With Ulster you just never know what your gonna get. Like the Belfast weather BJ tweeted about yesterday, being four seasons in one morning, Ulster’s performance yesterday evening was much the same.
Reasonable first half which included decent defending and its alter ego indecisive finishing. The second half was a game of two halves which featured some awful kicking, nice work in the lineout and some useful defending towards the end.
The scrums were to my mind pretty decent but it seems whichever prop is first to engage and drops the scrum because his opponent is not engaging straight on, then it’s that prop who is penalised.
At least that seemed the way of it with the Bear, first winning a penalty then giving one away simply because his opponent paused that wee bit longer before engaging.
Aironi though were not good enough to put us away when we wobbled at the start of the second half. That is the key here, you feel it is only a matter of time before we don’t get the breaks and are made to pay for being wasteful when we were on top.
The next game against Edinburgh will tell a story because up to now we have lived mostly off others mistakes without creating too many chances of our own.
1000 Conversions at Ravenhill
With Niall O’Connor missing a few relatively easy kicks yesterday I was heartened to learn of the 1000 conversions promised for Ravenhill on Sunday. We had taken on a new and ambitious kicking coach I thought.
The truth has proved to be more prosaic with Pastor McConnell promising to convert 1000 souls at Ravenhill during his Sunday religious shindig there.
Mind, given Pastor McConnell’s alleged ability to work miracles, perhaps he should be retained for a few days as kicking coach. Having gotten a ME victim off the couch and unto her feet at one of his missions, he perhaps could work on Niall’s feet and interlinking radar whilst simultaneously laying hands on mini Humphs boots.
The Return of the Weathermen
The Weathermen originated in the 60’s with a mission to overthrow American democracy and replace it with a revolutionary proletariat. The Weathermen are back but this time without a revolutionary goal in sight though global warming or lack of it in Northern Ireland is likely to feature high on the agenda.
Word is, the climatically obsessed BJ Botha is forming a band made up exclusively of fellow travellers focussed on the Northern Ireland weather. It is to be hoped that this sideline will provide BJ with much therapeutic healing as he braves Belfast’s four in one day seasonal weather.
Famously BJ remained in bed with a cold one Saturday whilst his teammates fought 140kph (BJ’s description) headwinds and gusting rain at Ravenhill. That’s approximately 80mph wind and whilst it was strong enough to shake the TV gantry and evacuate a stand, it wasn’t quite that bad as I recall it.
BJ will front The Weathermen as lead singer, with fellow saffers Ruan Pienaar playing an array of instruments, from guitar to accordion, as befits his utility status and Robbie Diack on lead guitar. Pedrie ‘Animal’ Wannenburg on drums will drive the whole thing and Steven Ferris, although not known to be clinically obsessed by weather, has been drafted in to provide an ‘oxlike’ presence on Bass. Johann Muller has elected to play castanets and do backing vocals.
The band will cover eclectic songs such as ‘Have You Ever Seen the Rain’, Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head’, ‘Why does it Always Rain on Me’ and as an encore, ‘I’ll Follow the Sun’.
The band’s tour de force is rumoured to be the old Van number, ‘And It Stoned Me’ with BJ donning a black, large rimmed hat and aviator shades for this song. Stevie Ferris has been teaching BJ to sing in a thick Belfast accent for this number with special emphasis on the ‘wadder,
Oh, the wadder
Oh, the wadder
Oh, the wadder
Hope it don’t rain all day!
Who Put It Up There?
BJ continues to bemuse and amuse in equal measure with his tweets. Obviously trying to watch Currie Cup on TV he had the SKY man looking at his satellite dish. It was too high apparently and the SKY man no doubt citing Elf & Safety couldn’t fix it. Who put it up? enquired BJ via his tweet.
Well one suggestion could be that when big Harrison occupied the place, he may well have hired in a few lifters or props by another name and had himself hoisted skywards with a spanner and a few bolts clasped in his teeth to complete the DIY effort.
It wasn’t clear if BJ actually got to see any rugby as he was last heard tweeting about SA TV on Top up TV.
Perhaps BJ should send out a distress call to UR fans who are a notoriously practical lot when it comes to problem solving and would no doubt for a small ration of Guinness, fix the dish and solve his weather problems all in one day.
Is The Original Kimble Original At All?
The chairman of the Ulster Rugby Supporters club is otherwise known as the Original Kimble. The origins of this eccentric nickname are unknown and may remain so but one is bound to ask is the Original Kimble really original in any shape or form?
This problematic query occupied my mind for a millisecond and a couple hundred words today. Not so much Einstein, Sarte, Russell or Hawking territory here, more lapping puddle than the frontiers of the universe and of course a search on Google.
To address the first one is ask which original is it?
‘first or unique item from which copies or alternative versions are made.’
‘genuine work of art that is not a copy or forgery’
‘an unusual or eccentric person’
‘a person of outstanding creativity or revolutionary thinking’
Is The Original Kimble all that or any of it, I ask?
As for Kimble there are few clues, other than the impressive ‘I love Kimble’ baby bib, the Kimble Cricket Club or Dr. Richard Kimble of the Fugitive. Outside of that there appears to be few Kimbles walking this earth if Google is to be believed, though it is frightening to think that there could be, ‘copies or alternative versions’ hanging around.
A Sartorial Affair
Having won the coveted fashion award for worst dressed second barrier crewman two weeks running, the normally sanguine Moondance was sufficiently impressed to ask what I was getting at in awarding him this title.
To be absolutely fair about this, MD’s trews were not ¾ length, they were in fact overlong cargo shorts that had slipped somewhat, twixt waist and knees as far as I could see, amidst the jungle of fabric that passes as fashion on the second barrier at the halfway line.
If I was getting at anything, it was the fact that Kimble had lost this coveted award and with a bye this week whilst the troops are in Aironi, MD must hold unto his hard won crown for one more week.
The Fit Patroller
No it’s not a reference to an event sec type but following on from the Fat Controller and The Fit Controller, there comes the Fit Patroller.
TFP is the Park’s family cat and has been hired to act as bouncer and keep the rowdy mice away from the Park household during the months of October and November when the field mice behave like BJ in a storm and seek shelter indoors.
Striding out where others merely dander, the fit Patroller sees itself as something altogether more king size than a kitten as it lounges under a 2’ 6” high dwarf conifer in the midday sun.
Perhaps imagining itself to be resting in the shade of a tree in the Okavanga Delta, the Fit Patroller behaves like an over enthusiastic Nazi when confronted by a mouse. Toying with it for a few minutes there is only ever one result as tiny skeletal evidence bears testimony of mission accomplished.
New Website Launches itself Without Fan Fare
I see the supporters club has reacted brightly to the new era of ‘perestroika’ introduced by the Fit controller and have launched a new website complete with apology, pre-empting mistakes with a disclaimer about not getting it quite right.
I was looking for a messageboard on it in case I wanted to air my thoughts and launder my thinking for the benefit of my fellow supporters. Sadly the voice of the people will continue to be channelled through Kimble’s outpourings and we, the people, will continue to mutter darkly to ourselves.
Corrections, comments or questions?