So, this utter humiliaton of the weekend then...

[supertinks]

For those not aware (although how any of you could not be, seeing as you all live in England), there was a rugby game at the weekend just gone. Wales v England. In Twickenham. Two weeks before the teams for the World Cup get announced. 34 days before the start of the World Cup.

We spent lots of money on tickets and travel to go to Twickenham (for the first time ever) to see this game (having already seen Wales beat England this year in Cardiff in March). We shouldn't have. We lost by 62 points to 5. 9 tries to one. Alright, the try we did score was a great piece of rugby, but it was the only decent rugby we played all day.

I have tried to put into words how I felt, leaving Twickers 5 mins before the end of the game, having to walk past thousands of jeering England supporters. But I have found it very difficult.

However, this morning I have found an article which fully expresses how we feel about the shambling idiocy that is our national coaching set up.

It reads:

"WELSH rugby has come in for a fresh verbal volley from Kiwi columnist Chris Rattue. Last November, Rattue labelled Wales the “village idiots” of world rugby following their 45-10 hammering by New Zealand in Cardiff. Now he has gone on the attack again in the wake of England’s nine-try demolition of Gareth Jenkins’ team.

He’s even gone as far as to claim coach Jenkins is in desperate need of psychoanalysis.

Writing in the New Zealand Herald, Rattue said, “This column got in a lot of lukewarm water last year after claiming that Wales were the village idiots of rugby union. This is the appropriate time to offer an apology – to all village idiots out there. Events of last weekend reveal that it was unfair to associate the well-intentioned if stumbling manner of your average village idiot with the people who run Welsh rugby. A fool with a hockey fetish would do a better job than Wales does with its national sport.

 

“Deliberately losing by nearly 60 points against their bitter old enemy England was an absolute masterstroke – for England. Wales did it beautifully, turning up at Twickenham with a pub team and then playing like skittles against an idling English bowling ball.”

 

He continued, “What another glorious moment for international rugby. Well done Wales. If you happen to see a Welsh bloke with a crinkly purple hat blowing a roll-out whistle then it's probably their coach, Gareth Jenkins, because he must have got his World Cup campaign out of a Christmas cracker.

 

“When you have as few resources and as poor a record as Wales, this is the time to throw all the eggs and even a few of the chickens in one basket, then hope like blazes you come up with a magic solution.

 

“Combinations and confidence – that’s what Wales need. Sending out the boys brigade for a humiliating defeat is tantamount to a World Cup surrender. About all you could say for Wales is that their latest rugby disaster gave Jenkins a chance to fine-tune his excuses.

 

“‘We’ve shown character, resolve and kept our heads up and the players wore the jersey proudly, but what we weren’t able to do was affect that game,’ said Jenkins, in one of his more lucid moments.

 

“If you want a chance at making sense of his other quotes, try translating them into Swahili and then get a two-year-old to read them backwards. Jenkins expressed surprise at England’s forward-orientated approach which threw his plans into disarray. England? Forward-orientated? Those two things don’t just go together – they came out of the same womb, at the same time.

 

“Gareth Jenkins doesn’t need video analysis. The man is in desperate need of psychoanalysis.”

Comments

[delvy.livejournal.com]

I am embarressed to watch us play at the moment. That is not a good sign.