Quite the dull view, really, because nothing out of the ordinary has happened… unless you count a mildly shocking upset by New Zealand when they defeated Australia on home soil to win the Rugby League World Cup. But even that was not a huge bit of news. The cricket was a good spectacle, but hardly a glowing endorsement of the game. The other sports were… sports. And then we got John Daly. He has expressed “excitement” in coming back to Australia, scene of a rather infamous meltdown last time he was here. How bad must Australian golf be when we need John friggin’ Daly to come on over and be our “international star”, pushing some hard-working, talented Australian golfer out of a chance… oh, excuse me. I said “talented Australian golfer”. Like any of those are still left in the country. Maybe John Daly is all we deserve. I mean, it’s not like we offer the squillions in prize money or the guaranteed television exposure for sponsors. Golf in this country has not recovered from Greg Norman’s retirement. Christ, this year he has been in our media more than any other golfer… and the guy’s retired! But that’s Australian golf. Our best are in Europe, Baddeley and a few others are in the US, a bunch are in Japan… and those left here are… well, they’re here. And they get to meet John Daly. Wheeee…
Basketball
NBL – Round 10
Melbourne 99 def. Cairns 98
New Zealand 112 def. South Dragons 98
Sydney Spirit 110 def. Adelaide 108
Adelaide 100 lost to South Dragons 106
Cairns 85 def by Perth 101
Townsville 121 def Wollongong 113
WNBL – Round 8
AIS 49 hammered by Adelaide 73
Townsville 89 def Bulleen 63
Sydney 82 def by Canberra 89
Bendigo 107 def Perth 76
Logan 67 def by Bulleen 73
Dandenong 80 def Perth 56
Soccer
World Cup Qualifying
Australia 1 def Bahrain 0
Bahrain were all over Australia, but against all the odds (to quote the typically over-the-top commentator) in the dying seconds Australia broke the deadlock and scored a miracle and incredibly lucky goal to steal the victory. But if Australia want to go further in next year’s World Cup in South Africa, then it is going to have to play one hell of a lot better than the insipid display they offered during this match. This sort of game is not a good advertisement for the sport, and just reinforces the stereotype of a dull, defensive game.
A-League Round 12
Adelaide United FC 2 def Sydney FC 0
Queensland Roar FC 4 slaughtered Perth Glory FC 1
Wellington Phoenix FC 2 def Newcastle Jets FC 0
Melbourne Victory FC 2 def Central Coast Mariners FC 1
W-League Round 5
Canberra 0 drew with Adelaide 0
Queensland 2 def Melbourne 0
Sydney 2 def Central Coast 0
Newcastle 4 killed Perth 1
Cricket
New Zealand Tour
First Test – Australia 214 & 268; New Zealand 156 & 177 – Australia won by 149 runs
Wow! What a… a bizarre test! More wickets fell in the first three days than almost the whole India tour! Only Katich from Australia showed any form with the bat, and the bowlers were dominant. Okay, it may have to do with the ‘Gabba pitch being hammered by violent tropical weather leading up to the match making it a bowler’s paradise, but this… this was insipid batting from both sides. Australia cannot in all rights still call itself the number one test playing nation in the world after this pathetic performance. While it was vastly entertaining to watch wicket after wicket fall with monotonous regularity, it underscored the fact that both teams just do not appear to have quality batsmen any longer. And that’s a shame in Australia’s case because our Sheffield Shield competition is brimming with exciting batsmen from all over the country! Enough of this rant… It was still a damn fun game to watch. You couldn’t leave the couch for more than five minutes or else you’d miss another wicket! But still, a test match over in a little over three days? Bizarre…
Australian Domestic
Sheffield Shield:
Victoria 484 & 0/35; Tasmania 218 & 300 – Vic win by 10 wickets (Vic – 6 points)
New South Wales 210 & 262; Queensland 354 & 0/119 – Qld won by 10 wickets (Qld – 6 pts)
Western Australia 239 & 8/404 (dec); Victoria 326 & 4/321 – Vic won by 6 wickets (Vic – 6 pts)
One-Day
NSW 153 (44.3 overs); Queensland 177 (47.2 overs) – QLD win by 24 runs
Rugby Union
Spring Tour
Wales 9 lost to New Zealand 29
England 6 killed by South Africa 42
France 13 edged out by Australia 18
The southern hemisphere teams won again, although France were very close to Australia. But it does show the widening gap in world rugby which will become an issue as the game tries to garner more footholds in the rest of the world.
Rugby League
World Cup
Grand Final
Australia 20 lost to New Zealand 34
Sport as she should be played. I loved watching this game. It was brilliant, high scoring and hard-hitting. Some critics have said it was not as good as should have been, but maybe they are just shocked by the surprise result – Australia losing a world rugby league cup after winning the last 7. And despite the fact the world cup of Rugby League is pretty well meaningless, this was a fine match that could really actually convert people to the cause. It could, of course, have been the fact that so many of the previous matches were not that good, but I enjoyed this one.
Closing Comment
Politics again. Sorry…
APEC has been and gone. It barely touched the radar in most countries, but in Australia it was held up as some sort of indication – no matter how small – that Australia might mean something in the world. From the way George W. Bush didn’t give eye contact or shake the hand of our prime minister to the position he was in, in the “group photo in embarrassing ponchos” event. Trying to indicate our position in the world. Not realising that a country of 20 million people does not really matter in the world. Not really. But Australians in general are so insecure about their place that they need to look at things like this like Pavlov’s dogs, salivating at the merest hint of acknowledgement. Pathetic. I like being ignored… It’s safer to be inconspicuous, especially with so many nations out to get so many others. But I’m in the minority down here. Sad, isn’t it?
And that’s this week’s view.
