Author: Nutta

The Preview Hiya Folks, For what will be one hellava confrontation, you need to read this preview with AC/DC timeless ‘If you want blood” in the background, because this Aussie pub-rock classic sums up what this match will be. If you like your rugby hard and heavy with a bit of blood, well you’ve got it right here. https://youtu.be/6EWqTym2cQU?si=OOJofvM9EmhW1tq4 Welcome aboard Funsters for a southern hemisphere extravaganza of aggression, big hits and svelte skills as the world-ranked 10th Falkland Island Silver Medallists (ie, Argentina) meet world-ranked 11th Manu Samoa in this Pool D fixture at the Stade Geoffroy-Guichard in Saint…

Hey Cobbers Some may remember there was a fair to middlingly successful pub-rocker in the late 80s and 90s called Johnny Diesel. He had a pub-rock hit from 1989 entitled ‘Crying Shame’. It’s opening line is ‘Pickin’ up the pieces up off the floor’. And indeed part of me wants to do just that in the aftermath of the Fiji game: pick up the pieces and sift through the debris. But enough others are doing that for now. I’ll keep my powder dry for another day. Instead, an interesting question arose last week when folk saw South Africa’s finest glorified…

Bula Vinaka Cobbers! Pre-Game: Welcome aboard the early morning express for a match that everyone in green and gold (and probably black and white) has been both keenly anticipating and fearing in equal measure. Well it’s inescapably here now: when our first favourite team faces down the Cibi in taking on our second favourite team at the 42,000 seater Stade Geoffroy-Guichard in Saint-Étienne at 1745hrs Sunday local French (0145 Monday local Sydney). The Kava Crew will be unimpressed to learn another Welshman by name of Andrew Brace will have the whistle for this second round affair when their Pool C…

Hail fellows, all well met! Frankly I’m looking forward to feeling human again after the weekend and having my first night of relatively normal sleep with no small hours degustation of all things Arnott’s Shapes related. After five odd nights of little sleep, and what little sleep to be had being grabbed in short bursts only, interrupted by lots of little Chicken-Crimpy type things washed down with copious amounts of port, rum and coffee, I’m near certain that Gary the dog is beyond curiosity and is genuinely concerned for my wellbeing. He’s accustomed to seeing me doing the odd night…

Well Gudday Cobbers, Welcome along to Pool D match 5 and the 26th properly recognised iteration of test match rugby between England (Poms/Roses/Butchers) and Argentina (Pumas/Argies/FISM – Falkland Islands Silver Medallists), this time dressed up as each team’s opening salvo of the Rugby World Cup 2023 edition. Background It’s a little known fact that these two mobs first butted rugby heads in 1978. But, given the Butchers didn’t award caps to their players for that match it wasn’t really counted as a full historic test. The first agreed test was a 19 all draw in May 1981. Their next meeting…

Gudday Cobbers, I hope this missive finds you all primed, pumped and brimming with excitement for the impending kick-off of the Big Bill. It’s time to put aside the ruminations, the scheming, the plotting, the tea-leaf analysis of the nuances of half-muttered remarks at airport press conferences, and to lock-in to a month and a half of sleepless nights, empty rum bottles, early starts, Arnott’s Shapes, late finishes, Macca’s brekkys, and the pastel and hazy-edged timelessness of sleep-deprived tournament footy. It’s time to ignore rhyme, rhythm and reason and back your team (the Wobbs), and your 2nd team (Fiji or…

Hey Cobbers, Welcome back all and sundry as the Green rejoins the Gold and the Noodles reconstitute as the Chew once again. I’ll let others tell the tales of where we’ve been, whence and why we came and how we’ve all arrived back where we all started. It’s been an adventure, but, however it’s come to pass, here we are. Comments on the Phoney War: I made the point a few weeks ago that the roughly eight months between when Germany invaded Poland in September 1939 and when the Blitzkrieg smashed into France and the Low Countries in about May…

Gudday Cobbers Well haven’t the 6-Nations judiciary, the English and – by extension – World Rugby got themselves in a wee pickle now? For those living on another planet and who don’t know what I’m talking about, 10 days ago, whilst England and Wales played out one of the worst Test matches I think I have ever seen, Owen Farrell put a shoulder fair into the noggin’ of Welshman Taine Basham. And let’s not beat about the bush because it was exactly that: a clear shoulder into the noggin’. from https://www.telegraph.co.uk/rugby-union/2023/08/15/owen-farrell-cleared-red-card-overturned-england-world-cup/ Following World Rugby protocols, referee Nika Amashukeli initially (and…

Hey Cobbers Is it only me, or have other folk always struggled with what to do with yourself when attending a wedding and you hit that dead patch between the end of the ceremony and the start of the reception? Usually after the last flourish of Aunty Flo on the organ there is that 2hrs of ‘dead air’ while the ‘happy couple’ has their happy-snaps and the rest of us shuffle dirt with our freshly polished RM’s and stand about fidgeting and commenting on the weather or wool prices. If the shindig was non-denominational and is at a winery or…

Hello Cobbers, I hope you have recovered your sleep and emotional equilibrium after the weekend. As a number of others have noted, it’s the hope that kills you isn’t it? Regarding the weekends matches, I watched a replay of the Wobbs vs AB’s relatively late on Saturday night, and nursing a sore shoulder so knowing my uncomfortable shuffling in bed would just aggravate the wife, I then just kept punching on through with Saffas vs Pumas, Paddy’s vs Dagoes, Jocks vs Frogs and Taffs vs Poms. What was interesting was that 5 test matches straight pretty much reinforced the same…

Konichiwa Cobbers, I hope all is well in your world, that the donuts are warm, that the chips are hot and the whiskey is spelt with an ‘e’. Firstly for this week, well done Braidwood Redbacks (banner pic). Typical of many country rugby clubs these days, they have had a tough few years in terms of surviving. But this year, while wins were still hard to come by, nonetheless they did put a team out on the park each weekend regardless of the travel or opponent. And that’s no small ask these days. So well done lads. Secondly, Brissy covered…

Hey Cobbers All, I hope this missive finds you all pumped, primed and perpendicular to the ground on this fine July Tuesday. With no matches in the southern Rugby Championship this weekend past to whet the words, I thought to cast my eye about some of the other competitions in our big brown land and see what’s about. I won’t cover everybody today, but just give a enough of an insight to shape any water-cooler chat and point the way towards perhaps what to watch and what to not. Up in sunny Brisvegas, the Hospital Cup is down to the…

Morning Cobbers! Before launching onto the SRC Rd2, I thought to highlight a trend I’ve been watching and it was in full flower over the weekend. I’m interested in folks thoughts… In the past 12-18 months, consistent with a ruling from World Rugby, we have seen more penalties against the breakdown Jackler for ‘hands on ground before ball’. It has certainly made pilfering harder to do legally as was intended. But like all things in life, humans and coaches adapt and things change. So now we are seeing Jacklers adapt by instead of ‘Hands on ground’, we are seeing smart…

Hey Cobbers Isn’t it funny where life sometimes plonks you down? I’ve decided to throw my shoulder behind the wheel of my friends at the RugbyDownUnder continuum. Who knows where this will go? Who knows where it may end? Who knows anything? If nothing else, it will be fun. A new home means a new chance to frame the terroir. And while I don’t know about you, one of my greatest culinary loves in life are asian noodle soups. Tom Yum, Bihun sup, Pho, Laksa, Udon, Hong Shao Niu Rou Mian… those heady concoctions of broth, noodle, flavour, chili and…

Hey Cobbers I hope this episode of the Chewsday Chew finds you happy, chirpy, smiling and enjoying the world around you. Apparently the stats show that if you’re reading this article then you are likely to be male, middle class and living on the east coast of Australia. According to a mate of mine who works at the ABS, that also means you’re statistically well within the top 0.5% of standard of living on the earth. And we are in that group largely by accident of birth, so we should probably just put a smile on our faces and be…

Hey Cobbers, Well, we’re out of the Super finals. With Australia’s last hope resting on the shoulders of the Brumbies, the results didn’t fall our way with the Brums going down to the Chiefs 19-6. So now for the Aussies it’s off to this year’s Rugby Championship to be contested between Argentina (FISMs), New Zealand (Nearlies), South Africa (Jaapies) and the Wobblies (Wobblies) as a prelude to the Big Dance Rugby World Cup in France later this year. And given the unsettled nature of the squad, a few critical injuries, the newness of the coaching team and the still-missing overseas…

Hello Cobbers, The long weekend in NSW allowed me the luxury to gorge on the quarter finals, rewatch everything in triple slow motion, etcetera. And I have to say I was well sated. I think that, if asked honestly, we all knew the Tarts were a lost cause, some of us held some hope for the Pink Koalas to maybe pull a rabbit from a hat (and by jeez, by jingo & by crikey they almost did) but deep down we all knew if we had any hope, it lay with the Donkeys. And thus it proved to be. The…

Gudday Cobbers, I hope this little blurb of mine finds you fighting fit and punching well above your weight. As usual there’s plenty going on in our great sport this week. From the Samoan women knocking over the Fijians, to the French dealing out proper punishments to domestic abusers, even if they are national rugby players, with prop Mohamed Haouas being sentenced to a year in jail after hitting his wife (some other folk could learn from that example) and through to the U20 Aussies and Kiwis ripping into each other in a two-test series that the Aussies won on…

Hello Cobbers, I hope we’re feeling fighting fit, peachy keen and pumped for another week. As usual, the weekend just gone threw up enough permutations to baffle the best of us in terms of what it means for the Super competition table and the outcomes as we all eye off the impending finals. But one incident in particular did grab my attention not just in and of itself, but also in the modern context of head injury, safety, CTE and simply concern over ‘high’ and dangerous contact in general. In Friday night’s match between the Queensland Reds and the Otago…

Hey Cobbers, I hope this finds you all fighting fit and pumped up for the new week. I, like many others, watched a fantastic game of women’s rugby on Saturday night as the Wallaroos defeated the Fijiana 22-05 in Sydney. Full credit must go, as ever, to the ladies from the wee Pacific nation who punched well above their weight all night. But at the end of it, the combined resources and effort of the Australian provinces were not to be outdone and the Wallaroos came away with a pretty emphatic victory to send retiring captain Shannon Parry out with…