Horatio
on the
Bridge
I TOLD you anything can happen in rugby, even against the mighty All Blacks – and so it did. When Handre Pollard overcooked his opening kick-off, sending it over the deadball line for a scrum on the centre spot, their put-in, it seemed the silly buggers factor was there in force.
When New Zealand ran in a two-try blitz, it seemed we had no answer. But then gutsiness took over and we tackled them out of the game, scoring our own tries. This was stirring Horatio on the Bridge stuff, an epic.
The official match stats tell the story. On attack: Tries – New Zealand 6, South Africa 5. Metres carried – New Zealand 653, South Africa 245.Carries – New Zealand 205, South Africa 59. Defenders beaten – New Zealand 33, South Africa 10. Passes - New Zealand 234, South Africa 61. Offloads – New Zealand 17, South Africa 3. Possession – New Zealand 75.3%, South Africa 24.7% … and so on.
That's the dry stuff. It suggests an overwhelming win for the All Blacks. But stats don't measure guts and kop, 15 men acting in concert, saying: "They shall not pass!" That's what makes rugby the game it is, a test of character as much as brawn and skills.
Sure, it was kicks that decided it in the end. Pollard on song again, Beaumont Barret getting the Silly Buggers Award for hitting the upright twice. But that's the fortunes of war, that's rugby.
Those closing minutes as we kept them out on our tryline were an epic of heroism. Ole, ole, ole! The return match at Loftus will be a sell-out.
· INVESTMENT analyst Dr James Greener takes issue in his latest grumpy newsletter with the very existence of the KwaZulu-Natal Quality of Life Portfolio Committee
"Presumably someone knows exactly what powers it has. But for the rest of us it sure looks like a severe case of fruitless and wasteful expenditure. Not to say unwarranted and unnecessary meddling in individual choice.
"If President Cyril really was the steely-eyed decisive businessman we are assured he is, he would long ago have asked for a list of all the national and provincial outfits with names like this and closed them down with a stroke of the pen. No argument.
"Assuredly, closing the deficit by increasing taxes is now way past the point of diminishing returns and for our president to live up to his alleged abilities he must immediately slash the state wage and expenses bills."
· OVERHEARD in the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties: "What's the difference between a bloke and a catfish? One's a bottom-feeding scum-sucker, the other's a type of fish."
· I'M NOT quite sure how to take this. Reader Naomi Stapersma sends in a quote from Can Jane Eyre Be Happy, by John Sutherland, published in Oxford World Classics: "He is a drone, and there is no lower order of life in the Trollopian order of life than idlers".
Do you think she's getting at me?
· THE novichok poisoning saga in England shifts from resembling a John le Carre spy novel to the realm of Walt Disney.
The two named and videoed Russian agents appear on TV saying they flew in to take a look at the splendours of Salisbury cathedral, then flew out again quickly because it looked as if it was going to snow.
Actually, Mickey Mouse would do better than that.
Tailpiece
"I JUST bought my mother-in-law a Jaguar."
"I thought you didn't like her."
"I know what I'm doing. It's bitten her twice already."
Last word
I know nothing about sex because I was always married.
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