The East Terrace

Ronan O'Gara finds pen is mightier than the boot/sword

Rumours are emanating from the Irish rugby camp that top-points scorer Ronan O'Gara has become an obsessive letter writer who is using every moment of his spare time to fire off complaints and warnings to all manner of people both inside and outside of rugby.

The 2009 Grand Slam winner has had a delivery of thousands of reams of paper, hundreds of envelopes and several exquisite fountain pens to the Irish team camp and is apparently devoting all his time to the either the writing of letters or studying some of the great letter writers such as Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw.

The British & Irish Lion caused a storm in his native Ireland this month when he took the unprecedented step of writing a letter in response to a damning opinion piece by Irish Independent hack Kevin Myers. Myers accused Ireland of 'not wanting to win' and that Kidney's selection of O'Gara confirmed this.

For the full story: follow this here link.

 

"Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean..."

England will face Wales this coming Saturday (6th Feb,2010) wearing a special kit to mark the 100th anniversary of the first international at Twickenham.

To celebrate the players will be wearing a traditional jersey:

We would like to take this rare chance to say well done to the RFU and their marketing department for bringing a rare hint of elegance and class to the professional game.

It even made us think of a poem:

"Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean,
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy autumn-fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more..."

There is more info here.

 

Wheeler reeling from 16th man controversy

The repercussions of the now infamous 'sixteenth man' incident in the Ospreys v Leicester European Cup match continue to reverberate around the rugby community despite the ERC having handed both a fine and ban to the Welsh side.

Leicester chief executive Peter Wheeler in particular is reeling from the shock realisation that, 'there exists in our fair and gentlemanly game of rugby union people who may, intentionally or not, bend, break or abuse the fine laws of our game'. Wheeler's trauma relates to a fifty second period during the Ospreys' 17-12 win against the Tigers when Wales and Ospreys' fullback Lee Byrne returned to the field of play after he had been temporarily replaced as a blood sub without obeying correct protocol. 

Amongst much confusion it turned out that the Ospreys had sixteen players on the field whilst defending a powerful Leicester attack. To compound matters further, referee Alan Lewis, after berating the Ospreys' management, failed to award a penalty to the Tigers. This added to the visiting side's indignity after the match. Former England international Wheeler, along with Tigers chairman Peter Tom, immediately launched a legal campaign to force the ERC to investigate the whole affair.

To see the full story: click here.

 

 

"Digs like a demented mole''

The East Terrace is very sad to hear of the passing of former BBC rugby commentator Bill McClaren.

 

His rich and warm voice gave millions of true rugby fans countless memories over the years and his style and charisma have been sorely missed in the modern world of rugby coverage.

Most modern commentators could do worse than spend more time looking at some of Bill's finer qualites and trying to learn from them.

For a fine example of Bill's wonderful touch people need look no further than his handling of the Wales v England match in 1999 after Scott Gibbs scored a vital try minutes from fulltime.  If Wales could hang on (they did) they would stun England and not only rob them of the Grand Slam, but also hand the championship to Scotland on points difference.  Bill barely mentioned this and instead got on with commentating on the game?

Why?

Because he knew that rugby fans already knew the importance of the score and he did not need to spend the remaining few minutes of a classic encounter spinning hyperbole in a loud, dramatic voice to ram this home. Nowadays commentators would have used those last few minutes to shout, wail and scream and speculate wildly about future fallouts in coaching and playing personnel as a result of a freak match outcome.

Bill didn't need to, because Bill had class.

RIP.

Tennis merger to be made official

The International Rugby Board (IRB) is to meet with representatives from the highest levels of world tennis to hold talks about a possible merger between the two sports.

Officials from both the IRB and the International Tennis Federation are to meet in London in the next few weeks for preliminary discussions about creating a new 'super sport'.

Whilst the two sports appear to have little in common, recent developments in top flight rugby union have seen a strong parallel develop between the games and IRB officials wish to capitalise on this to help expand rugby's appeal to television and sponsors.

In the last six months rugby matches have seen a dramatic increase in so called 'ping pong kicking battles' in which the ball is kicked ad nauseum between the opposing sides as neither team wishes to risk being turned over in contact and surrender vital possession. The increase in the 'tennis style kicking' is attributed to the current interpretations by referees at the breakdown.

"We believe that by combining two high profile sports we can appeal to a wider audience," said an IRB spokesman at a press conference in Dublin.

For the full story click here.

“Destroy the seed of evil, or it will grow up to your ruin”

Are you an idiot?  Are you someone with no taste?  Do you have no feel for real rugby but love gimmicks and plastic/fake things?

If so, you may be the kind of moron that finds kits like this (new from Edinburgh Rugby) amusing:

Oh, how Stade.  How witty and amusing.  How charming.

Well done Edinburgh, I'm sure this will help Scottish rugby be taken even more seriously by both the rugby public and the public you need to win over to survive.

New Zealand players asked to beg

The New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU) and the New Zealand government are taking dramatic steps to ensure their holding of the 2011 Rugby World Cup is deemed a success and avoids becoming a financial disaster.

 

The revealed 'action plan' has been put together in light of the gloomy economic predictions regarding the potential losses of Rugby New Zealand 2011 Limited (RNZ 2011).

RNZ 2011 boss Martin Snedden is budgeting for a loss of around NZ$40million from the sport's showpiece and the figures are a major embarrassment to both the IRB and NZRU in light of the fact previous tournaments have grossed massive amounts of money for event organisers.

The most shocking part of the 'action plan' from the NZRU is that players on this Autumn's European tour are being asked to beg and busk during their spare time to help raise extra funds. Coach Graham Henry has confirmed that he has related to his players that they will be expected to put in a lot of hours 'off the paddock' in helping their country to achieve some level of financial stability.

For the full story click here.

Your 'strong sublimated pattern of swirling greens' offends me

Many people have complained that the Ospreys, in light of their resources, have had very little success since their creation a few years ago in the great carve up/butchery of Welsh domestic rugby.

We disagree.  They have in recent seasons been amongst the market leaders in producing godawful rugby jerseys.

Their partnership with Kooga has been so innovative they even added lots of gold to their jerseys this year to complement the tacky 'fake tan and gold jewellery' style of many of their star players (Lee Byrne we are looking at you in particular).  

However, they've really raised the bar with their press release for their latest abortion of a kit.

We'll let Bill Newton of Kooga say it in his own poetic way:

“This new shirt is particularly striking, and is a radically different shirt to anything we have supplied them with before. The strong sublimated pattern of swirling greens is a strong representation of the region, and being very much on trend right now I would expect that this shirt will prove to another hit with supporters.”

If I lived anywhere that could accurately be represented by 'a strong sublimated pattern of swirling greens' I'd either move or claw my eyes out with a chopstick.  People of 'Ospreylia' take a stand before Kooga scar you forever.

We don't have an image to download yet, so to see the amazing press release and fantastic kit design click here.

What makes it all even more laughable/tragic is the Ospreys website is full of banners saying "REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE''.  Well, wouldn't it help people from the region to remember who they are if they could stop having the team play in different outfits (and they are outfits, rather than kits) every other game?

We'll leave you with some previous sins against style:

"Why you no wear uniform?"

Does anyone know what is going on in this RFU England Shop advert?

It looks like some sort of open-handed martial art attack.

Answers on a postcard, please.

Wither media outrage?

The East Terrace awaits the media outrage over John Hayes getting his lenient six week ban for stamping reduced: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/8305958.stm

We are 100% sure those same journalists who were outraged over Mr. Burger getting a mild slap on the wrist from the SARFU in the summer will also be screaming blue murder over Mr. Hayes and his outrageous appeal.

They will....won't they?

Hello?  Anyone?