Piston-packin' Paul's Spit Stop

Sydney Morning Herald

Saturday August 25, 2007

Peter Fitzsimons

YOU know TFF is an absolute motor racing nutter! Which is why I paid attention when last week's Auto Action magazine ran its first ever drivers' poll, which involved asking all 30 V8 Supercars drivers what they thought of each other, life and the universe. The highlight was one Paul Morris - nicknamed The Dude - being voted by his peers to be not only the "most dangerous driver", but also the "driver rivals wouldn't want to pick a fight with". And for good reason, judging by his verbal spray in response. Go on, Paul, please repeat for TFF and assembled Fitzphiles, just what you told Auto Action about their response. "Some of them are little more than occupational steering wheel attendants. If they couldn't drive a race car, they would be picking up rubbish in the streets.

"The biggest decision some of them make every day is where their next cappuccino is coming from."

"Some of the guys are insecure. They have to justify why they are being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, so if I pass them they blame me to try and keep their jobs. "I don't care what they think about me or the way I drive, and I won't be changing anything."

By last weekend, the first race since the poll results, Morris had seen the lighter side and had T-shirts made up for him, his wife Alana and son Nash reading: "Dirty Dangerous Dude" and "Dirty Dangerous Dude Kid" for his little boy.

"I reckon the best reaction is from the fans. They're telling me, 'Give it to the bunch of pussies'."

Attaboy!

Grassroots dying

Good luck to the Wallabies, who left on Thursday afternoon for France, and let's hope they bring home the World Cup. Of far more concern to TFF and many readers is the state of the game at the grassroots. Sure, we always hear figures that purport to show that rugby is thriving as never before, but is it? In 1987, in Sydney, according to the programs of the time, there were Grade Division 1 & 2 + Colts = 151 teams, with Subbies + colts= 177 teams. This year, the following is the number of teams playing in Sydney. Grade + Colts = 76 teams. Subbies + Colts = 109 teams.

This is important stuff. TFF has long maintained that the mine canaries of rugby are the the Thirsty Thirds, the Fighting Fifths and Struggling Sixths of every club. When they are prospering, the game is prospering. And yet it seems they are not prospering. Perhaps part of the answer is less focus on Wallabies, Super 14 and Australian Rugby Championships, and more on revitalising club rugby. It is not the sexy end of the game, but it is most certainly the lifeblood, and the benchmark of success for those who run it has to be based less on silverware on the mantelpiece and more the net number of bums in muddy shorts running into each other on Saturday afternoons.

Poor old Rhinos

Meanwhile, there was no joy on Monday night out west for the Dubbo Rhinos, who had the decision to drop them a division confirmed by the Central West board. This means they will be in division two, which caters for one first grade and one colts team. So the Rhinos second and third XVs and seconds colts won't have a game. Is that sane administration, when 50 players won't get a game of football? The Central West board also decided that in the first division, the results of the Thirsty Thirds of each club will not count towards the net aggregation of points in that competition, meaning they suddenly become mere adornments. As administrative policy of the game, that is insane. I'd like to give you an answer from the board of the Central West but, like the Rhinos, I cannot get any response.

Tall Black all class

Speaking of lovely moments in sport, basketball had one when the Boomers played the New Zealand "Tall Blacks". (I know, I know, but that is what they call them, and who are we to argue, really?) The moment came just before the match when the young New Zealand national anthem singer Skylla Halstead, who is Australian, suffered a terrible mental blank just as all eyes and cameras were upon her, and momentarily forgot the words to the verses sung in the Maori language. No worries. After some stumbling, the Tall Blacks reserve Paora Winitana stepped up, put a gentle hand on her shoulder and - as he obviously knew the words backwards - sang it with her, long and strong. Ain't that lovely, and some demonstration of what their anthem is about in the first place? Sadly, the Tall Blacks themselves didn't then forget the words to the Haka, and went to an 11-5 lead over the Australians while it was still echoing around the stadium, but the Boomers soon enforced the natural way of things by putting them to the sword, 79-67. RAH!

Brotherly love

In response to TFF's item about the best 50 sporting sledges according to The Times, readers continue to send in their favourites. One of the best, sourced to a Jason Akermanis column in The Courier-Mail, was when Brett Voss, playing for St Kilda, was lining up for a critical goal, late in game against the Brisbane Lions. He was being marked by his older brother Michael Voss. Just as Brett had composed himself and was about to commence his run, the older Voss piped up: "My Dad's slept with your Mum!"

It was true. It was undeniable. And Brett missed.

TEAM OF THE WEEK

Souths. Beat Manly last Monday night to now move firmly into the frame for the finals series.

Kurtley Beale. Starring in the new-fangled Australian Rugby Championship, which seems to be producing notably good rugby in front of smallish crowds.

Makybe Diva. It's a boy! Proud mum gave birth to a 47kg foal by Galileo. Expected to go for as much as $5 million.

Sydney Swifts. Claimed the last-ever national netball league title after a 45-37 victory against the Melbourne Phoenix ... (As if you didn't know, the new competition will be the Tasman Trophy Netball League with five teams from Australia and five teams from NZ.)

David Beckham. New York Red Bulls' average crowd is 11,573. He came to town and they drew 66,237. Do you think we could convince him to turn out for the Australian Rugby Championship?

Adam Ashley-Cooper. TFF heard a lovely yarn the other day about how the Wallaby went way, waay beyond the call of duty to get a young bloke with serious health problems back on his feet. To quote the boy's mother: "Adam's kindness, concern and his generosity is an absolute credit to himself and to the team and country he is representing."

St Brigid's Butterflies. Composed of Kate, Elli, Tori, Sophie, Mali, Jess, Maeve and Greta, and coached by Jenny Morrissey, they have been together as a netball team for six years and last Saturday, at last, won their grand final against the Seekers. Bravo Mesdemoiselles.

Goulburn Rugby Union. For the first time in yonks, they have two grades in grand finals at Poidevin Oval, with their first-grade side undefeated this season. Their last first-grade title was in 1977, when a young red-headed bloke fresh out of St Patrick's College took a year off before university. Alas, no one can remember his name.

John Bates. Aged 37, he is a member of the Frigid Frogs Swim Club of Harbord, and recently swam 24.7 seconds for the 50 metres freestyle, an Australian record for 35-39 age group. This means he will swim in his sixth straight Olympic trials. He's never made it to the Games, but keeps plugging away!!

WHAT THEY SAID

Geoff Lawson, as he took over coaching the Pakistan cricket side: "Any side that wants to be world's best needs aggression, the killer instinct and must play to its strength, and that's what I would be looking at."

David Morrow on ABC's Grandstand Rugby League, during the Cronulla v Wests Tigers game: "Penrith are looking squarely down the gun barrel of the wooden spoon."

Shane Warne on reports he may get German citizenship via his mum so he won't be counted as an overseas player for Hampshire: "I am Australian, as simple as that, and I always will be. I'm not going to be Adolf Warne or anything like that - I'll always be Shane Warne." The relief, Shane!

Andy Mill on Greg Norman hooking up with his former wife Chris Evert: "Greg Norman at one time was my best friend, and a year-and-a-half ago I would have taken a bullet for this guy. But I didn't realise he was the one who was going to pull the trigger." Ugly.

John Connolly on Eddie Jones helping South Africa: "I hope Eddie helps South Africa the way he helped Queensland ..."

Connolly on his preference for a local coach to succeed him. "I would support whatever decision the ARU made. But, personally, I would like to see an Aussie get the job. I was offered the Ireland job in 1996, and I knocked it back because the interest is not the same coaching another country. Can you imagine an Englishman or a New Zealander standing there singing our national anthem?" Nuh.

Manly CEO Grant Mayer happy to be a silvertail in the raging war of words with Souths: "We are proud of that - we are and will always be the silvertails. There will always be imitators but there is only one true silvertail. You just compare it - we've got Manly beach, and they have Redfern."

Finally, this is what Marco Materazzi says he said to provoke Zinedine Zidane into head-butting him in last year's World Cup final: "I prefer the whore that is your sister."

St George Illawarra coach Nathan Brown after one of his players, Jason Ryles was suspended for two weeks for a grapple tackle: "The good thing about it is that Rylesy's got four months [off] now. He can go and get a pedicure, get a Brazilian [wax] and go and order his skirt so he can play with all the rest of the girls that are going to be playing in the NRL next year, 'cause that's where the game's going. And I'm not a fan of the grapple tackle, mind you, I'm glad they're getting rid of it. But Jason Ryles did not commit a grapple tackle."

Socceroo Craig Moore referring to himself in the third person singular and plural in the one sentence!: "Just because Craig Moore is back playing in Australia; I am exactly like every other player, you need to be playing well to be given that opportunity [to play for Australia] and we will see where it takes us." Michael Clarke, eat your heart out!

Brad Fittler after being signed on a two-year contract to coach the Roosters: "I've had a dream run, really, pretty much my whole life. I've been born with a golden egg up my arse."

© 2007 Sydney Morning Herald

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