he is the next door neighbour - so I'll just have to suck it up and take my lumps if the result goes the way many are thinking it will.

Normally it gets even worse if a cnut like this' team loses. I don't envy you this situation.

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:24 am

PornDog wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:08 am

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 10:28 am Ireland to win well on the back of breakdown speed and aggression.

AB's to go fully headless chicken with BB bring out his basement best kicking game.

Also think there is going to be a card that benefits Ireland.

TBF - AB's don't deserve to beat Ireland in this World Cup - Ireland have been a better brand of rugby for a number of seasons now - better coach, better tactics, better players.

My biggest issue will be having to watch the game with one of the most aggressive Irish supporters I have ever met - proper screaming in your face when Ireland score. It's a lot.

Jesus man, you need better Irish friends, he sounds like the wrong sort all together.

He's an interesting guy - likes to try and mentally disintegrate any opposition supporters. I think the AB's truly hurt him over the years - he is loving the current power shift - but boy oh boy is he hard work. I don't mind banter - but he takes it way to far. I have walked out mid game due to the fact that it feels like he is wanting me to throw fists or something. He is the next door neighbour of my mate who is also and Irish support - but absolutely quality to watch games with.

Uncle fester wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 2:45 pm

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:24 am

PornDog wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:08 am

Jesus man, you need better Irish friends, he sounds like the wrong sort all together.

He's an interesting guy - likes to try and mentally disintegrate any opposition supporters. I think the AB's truly hurt him over the years - he is loving the current power shift - but boy oh boy is he hard work. I don't mind banter - but he takes it way to far. I have walked out mid game due to the fact that it feels like he is wanting me to throw fists or something. He is the next door neighbour of my mate who is also and Irish support - but absolutely quality to watch games with.

Sorry, I'll try to be more understanding on Saturday.

Seriously, is he a GAA or soccer head?
Doesn't seem like the right sort at all.

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 2:55 pm

Uncle fester wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 2:45 pm

Thor Sedan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 11:24 am

He's an interesting guy - likes to try and mentally disintegrate any opposition supporters. I think the AB's truly hurt him over the years - he is loving the current power shift - but boy oh boy is he hard work. I don't mind banter - but he takes it way to far. I have walked out mid game due to the fact that it feels like he is wanting me to throw fists or something. He is the next door neighbour of my mate who is also and Irish support - but absolutely quality to watch games with.

Sorry, I'll try to be more understanding on Saturday.

Seriously, is he a GAA or soccer head?
Doesn't seem like the right sort at all.

Pure rugbyhead. He is an OK guy - but the switch flips when the green of Ireland runs out.

After the Irish series win in NZ he sat there for about 20 minutes asking me if I was going to cry and if I realised how pathetic the AB's were - then the switch flicked back and he asked me how my golf game was shaping up?!?!

I couldn't keep up.

Gumboot wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 4:36 am Given our QF history, I hope they appoint Wayne Barnes to ref this one...just for the craic.

average joe wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 6:22 am I hope it's Jaco Peyper.

Gumboot wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 4:36 am Given our QF history, I hope they appoint Wayne Barnes to ref this one...just for the craic.

OomStruisbaai wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 9:31 am

Gumboot wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 4:36 am Given our QF history, I hope they appoint Wayne Barnes to ref this one...just for the craic.

You are right Barnes it is.

Mark Reason: If you love sport, shout for Ireland to win the Rugby World Cup


OPINION: I hope Ireland beat New Zealand on Saturday night in Paris (Sunday 8am NZT). I hope Ireland win the Rugby World Cup. That’s not a north versus south thing. It’s about the fans. It’s about the men and women who spend their money and their souls and who are treated with disdain by the balding buffoons who run most of the sporting world.

Ireland’s fans have turned Paris green. How do you translate ‘craic’ into French? I don’t know, but the Ireland fans have managed it. These are the men and women who follow their team to the four corners of the world, often in expectation of defeat. But as one Irish flag proclaimed in the Stade de France; they always, but always, ‘Dare to Dream.’

And that’s the secret to it all. Nobody dreams like the Irish. There is a reason why Boston and Liverpool and Glasgow are three of the world’s great sporting cities. The green dream is embedded in their bricks and stones. Families migrated there to make a better life. Hope is the lifeblood of the itinerant Irish.

The joy of the Ireland team at this World Cup is not at its most vital in the rugby they play, although some of their attacking moves overlap like a sonnet. No, the overwhelming joy of this Ireland team is that they are doing it for their fans. The players and the people are still walking the same roads together.

Some commentators actually criticised the Ireland team for performing ‘a lap of honour’ after they beat South Africa in the opening match. What shrivelled spirits. Could they not see the love flowing between the players and their fans? Could they not see what was really at the big, green beating heart of it all.

Coach Andy Farrell said after the victory over Scotland: “We got a bit of stick, didn’t we, for walking round against South Africa but we’ve walked round and thanked the fans in every game. It’s the least we can do when they turn out in their thousands like they’ve done. We’re playing for them.

“We talk about it every week. I talked about it before the game today in the dressing room. It means more than what people think. One hundred per cent. I know France is buzzing with Irish people, but I believe it’s going bonkers back home. We know when we turn up for training on Monday we’re not just doing it for ourselves.”

It’s hard to read that bit of Farrell northern soul and not think of Sam Cane saying: “We have got amazing fans but we have also got some pretty brutal ones... they might like to think they know a lot about the game of rugby but really they don’t.”

And that’s the difference. Some of the All Blacks think that they are better than the people who pay their money to follow them. New Zealand Rugby is just as aloof as all they measure everything by a fast buck – they ignore the fans in the south when the big internationals come to town and they stage Super Rugby in stadia that treat spectators like effluent.

But this is how the ‘little’ people at the often non-turning turnstiles are dealt to the world over as they queue for hours to get in. The panjandrums at FIFA think it’s okay to hold the World Cup first in Qatar, then in multiple cities around America and then prospectively in Saudi Arabia. Stuff the travelling fans. They are just mince.

The ICC and the Cricket World Cup are just as bad. Rachin Ravindra played one of the great one-day innings by a New Zealander the other night, but there was hardly anyone in the ground to see it. When Sachin Tendulkar walked out with the trophy before the opening match of the tournament he turned and waved to the four sides of the ground.

But he was waving to imaginary people. There was no one there. But then tickets had not gone on sale until 41 days before the tournament and once they were available, the website kept crashing.

This is the vile face of unchecked capitalism. People don’t matter. Only money. In the buildup to the match between Australia and India the players lined up with a row of kids in front of them. Those boys and girls were wearing t-shirts with ‘IndusInd Bank’ on the front. Sport had turned wide-eyed kids into walking billboards.

Not that World Rugby is any better. They are changing the qualification process to make sure that the United States makes it in 2031, when they are the host nation. In fact, sometimes it seems like money is the only qualification necessary. By then Portugal, the “team of friends” whose captain said “it all comes from the heart”, will probably be blowing in the wind.

World Rugby has been stuffing it up for years. Wales’ coach Warren Gatland called the early pool draw ‘ridiculous’ and that was back in 2015. The then chief executive promised to look into it. Eight years later World Rugby is still looking into it and has managed a farce where the best four teams in the world play each other in the quarters.

So Ireland, with their best ever team, may well go home before the semis. What an insult to their wonderful fans. Jonny Sexton got a text from his brother three hours before kickoff saying: “wait till you see what it’s like.” It was all going off. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry were amongst them, still bobbing up and down days after their Ryder Cup triumph.

Maybe the Irish footballer Denise O’Sullivan had joined in. She said at the Women’s World Cup: “It was unbelievable. I can’t even describe it. We were in the tunnel waiting to walk out and we could already hear the Irish fans. We were just all smiling and looking at each other. It was a moment I will never forget and then walking out. Even to do the warm-up, they started singing right away and that’s all you could hear in the stadium, Irish fans.”

These are the same supporters who sang to the Swedish fans after beating them in a Euro game: “Go home to your sexy wives.” They have serenaded the police in Paris. And I will always cherish the moment at Lansdowne Road when the band of the Gardai marched down to the French end and played ‘la vie en rose’ which then soared over the stadium.

It’s a beautiful thing. The fervour and the humour and the humility of the Ireland fans. Former Samoan international Eliota Fuimaono-Sapolu, who had a lot to put up with after three dreadful decisions in the England v Samoa game (did no one notice that Owen Farrell’s first penalty goal should also have been timed out), posted “Irish fans and Zombie. Epic.” Even the angry warrior was lifted by the hope in those Irish hearts.

And you just know, win or lose on Saturday night, the Irish fans will still be singing. Allez les verts.

Guy Smiley wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 3:37 pm You’d have to be some sort of weedy thin skinned ginger to take offense at that Gregor Paul bit of hand wringing.

Uncle fester wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 4:23 pm

Guy Smiley wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 3:37 pm You’d have to be some sort of weedy thin skinned ginger to take offense at that Gregor Paul bit of hand wringing.

My takeaway is that BBBR cudda doid.

Irish flanker Peter O’Mahony telling All Blacks captain Sam Cane: “Who do you think you are pal? You are a shit Richie McCaw.”It was a brutal takedown by the Irish flanker and while Cane and his teammates laughed it off at the time

Muttonbird wrote: ↑Mon Oct 09, 2023 9:07 am Interesting. I got banned from PR for creating this same match thread.

Guy Smiley wrote: ↑Tue Oct 10, 2023 4:20 pm Bitter spite, is it?

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby-wor ... -world-cup

Mark Reason: If you love sport, shout for Ireland to win the Rugby World Cup


OPINION: I hope Ireland beat New Zealand on Saturday night in Paris (Sunday 8am NZT). I hope Ireland win the Rugby World Cup. That’s not a north versus south thing. It’s about the fans. It’s about the men and women who spend their money and their souls and who are treated with disdain by the balding buffoons who run most of the sporting world.

Ireland’s fans have turned Paris green. How do you translate ‘craic’ into French? I don’t know, but the Ireland fans have managed it. These are the men and women who follow their team to the four corners of the world, often in expectation of defeat. But as one Irish flag proclaimed in the Stade de France; they always, but always, ‘Dare to Dream.’

And that’s the secret to it all. Nobody dreams like the Irish. There is a reason why Boston and Liverpool and Glasgow are three of the world’s great sporting cities. The green dream is embedded in their bricks and stones. Families migrated there to make a better life. Hope is the lifeblood of the itinerant Irish.

The joy of the Ireland team at this World Cup is not at its most vital in the rugby they play, although some of their attacking moves overlap like a sonnet. No, the overwhelming joy of this Ireland team is that they are doing it for their fans. The players and the people are still walking the same roads together.

Some commentators actually criticised the Ireland team for performing ‘a lap of honour’ after they beat South Africa in the opening match. What shrivelled spirits. Could they not see the love flowing between the players and their fans? Could they not see what was really at the big, green beating heart of it all.

Coach Andy Farrell said after the victory over Scotland: “We got a bit of stick, didn’t we, for walking round against South Africa but we’ve walked round and thanked the fans in every game. It’s the least we can do when they turn out in their thousands like they’ve done. We’re playing for them.

“We talk about it every week. I talked about it before the game today in the dressing room. It means more than what people think. One hundred per cent. I know France is buzzing with Irish people, but I believe it’s going bonkers back home. We know when we turn up for training on Monday we’re not just doing it for ourselves.”

It’s hard to read that bit of Farrell northern soul and not think of Sam Cane saying: “We have got amazing fans but we have also got some pretty brutal ones... they might like to think they know a lot about the game of rugby but really they don’t.”

And that’s the difference. Some of the All Blacks think that they are better than the people who pay their money to follow them. New Zealand Rugby is just as aloof as all they measure everything by a fast buck – they ignore the fans in the south when the big internationals come to town and they stage Super Rugby in stadia that treat spectators like effluent.

But this is how the ‘little’ people at the often non-turning turnstiles are dealt to the world over as they queue for hours to get in. The panjandrums at FIFA think it’s okay to hold the World Cup first in Qatar, then in multiple cities around America and then prospectively in Saudi Arabia. Stuff the travelling fans. They are just mince.

The ICC and the Cricket World Cup are just as bad. Rachin Ravindra played one of the great one-day innings by a New Zealander the other night, but there was hardly anyone in the ground to see it. When Sachin Tendulkar walked out with the trophy before the opening match of the tournament he turned and waved to the four sides of the ground.

But he was waving to imaginary people. There was no one there. But then tickets had not gone on sale until 41 days before the tournament and once they were available, the website kept crashing.

This is the vile face of unchecked capitalism. People don’t matter. Only money. In the buildup to the match between Australia and India the players lined up with a row of kids in front of them. Those boys and girls were wearing t-shirts with ‘IndusInd Bank’ on the front. Sport had turned wide-eyed kids into walking billboards.

Not that World Rugby is any better. They are changing the qualification process to make sure that the United States makes it in 2031, when they are the host nation. In fact, sometimes it seems like money is the only qualification necessary. By then Portugal, the “team of friends” whose captain said “it all comes from the heart”, will probably be blowing in the wind.

World Rugby has been stuffing it up for years. Wales’ coach Warren Gatland called the early pool draw ‘ridiculous’ and that was back in 2015. The then chief executive promised to look into it. Eight years later World Rugby is still looking into it and has managed a farce where the best four teams in the world play each other in the quarters.

So Ireland, with their best ever team, may well go home before the semis. What an insult to their wonderful fans. Jonny Sexton got a text from his brother three hours before kickoff saying: “wait till you see what it’s like.” It was all going off. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry were amongst them, still bobbing up and down days after their Ryder Cup triumph.

Maybe the Irish footballer Denise O’Sullivan had joined in. She said at the Women’s World Cup: “It was unbelievable. I can’t even describe it. We were in the tunnel waiting to walk out and we could already hear the Irish fans. We were just all smiling and looking at each other. It was a moment I will never forget and then walking out. Even to do the warm-up, they started singing right away and that’s all you could hear in the stadium, Irish fans.”

These are the same supporters who sang to the Swedish fans after beating them in a Euro game: “Go home to your sexy wives.” They have serenaded the police in Paris. And I will always cherish the moment at Lansdowne Road when the band of the Gardai marched down to the French end and played ‘la vie en rose’ which then soared over the stadium.

It’s a beautiful thing. The fervour and the humour and the humility of the Ireland fans. Former Samoan international Eliota Fuimaono-Sapolu, who had a lot to put up with after three dreadful decisions in the England v Samoa game (did no one notice that Owen Farrell’s first penalty goal should also have been timed out), posted “Irish fans and Zombie. Epic.” Even the angry warrior was lifted by the hope in those Irish hearts.

And you just know, win or lose on Saturday night, the Irish fans will still be singing. Allez les verts.