Playing the blame game off the park

made me laugh :)

Greg Growden
Monday, February 26, 2007
http://www.rugbyheaven.smh.com.au/ar...338471265.html

MONDAY MAUL

A SANZAR document, titled "A coach's guide to staying on side with Big Brother", has landed on the Monday Maul desk. The confidential document is in the form of a questionnaire. It asks:

Question one: If, after a Super 14 match, a journalist asks you for a comment about a referee do you:

a) Turn the blame back on the media, and say: "It's high time you monkeys gave the referee a fair go. They're doing a great job."

b) Change the subject and spout out such meaningless phrases as "think tanks", "bottom lines" and "24-7", until the media start nodding off.

c) Go into a tirade. Shout obscenities. Say you'll pay any fine. Threaten to buy a cement truck so you can run over one of them. Scream: "Zero tolerance, my arse!". Then kick over the chair, trash the media room and shirt-front one of the scribes.


Two: If they ask about the touch judge, do you:

a) Go on about how it is terrific that out-of-form or has-been referees can stay in the game by prancing up and down the sideline.

b) Mention how you know for a fact that one Super 14 team runs a sweep on the exact time a certain glory-seeking touch judge will first run onto the field to pester the referee. Apparently the three-minute mark always gets the money.

c) Go into a tirade, and froth at the mouth at the stupidity of some touch judges who believe they can adjudicate on brawls on the other side of the field, but when the ball is on their side, they can't even work out where it has gone over the sideline. Then head-butt the mug who asked the question.

Three: When asked how can the laws be improved, do you:

a) Go into a long explanation about how the IRB has been brilliant in organising a "brains trust" to assemble in Stellenbosch to try to improve the laws, and that it would be so spiffing if some of those were introduced before 2030.

b) Go on about how the problem is not the laws, but those mongrel players who refuse to play to the laws, which are, thankfully, being policed so well by the referees.

c) Go into a tirade ... You know the rest.

Four: When you lose, you blame:

a) Yourself, then get all weepy, saying: "I take full responsibility."

b) Blame it on the actual football. No matter what the match conditions, you say the ball was "like a piece of soap", because that always gets the sympathy vote.

c) Blame it on the ref, the touch judges, the media, the morons in your team, the crowd, the draw, the ground announcers ...

Five: When you win, do you say the prime reason was:

a) My fantastic players, and the ARU and SANZAR for devising such a sensational competition.

b) The referee.

c) Me.

Give yourself five points for A, three points for B, and no points for C.

If you poll between 0-5: You just don't get it. You're barred. You're fined. We're going to send you to the cleaners. And when we rub you out of the game, don't even think a few years down the track of applying for any lucrative advisory roles with the ARU or SANZAR. We have long memories.

Between 5-15: There is hope. You do know how to say the bleeding obvious, and fully comprehend Agenda A and Agenda B. There may be a spot for you on the ARU board.

Between 15-25: Congratulations. Your reward is a berth on the gravy train. We'll get you involved in a "rugby development" committee, or maybe even a "laws seminar". Ever been to St Tropez in the spring? Or what about a nice villa down the south of France in September-October this year? Start packing.