The Bribble

French Cricket
Tuesday, 27 October 98

The Real Boycott Trial

Professional Yorkshireman, xenophobe, misogynist, ex-professional cricketer and soon to be ex-professional cricket commentator (now that test cricket has gone to Channel 4) Geoffrey Boycott was in the headlines last week. Boycott is on trial in France in front of a French magistrate in a French court for beating up his girlfriend in a French hotel. It was reported that he shouted out in the middle of proceedings that "everyone's talking French and I can't understand it." Appealing as is the notion that the French should conduct all their trials in English, preferably in a Barnsley accent to accommodate Geoff, it now transpires that he was misquoted, and what he said was, "everyone's talking sense and I can't understand it" -- as he always struggles to whenever he comes up against it.

Elsewhere in the cricket world, the one day England team went all the way to Bangladesh for the Wills International Cup only to be knocked out by South Africa in their first match. During the match, skipper Ben Hollioake suffered badly from dehydration and described the effect thus: "I felt like I had smoked about ten joints." He went on to explain that after playing an unbeaten 83, he went out to field for the South African innings but after five overs felt very dizzy and thought he was going to pass out, so he returned to the dressing room where he "suddenly had an incredible attack of the munchies and ate about five Mars Bars and three bowls of noodles." Well, yes, it does sound very much like he had smoked ten joints. So clearly the influence of Beefy Botham, who is employed as an advisor to the cricket team, is being felt.

In football, it is good to hear that Paul Gascoigne could be back at the weekend after spending two weeks in clinic for treatment for alcohol problems. How successful the treatment has been remains to be seen, as when asked if he had stopped drinking, Gazza replied, "Yes I will do." Sober or not, he will no doubt receive a rapturous reception from the Middlesborough fans, which is more than can be said for another player returning to the fold -- Pierre van Hooijdonk. He is now set to return to Nottingham Forest, three months after having gone on strike saying the club lacked ambition plus a few other choice comments. However, after paying rather a lot for him, Forest were stuck with Pierre, as they effectively had no asset to sell -- seeing as he wasn't actually playing football, which is one of the main criteria for being a footballer. But chairman Irving Scholar has negotiated with the player, who has now agreed to return. A meeting with club manager Dave Bassett and five senior players has been arranged, which is promised to be "lively." His return will not be in the least bit popular with the fans, but after losing 5-1 to Liverpool at the weekend, the fans may have to take what they are given.

In Rugby Union, Australia named their party for their tour of France and England in November, which is missing six front line players, including Matt Burke and Ben Tune. Cast your minds back to May, when England embarked on a ludicrous tour of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa with a severely depleted squad resulting from injury and exhaustion following a demanding season stretching back to the Lions tour of South Africa. At the time, the Australian Rugby Union denounced it as "the greatest English sellout since ANZAC day." When reminded of those comments in the light of the missing players, Australian chief executive John O'Neil explained, "that was entirely different." Of course it was, Mr O'Neil, of course it was.

Since May, the Rugby Union club v country row has been raging, and it took another turn this week when England prop Graham Rowntree played for Leicester when less than fit and earned himself a rebuke from England coach Clive Woodward, who told him "You were crazy" but went on to explain that Graham will still be considered for the England squad when he gets fit. That pretty much sums up the country side of the argument, i.e. your country comes first. The club side is that it is the club that pays the players' wages, and therefore it is the club that calls the tune and therefore should expect the players' loyalty. Certainly at the moment the power seems to be with the clubs and could be going a similar way in football.

Last week Arsenal manger Arsene Wenger stated that "international football is behind club football" and felt that the future of football lay with club competition or matches between continents. Now I know that Arsenal have been selling out Wembley in their Champions' League matches, but will I care if Arsenal get knocked out? Not much. Certainly not even a tiny fraction of what I felt after England's exit from the World Cup in the summer. My point is that, valid as the club's arguments may be, they underestimate the strength of the shared experience of supporting your country.

One of the things that made the France 98 experience almost bearable was knowing that there were tens of millions who felt the same way. Wherever you went in the days after England's defeat, there were people prepared to talk for hours about Beckham's behaviour, Hoddle's failure to practice penalties, etc etc etc. When Arsenal or Manchester United go out, some people will be very upset, some will be glad and many many more simply won't care. It is nothing like the international experience, and the clubs always seem to forget that.

And finally, but still with Rugby, last week we described in the Bribble the cup exploits of Old Street Onians, the Herts/Middlesex League Three side for whose second team your joint Bribblers occasionally turn out. One of our second team colleagues, Kunal Thakore, returned to India after completing a year long secondment for the law firm that he worked for. On his return he was immediately called up to the Indian team for the Asian Rugby Championships being held this week in Singapore. Well done, Kunal.

Rugby Union scores just in: Singapore 85 India 0

Richard Hay & Richard Quinn (easilypartedfool@yahoo.com)