It's Happening

Bit of a weird week. Been sick on and off. And this is happening. We've waited four years for this and we're ranked no.1. This is the biggest thing since sliced bread and we're into it. The All Blacks are famous for their haka at the beginning of each game. The haka is a dance, and in the All Blacks case it's a war dance. A challenge. I could wax lyrical on the haka for a couple of thousand words but will restrain myself to telling you there are two versions. The old one, a controversial new one, and then this one below, which seems like the old one with a few modifications. The other team stands and faces up to it like rugby men do. Except this time, the first haka in the Rugby World Cup, we played the Italian team. And they went into a huddle during the haka. A huddle. (Let's pause and consider the sight, off camera, of grown men huddling before the other team). We beat them 76-14. Or as one commentator said, "The Italian team turned their backs on the All Blacks during the haka and didn't turn round again until ten minutes before the game finished". Indeed. "Girly team", said Kiwi couch commentators.

The Cup matches are being played in France. They have this unusual thing of having a band play during the games - sounds like a mariachi band. Incongruous - the guys are rucking and mauling while this happy brass instrument stuff is riffing along in the background. There are rules to rucking and mauling, which consists of one guy who had the ball being somewhere underneath a pile of other guys trying to get the ball by stomping in his general direction. How the referee can actually see what is going so on he can enforce the rules is a great mystery which we don't care about. Tonight we play Portugal which isn't an even match but it's good experience for the Portugese team. Once every four years. We want to win. If we don't we'll hear about it for the next four years. If we do we'll hear about it for the next four years. Rugby is huge here. Anyway, here's the haka from our first 2007 Rugby World Cup game. It's about 56 seconds.