Oval becomes watery grave
In the week the Ashes finished up, the word ‘omnishambles’ was finally welcomed into the Oxford English Dictionary. Let it be immediately put to work.
It was a cricketing summer that might have been remembered for many things.
A search party was sent out for the spirit of the game, but it returned early, empty-handed, having been offered the light.
There were times — mostly of England’s design — when even Test cricket’s greatest detractors would have had cause to recant; and accept the game could be more boring than even they had realised.
We could, if we wanted, dwell on the continued decline of Australia and Australianism as a force, as a concept, as a virile, belligerent advert for getting up early in the morning.
But sooner or later we’d have to get round to examining if this state of affairs could have anything to do with the numbers of us down there now, pestering them and staying in bed until Neighbours comes on.
Instead, we might reflect on a summer when the computers proved as trustworthy when detailed to detect a batsman’s dismissal as they are at zealously guarding the privacy of our emails.
Ultimately, though, this series was notable, not for the excitations, at the crease, of two ICC Full Members, but for the evacuations, near the crease, of several full members.
It was an Ashes dampened not just by cloudbursts, but by torrents of urine.
The enuresis series.
If we can pay crude tribute to Brian Johnston’s famous gaffe; it seems the batsman was holding the bowler’s willy all right, chiefly because some of the England players taken short were all-rounders.
The writing had been splashed on the wall earlier this month, regarding England cricketers’ versatile toilet habits, when Monty Panesar took revenge on some intransigent nightclub bouncers by climbing onto a promenade above the venue to urinate on them.
But this week, bladder emptying was a tool of celebration rather than protest.
It seems several of the winning Ashes squad broke away from a late-evening drinking session on The Oval outfield to give the dusty pitch a much-needed sprinkling — apparently to cheers of approval, if not handshakes, from their team-mates.
As one Australian cartoonist put it: ‘Poms caught slashing outside off-stump.’
Somewhat ironically, the Aussie journalists who witnessed the flash flooding, while typing up the last of their post-mortems, alleged Stuart Broad was among the relieved; a man so reluctant to go earlier in the series.
But maybe the most remarkable thing about an undignified episode was the subdued postscript.
For Englishmen to leave themselves open to accusations of crassness and arrogance from an Australian — Shane Warne duly obliged — might never be considered ideal.
The subcontinent, too, has slammed the incontinent. “Disrespectful and bizarre,” lashed Aakash Chopra. Yet reaction at home to the brainless drain has been curiously sanguine.
In a half-hearted apology, the England team called it “a simple error of judgment”. .
And that, more or less, is how their media have accepted it.
Yet it is difficult to guesstimate the scale of the ‘controvassy’ had English footballers answered the call on the Wembley turf. A dedicated Sky newswall; certainly. Questions in the House; definitely. A debate about the introduction of catheter technology; probably.
There was a time when the old village green game might have been as repulsed as tennis would if Federer had lifted the Wimbledon trophy, then hung up his monogrammed jacket, slung the white slacks to half-mast and squatted between the Centre Court tramlines.
But perhaps the sport’s declining ability to generate true outrage reflects the greater malaise, its ever-dwindling grip on hearts and minds.
The muted acclaim for some fine England performances also reflected a realisation they have climbed atop Australia in recent times.
Still, a damp squib had a fitting finale and at least gave the good people of Malahide fair warning ahead of Tuesday’s one-day international. Keep the covers on as long as possible.
Funnily enough, my views on another great sporting controversy, which has now persisted into a second week, are also clouded by an untimely encounter with inappropriate urination.
So I have mixed feelings on the GAA’s decision to drop Question Time from Scór.
The incident in question was witnessed, from the same stage, in a North Tipp Scór na nÓg final, where, to be fair to the chap involved, even the two-mark questions were causing consternation.
Startlingly, before the four-markers had kicked off, the pool forming beneath one of our nervous protagonist’s legs was the first real indication his parish wasn’t going to win.
If even one young lad is spared a similar fate, maybe the quiz’s axing is a small price to pay. Then I remembered they changed the format years ago to a table quiz anyway, to spare lads that walk of shame back from the microphone.
But when they went soft, they ruined it as a show.
The Novelty Act will be gone too, from next year. I don’t know if it ever provoked incontinence, but it had become a vehicle for toilet humour, argued Jarlath Burns.
I wouldn’t know anything about that. But, in truth, I don’t remember too many people wetting themselves laughing either.
You don’t need to look too closely at the bottom line to wonder if something doesn’t quite add up in the NFL’s settlement in the concussion case brought by former players.
A feelgood clean slate on the eve of a new campaign? Not so sure.
The organisation has agreed to pay $765 million (€578m) to more than 4,500 claimants, spread over 20 years during which conservative estimates project its revenue will top $200bn (€151bn). Experts predicted a payout of at least $10b (€7.5bn).
But what price the ability to sit on what it knows now about what it knew then? The no-admission settlement doesn’t require the NFL to explain what information it had about the dangers of concussion before it made efforts to mitigate them.
When you watch clips from The United States of Football, a movie about concussions which opened last week in the States, and see some of the chronic disability suffered, it’s easy enough to figure out that a baseline of $170k (€128,000) per man might be a low enough precedent for future cases.
And that’s before you consider the men who have died already, after years in their families’ care; families that deserve answers as much as compensation.
Dismissed by Dunphy in April, named Uefa’s best player in August. A familiar pattern.
Not, as far as I know, a sportsman. But the guy who set up his own Premium Rate phoneline to make money out of cold sales calls, should serve as an inspirational example in creativity to sportspeople everywhere.
Still playing games, mind games and guessing games. But not much football.
The Ugly Game has made a return, in case you didn’t notice, and allegations of biting and gouging already abound in the grandly named Rugby Championship. Not to worry, at least these lads always retreat a few yards when the ref tells them.
