Sports Comment
Mackay Is The Limit
09/05/2008
1956 was a watershed year in New Zealand sport.
The All Blacks beat South Africa for the first time in a rugby test series with Peter Jones scoring the match and series-winning try in the 11-5 fourth test triumph at Eden Park. Earlier in the year New Zealand had also triumphed for the first time in test cricket when it beat the West Indies by 190 runs on the same hallowed sporting turf.
There was a Southland connection with both victories. Robin Archer played in the first and third tests of the epic Springbok series. And a fresh-faced 25 year old Jack Alabaster was involved in one of the key moments in the historic cricket victory when he dismissed the Windies' star batsman Everton de Courcy Weekes.
It was my good fortune and honour to be asked to interview 77 year old Alabaster last night at the ILT Southland Sports Awards in his capacity as a former winner of the Southland SportsMAN of the Year (back in 1959 we were less politically and gender-correct when we dished out sporting gongs).
He reminisced on his 21 tests that spanned an amazing 18 years and a first class career in which he collected 500 wickets in 143 appearances.
Outside of his obvious sporting achievements Jack also tasted success in the world of teaching. After a spell as principal of Kingswell High School he took on, arguably, the highest profile teaching post in Southland - that of Rector of Southland Boys High School.
I tracked down one of his former pupils, former All Black Paul Henderson, to enquire of Alabaster the headmaster. Paul had mainly fond memories of his time at SBHS although I did sense a Ginge-twinge of bitterness when he said the sixth form was the two best years of his life.
It came to pass that Ginge failed University Entrance (UE) the first time round by 13 marks, not through stupidity, rather because of his untiring efforts for the school on the rugby paddock. The next year when he returned to repeat the sixth form he was once again distracted by his obligations to school and country - he captained the First XV and represented New Zealand Schoolboys.
However his sporting endeavours and his close academic shave the year before did not encourage Alabaster to accredit him UE second time round and he was forced to sit the exams again. This time though there was a happy ending and Ginge finally passed (which is more than he ever did on Rugby Park).
The final quote on Alabaster belongs to Ginge. "Despite Jack plainly getting it wrong with the UE accrediting, he did have the vision to appoint me a prefect, while ignoring the claims of my twin brother Goof".Email Jamie your thoughts by clicking here.
02/05/2008
Ode to Jock and Steve
This is an ode to Hobbs and Tew
Who gave themselves a 52
The Rugby Union calls it a pass
But let's be honest, it's a total farce
The World Cup was lost without a fight
And the Super 14 was absolute shite
The TV ratings have fallen from the SKY
And a simple drop kick could tell you why
I blame the lefties and liberal schools
Who've taught our kids to be total fools
No longer is there fail or pass
Now it's merit or achieve - what an ass!
As a nation we've forgotten how to win
And when we lose, it's the same PC spin
The likes of Pinetree, never stood for second
More hard-buggers like him, are needed I reckon
Reconditioned and rotated - the players got lazy
Some of the boys even looked stir-crazy
Trained but not house-trained, they've peed in bars
And Dougie went one better, upon some cars
So when it came time, to front in the quarter
To a bunch of Frogs, we were lambs to the slaughter
And when we should have taken three points
We lost it completely - were we smoking joints?
We blamed the ref, Wayne what's-his-name?
We blamed the lack of a good hard game
We blamed poor Richie and gave him stick
When it was really the fault of several drop kicks
When it comes to blame, it's right to point
To the blokes Jock and Steve chose to anoint
Ted Henry, Shag Hanson and woeful Wayne
Have totally shagged our national game!
However all is not lost, there's 2011
Salvation awaits us at Eden Park heaven
Since 1987, I know it's been foreign
But we could win the Cup . with Robbie and Warren.
Email Jamie your thoughts by clicking here.
25/04/2008
When we were kids growing up in Riversdale, my younger brother Don and I spent an unhealthy amount of time sitting in a Landrover between my father and the bloke who used to work on our farm, Fred Cavanagh.
Unhealthy because of the passive cigarette smoke we ingested, but healthy in that we also ingested a great deal about life. As inquisitive kids we had differing interests as we badgered the grown-ups for life's pearls.
In my case it was always asking Dad about the All Blacks. Was Earle Kirton the best player in the team? Was Tony Steel the fastest? Was Colin Meads the toughest? Those early forays into asking questions about rugby have stood me in good stead as I now make a living from, amongst other things, interviewing people and writing about sport.
Don always aimed his questions at Fred as they'd formed a great bond. His interest, amongst other things, was war and he constantly harassed Fred about his time spent serving his country in the Second World War. His line of questioning would, today, be deemed totally politically incorrect and Fred, like many returned servicemen, would never speak of the atrocities of war.
So it was very much to Fred's credit that he never took offence or umbrage when asked for the umpteenth time, how many Germans he'd killed!
Don's early forays into asking questions about war have also stood him in good stead. He recently completed a doctorate where his PhD examined the political aftermath of the Gallipoli campaign.
We've both gone on to become writers of sorts, although my effort in writing one chapter for the Riversdale Rugby Club's centenary publication pales by comparison to his effort in writing an entire book, The Fallen, which honours the men from our district who lost their lives during the wars of the 20th Century.
It was upon reading a chapter in the book that I twigged to the tenuous link we have to life. Our grandfather Hugh served at Gallipoli. On August 7, 1915, alongside his first cousin and childhood friend, Peter Mackay, the pair came under fire while trying to clear the foothills in advance of the attack at Chunuk Bair.
Peter was killed and Hughie, right by his side, was wounded. His cousin and mate literally died in his arms. It could have so easily been the other way round.
Lest we forget.
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Jamie Mackay's Sports Thoughts
18/04/2008
Definitive proof that the NZRU has its head firmly embedded in its own backside was delivered yesterday in the form of a 47-page review of the failed World Cup campaign that could have been written in 47 words within 47 minutes of the fateful final whistle at Cardiff.
The timing of the report is bizarre, nah incredibly stupid. Just when you thought it was safe to get back into the water, the NZRU, showing all the timing of Luke McAllister drop goal, reopens the festering six month-old sore just as we were beginning to forget it.
At a time when many heartland provinces are struggling to balance the books, I would love to know the cost of a review that was more than four months in the making and five months overdue in delivery.
Why commission a report when you've already decided to maintain the status quo, effectively giving the incumbent regime the big tick? The review came up with nothing your average punter leaning on the local bar couldn't have deduced over a couple of cold ones.
You don't need to be a highly-paid consultant to figure out reconditioning, rotation, lack of battle-hardness, lack of leadership on the field, poor team selection for the quarter-final, too many hangers-on in the support staff and plain old-fashioned arrogance were to the forefront of the failure.
And what if the review's findings suggested Graham Henry had to go? Surely the sensible play would have been to fast-track the review and appoint the All Blacks coach as a result.
What peeves me most of all though is Henry's almost-complete lack of contrition. It smacks of his smirking I-know-best-schoolteacher-addressing-errant-schoolboys demeanour. His insistence of defending the indefensible is inexcusable and he would gain much more respect from the great unwashed if he just admitted culpability and took it on the chin.
No one would deny Henry has been a great coach in the past. But he had his chance and he blew it.
Rugby is at a crossroads in a rugby-mad country that is hopping-mad about the state of the game. A lot of the current angst could have been avoided if the NZRU had avoided the meaningless charade of a toothless, long-winded review and anointed the people's choice, Robbie Deans, with Warren Gatland as his assistant.
The whole sorry saga reeks of stable doors and bolting horses.
Email Jamie your thoughts by clicking here.
11/04/2008
I write this column from 20,000 feet on a beautiful Thursday morning flight from Palmerston North to Christchurch.
In the land of the long white cloud it's not often you enjoy a cloudless sky but that's what I'm gazing down upon as we pass directly overhead Wellington. I have a magnificent view of the Harbour and, more poignantly, Barrett Reef where 40 years ago, almost to the hour, the Wahine struck disaster.
I've long held a fascination with the Wahine tragedy and I guess that is partly because my great aunt and uncle, Nell and Mart, were booked on the voyage but missed the Lyttleton connection due to Mart's appallingly slow driving (incidentally they were also supposed to be on the train that came to grief at Tangiwai on Christmas Eve 1953 but missed that one as well).
I think the other reason the Wahine occupies such a big space in my memory bank is because it came to pass when I was eight years old and just becoming aware that life existed outside my home town of Riversdale.
My first real awakening to life on the other side of the world actually took place six months earlier in late 1967 when the All Blacks toured Britain and France. They took pride of place on my bedroom wall and to this day I can still name all thirty members of the touring squad and recite, chapter and verse, their occupations, a pretty simple task really considering most of the forwards were farmers.
I cannot think of any present-day All Blacks I admire, save for maybe Richie McCaw, but there's plenty of the 1967 side who have my unadulterated admiration. Top of the pile are my three favourite All Blacks - Colin Meads, Brian Lochore and Ian Kirkpatrick.
I've also been lucky enough to either meet or interview Chris Laidlaw, Earle Kirton, Sid Going, Ian MacRae, Fergie McCormick, Graham Williams, the late Kel Tremain and Southland's own Jack Hazlett.
And after Wednesday's big Drought Shout at the Mangatainoka Tui Brewery, I can add one more to the list, after a tall and humble Manawatu farmer introduced himself.
He said he likes listening to the Farming Show. I said it's an honour having Sam Strahan tuning in. He doesn't realize it yet, but he's just been added to the 1967 All Blacks personal-friend-list alongside Pinetree, BJ and Kirky!
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04/04/2008
If you're looking for a good read can I thoroughly recommend Kerre Woodham's Short fat chick to marathon runner. It tells the tale, in a humorous self-deprecating style, of Woodham's efforts to get to, and get through, the 2007 New York Marathon.
Having been through the same ordeal in the very same race I'm now tempted to replicate her literary efforts with my book which I could title Taller bloke (with developing beer gut and man boobs) to marathon runner.
The first chapter of her book is entitled The midlife crisis and the marathon and reads thus:
"With the benefit of hindsight it was inevitable that I'd run a marathon in my forties. It's a total cliché - middle-aged woman, midlife crisis, run a marathon - and my life has been a series of clichés. From good Catholic girl, to very bad Catholic girl, to hard-drinking journo, to suburban wife and mother, to teetotalling dairy-free couscous muffin-maker par excellence. Why wouldn't I run a marathon?"
There are lots of parallels with my own story, except I haven't gone teetotal and can't remember baking any muffins! But there's an element of midlife crisis for anyone who decides to run 42.2 kilometres in their forties.
Her book is a warts-and-all, must-read for anyone contemplating a marathon. It's co-written by her personal trainer Gareth Brown and includes the very achievable training schedule she used for her first marathon - Auckland in 2006.
I hope it inspires you to do something truly inspirational. It's certainly inspired me to make a six month-overdue apology to one my running mates from New York, Western Southland farmer and builder Dick Hishon.
When we gathered for a post-race, well-earned beer to swap yarns about our day running through the five boroughs of the Big Apple, I must confess to not believing Hishon when he claimed Sean Fitzpatrick called out to him in personal support. But lo and behold, there on page 142 of Woodham's book, is a similar claim.
So Richard, I now concede part of your story is true but there's still a bit that mystifies me. I know that Fitzpatrick and Woodham have long been members of the Auckland celebrity public-speaking circuit and would be well known to one another.
Here's the bit I don't get. Why would Fitzy yell out to a Dick from Otautau?
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28/03/2008
Dear Jock and Steve,
I note with interest the NZRU's emergency think-tank on the state of our national game and how to prevent its perilous slide as a spectacle for the fans. While my invitation was lost in the mail, I hope the following observations won't be lost on you.
# Bring back rucking. Let's be honest here, the only reason it was banned was in case some toffee-nosed, public-schoolboy twat in England got hurt and sued the pants off the Home Unions. It's a physical, gladiatorial game and a few rake marks on the back never killed anyone. To the contrary, it was once a badge of honour in the showers afterwards.
# Unless we can get back to committing six or seven forwards to contesting the breakdown, we will continue to be blighted by the sight of 13 players spread-eagled across the paddock, snuffing out attacking back play, while only two are committed to the tackle area. This, more than anything else, is stuffing rugby. In the good old days, quick ruck ball was the best attacking platform available in the game. Bring it back.
# There's an old adage which says if it ain't broke, don't fix it. As a spectacle rugby was at its open best in the decade from 1987 to 1997. Look at the brand of rugby the All Blacks played at the 1987 and 1995 World Cups and compare it to the dross dished-up in today's bastardized version of rugby league. The only ones who look more bored than the fans these days are the players themselves. Retro is cool. Go retro with the rules.
# We need less rugby not more! Don't extend the Super 14, condense it. One round of Super 14 is dull enough, two would be interminably terminal. Ditto for the Tri-Nations. Variety is the spice of life. Please deliver us a varied menu.
# Bring back the extended tours. To your credit you've recognized this by introducing mid-week games to the All Blacks end-of-season tour to the UK and Ireland. We need to reciprocate by bringing the likes of Wales over here more often, playing the Southlands, the Northlands and the Hawkes Bays - the heartland provinces. The Lions tour of 2005 was a case in point. Bring them back every four years, in between World Cups. Crowds will turn up to see something a bit novel.
# While you're at it, bring back the 30-man touring squad. To take 45 players on the end-of-season tour cheapens the jersey and the tradition. Forget the corporate bullshi# about the brand and think about us, the fans. We're an endangered and dying species!
Yours in sincere concern, Jamie Mackay.
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14/03/2008
If the average life expectancy of a Kiwi male of my vintage is 72, then my 48 years on this mortal coil means my biological clock has just hit 8 o'clock.
In television terms that's prime time but in real life you could justly argue that you're past your prime, if not your use-by date. Do the math and in my case it's a simple equation. I've only a third of my life left to tick all the unticked boxes.
So much to do. So little time. So many places to see. The clock is counting down and the last third of your life should ideally be spent spending some of the money you've worked so hard to accumulate in the middle third of your life. Besides if you don't blow it, your kids certainly will and where's the joy in that?
With, relatively, so little time left I reckon you need to eliminate the unnecessary so you can enjoy the autumn of your life.
All of which is a long-winded way of explaining why I've watched only 10 minutes of Super 14 rugby this year.
You see, if I put my life under the chronological microscope, I've spent a disproportionate amount of the my first 48 years playing, watching, reading, writing and talking about rugby.
Maybe the great timekeeper upstairs has deemed I've crammed a lifetime of rugby into my two-thirds of a lifetime?
Maybe it's man thing? Like when we get home from a hard day at the office and your loving spouse enquires about your day, only to be greeted by an incommunicative grunt. We blokes only have so many words at our disposal in a day. I work in radio so mine are well and truly spoken for by 6pm and definitely history by 8.
And 8 o'clock is definitely where I'm at with rugby at the moment and I feel as guilty as hell about it.
I loved the game, but like a relationship that's run it's course, there's no spark there anymore.
I still love sport though. I'm loving the cricket. Bring on the Masters golf. I'm counting the sleeps until the Olympics. God damn it, I still love Colin Meads.
But you know you're in trouble when you're not overly bothered by the prospect of the love of your sporting life losing to an Australia team coached by an All Black.
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07/03/2008
It was the best of towns. It was the worst of towns. Without wanting to completely butcher the works of Charles Dickens, it is how I feel about the tiny Central Southland hamlet of Drummond.
You see, tomorrow Drummond was going to be the venue of one of my finest sporting hours, 38 years after the same town dealt me one of my cruelest blows.
But first he must get past Paul Avery, John Kirkpartick, Dion King, Dean Ball and hopefully Southland's dynamic duo of Darin Forde and Nathan Stratford.
Let me explain. Today I'm heading to Tuatapere to be a guest for the Western Southland Supreme Cut lamb competition. It's a fundraiser for the Hauroko Valley primary school and it basically involves a game of golf and a beer afterwards. How could a bloke refuse?
Tomorrow I'd planned to break the trip home by stopping off for a game of golf at the majestic Drummond golf club on my newly acquired golf handicap of 9.6 and in the process play for the first, and perhaps only, time in my lack-lustrous career as a single-figure golfer.
I have the ability of an 18 handicapper and the temperament of a 36 handicapper, so for the golfing Gods and planets to align and conspire to place me on a 9 is astrologically akin to seeing Haley's Comet - a once in a lifetime opportunity. Imagine my disappointment when I discovered an index of 9.6 at Drummond equates to only a 10 handicap.
Now I know what Gene Pitney meant when he sang about a town without pity.
As a tubby 10 year old in 1970 I journeyed to Drummond as a member of the Northern Southland under six stone, seven pounds (42kg) rugby team to trial for the Southland Primary schools side. The only problem was I weighed six stone and ten pounds.
Alongside failing the Dollar Scholar exam (twice) when we changed to decimal currency in 1967 and my driver's license as an over-cocky 15 year old, tipping the bathroom scales past the point of no-return at Drummond, rates as my most cataclysmic failure.
I wasn't helped by the man on the scales saying I was "too fat" rather than a conciliatory "bad luck son, you're just over".y.
Perhaps it's just as well I'm not playing golf at Drummond tomorrow. Who knows I could've been inadvertently paired with that well-meaning rugby administrator whose comment has unwittingly scarred me for 38 years.
Catch you next week. Come rain, hail or the Drought Shout running out of Tui!
Email Jamie your thoughts by clicking here.
29/2/2008
Gidday from Wellington, where I'm en route to Masterton for the Golden Shears.
I love fairytale endings in sport and if 46 year old David Fagan can win his 16th Open title he will become the oldest man to do so after the legendary Ivan Bowen won the first Golden Shears in 1961 at the ripe old age of 45.
But first he must get past Paul Avery, John Kirkpartick, Dion King, Dean Ball and hopefully Southland's dynamic duo of Darin Forde and Nathan Stratford.
# Have we ever witnessed a sportsman go from hero to zero at a greater rate of knots than Jesse Ryder?
Six days ago he had the sporting public eating from his hand. Now that hand is torn to shreds and so is his reputation.
I think most of us could have forgiven him for having a few too many in celebration after the series win against Poms. But he over-stepped the mark and no-balled himself when he abused hospital staff and added salt to his gaping wounds by drinking in a bar until 1-30am on the night before the series decider.
For those of us who aspired to sporting greatness, but we're at the back of the queue when the Almighty was handing out talent, it is the ultimate betrayal. Oh to be given the opportunity.
What a chump! Maybe Adam Parore was right after all.
# Has rowing ever enjoyed a higher profile in this country? I still regard our win in the eights at the 1972 Munich Olympics as a our ultimate moment but, gee, the Rob Waddell vs Mahe Drysdale battle for the single sculls berth at Beijing has lifted interest to a new level.
It'll be standing room only on the shores of Lake Karapiro on Sunday.
# By night he's the Southland Stags coach. By day he's the local manager of DB and David Henderson could certainly be described as a good sport.
To that end he's done his best to ease the pain for drought-ravaged farmers by instigating the March 12 Drought Shout at the Croydon Lodge Hotel and he's put his money where his mouth is by throwing a considerable volume of his fine Tui product at the bone-dry farmers.
Funny how twin brothers can be so different eh? David's shouting for thousands while Ginge is yet to bother the scorers.
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Jamie Mackay's Sports Thoughts
22/2/2008
It should have been the perfect end to a day of slaving over a hot microphone.
Twilight golf with the boys, a couple of beers, then home in time for the Halberg Awards and the prospect of another scintillating taped episode of Coronation Street to complete the evening.
As is often the case when you're really looking forward to something, the end result disappoints. An ugly three-putt saw me fronting with the first round at the bar and Ken Barlow's acting plumbed new depths.
Perhaps, though, the biggest disappointment was the Halbergs.
I've got to be careful having a crack at the MCs because I'm in the business and have failed miserably before myself, but I question the selection of Simon Dallow and Pippa Wetzell to front sport's most prestigious evening.
Both, as they were at pains to point out, have a background in sport, albeit in the dark distant past, Dallow in track and field and Wetzell in rowing.
It would be churlish of me to describe Wetzell as anything other than attractive but the longer I watched her the more I got annoyed by her penchant for glancing sideways at her co-host like a startled rabbit. And is it asking too much for an MC to ad-lib rather than read ad nauseam from written notes? Even the dreaded autocue would have been more palatable.
I'm sorry TVNZ, but why not go for one of your stable of sports presenters or better still take a punt on someone like Taylor, an accomplished MC, to front proceedings? I realize you don't have access to Sky's Ian Smith or Grant Nisbett but what's wrong with Peter Williams, Keith Quinn or even someone with a true sporting pedigree such as new Southern Steel signing Jenny May Coffin? Why the obsession with your so-called celebrities? In reality they are little more than well-paid autocue readers!
And did we really need Kiwi band Opshop jammed in the middle? I liked the musical intro from Geoff Sewell singing the Liverpool sporting anthem "You'll Never Walk Alone". Likewise with Will Martin's "I am my Country" to wrap proceedings but the bits in the middle should've been strictly sport. One final gripe. Why was Brad Butterworth nominated? The man cost us the America's Cup. Why salute the enemy?
E-mail me your thoughts to jamie@farmingshow.com and I will catch you next week.