R.I.P. Football and Cricket

When I first moved to Cardiff my boss at the time introduced me to his best mate from University. After a quick chat it turned out that his brother in law had managed a football team I had played for, he had lived in the next village across from mine and we had gone to the same Grammar School, albeit several years later in my case. We became firm friends.
One day we were having a few beers and this long haired idiot walks over and starts chatting to my mate. It turned out they were cousins and this kid tells him that he had just quit his job with the Council to spend some time touring with his band. My mate advised him against this and I’ll always remember him, bearing in mind he was probably in his early thirties at the time, imploring this kid to “think of your pension”.
I tell you all this now because that kid was Stuart Cable of the Stereophonics who was buried yesterday and remembering the conversation seems almost surreal.
When I was in my late teens there was a pub called the Globe which we used to frequent every bank holiday. The Stereophonics or, as they were called then, the Tragic Love Company, used to play there. Even though they were probably thirteen or fourteen at the time you could tell they had class and would go all the way.
I met Stuart a few times after that and he always used to take the piss out of my mate about the Council and pensions. He was a lovely guy and my condolences go to his family and friends. R.I.P. mate.
Onto other business. I’ve always hated the French and their attitude in the World Cup proves what I’ve always thought about them. Absolute wankers. I couldn’t believe it when they all walked behind the goals in the Mexico match. For some of them it’s their last shot at a World Cup and they behave like spoilt brats. If I’d been Thierry Henry I would have been begging Domenech to let me on the field and try to turn things around. Good riddance to the French wankers. England hasn’t been much better and Rooneys rant to the cameras just about sums up Professional Footballers. Fuck you all, I’m bigger and better than the lot of you and you shouldn’t ever forget it. Wanker should have been born across the channel.
My Daughter entered a sweepstake in School and picked out Chile which I’ve had a tenner on at 80/1. One time please.
Talking of the light of my life, she was picked to play in the School Cricket team in a competition at Sophia Gardens recently. I went down to watch and it was a great day out. She had managed to get into the first team even though she cannot catch a ball and bats as if she’s playing Baseball. They won their first two games quite convincingly and she even managed to take the most wickets in the second match when her underarm lobs enticed a series of batsmen to give her team catching practice. The third game was a disaster.
Under 11 Cricket is played by teams of Eight and each team starts with 200. For every wicket you lose five points comes off this score. Obviously, whatever you score is added on. Every person bowls one over and every person bats for at least one over no matter how many times they are out.
There were four groups of four and the last game was a winner takes all berth into the Semi Finals. These kids turned up, all in whites, and the first thing I noticed was seven of them had County badges on their Jerseys. Watching them bowl it was obvious that they had all been coached by their action and when it came for my Daughter to bat I feared the worst. This kid started launching balls down the wicket like Curtley Ambrose and it took all my will power to not walk on the pitch and give him a slap. In fairness to my Daughter she got her bat on the ball a few times and didn’t get bowled. I was well chuffed. The team scored 203 and the game was all over bar the shouting. The two kids who were batting when my Daughter bowled had a field day although, to be fair, all of them scored runs and they won by about fifty. Unsurprisingly they went on to win the whole Competition. My Daughter enjoyed it which is the main thing; if only she’d pick up the Golf Clubs I bought her, little witch.
Loads of other things I should really be blogging about but I’ll save them for another time.
One last thing, Jessica, should you read this I cannot post comments on your blog and can’t even read it half the time because of some “forbidden 503 error message”. Any ideas?
Later.