In the end the All Blacks defeated Argentina with eight men. Whether you choose to believe in the rust theory – the All Blacks hadn’t played a test match since August 15 at Eden Park – or the more magnanimous approach to analysis, which is to give the Pumas at least some kudos for their … Read more
Every four years rugby fans from around the world come together to experience the sport’s ultimate glory – hearing the absolute belter that is World in Union at the start of the Rugby World Cup. This year’s version of rugby’s great anthem is threaded throughout the tournament’s conceptual 20-minute Michael Jackson music video of an … Read more
Premier League Pass kindly loans us NBC’s excellent football pundits Men in Blazers, to bring us up to speed with all the Premier League talking points ahead of this weekend’s games. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRsOsIFUZ0o Watch all this weekend’s Premier League action live and on demand at Premier League Pass.
It’s been a busy old week in Premier League twitter with the first round of Champions League football to play in or watch on telly, but there’s still been time for the important things – celebrity haircuts, European basketball mania, and a competition to find Stoke’s best baker. Premier League Pun of the Week A … Read more
Amongst the Rugby World Cup fever, Don Rowe finds a gem of New Zealand sporting culture which risks going unnoticed. At the time of writing, we’re 19 hours from the opening of the Rugby World Cup and already a growing sentiment of rugby-fatigue is finding sympathetic ears across the internet (parts of twitter and r/newzealand, … Read more
This Rugby World Cup has offered plenty of entertainment already – a daft Englishman mocking the haka in an attempt to huck shite clothes, a former All Black hating on the English, current All Blacks using their bus as a changing room for maximum sponsorship exposure, and Tonga winning ‘Blazer of the Tournament’. Alas, no … Read more
Joseph Moore has been trapped inside The Wellington Phoenix for his entire adult life. Here he presents a five point argument in an attempt to get others to join him. (NB: one of the points is ‘Friendship’). Pre-season is hell. It’s been a few months since the mighty Wellington Phoenix last kicked a ball in … Read more
With the BMW Championship teeing off on Friday morning NZ time, we are only two tournaments away from finding the PGA Tour Champion for 2015. That person wins the FedEx Cup. The what? Calum Henderson finds out. What is the FedEx Cup? The FedEx Cup is the PGA Tour’s Championship trophy. It will be awarded … Read more
Guy Wilson first met Lydia Ko when she was just five years old. She walked into the pro shop of the Pupuke club on Auckland’s North Shore, accompanied by her father, and asked for a lesson. For the next decade the pair were inseparable. She was the perfect pupil, calm, diligent, preternaturally gifted. He was … Read more
The halfway point in the ITM Cup came and went over the weekend with Canterbury playing with all the precision of the Hyundai assembly line, the Turbos getting a first win, and Tasman making it 5-0 to start the year with a second half feast against the Lions. With the Makos taking on their bogey … Read more
Levi Stadium, Santa Clara. The first Monday Night Football game at the most advanced stadium in the United States. The 49ers, in black, against the Minnesota Vikings. There were plenty of storylines here: would the Vikings defence live up to their solid rep? Would Adrian Peterson be a force again? Would Colin Kaepernick? Was Teddy … Read more
Schadenfreude is not a football team in the German lower leagues, but it is nevertheless a state familiar to sporting partisans, not least fans of the beautiful game. For followers of English football teams that don’t begin in Chel and end with sea, precisely this basest of human emotion, pleasure at the misfortune of another, … Read more
New Zealand gets off to a flyer at the Parliamentary World Cup. Scotty Stevenson says surely this needs to be a bigger deal, and imagines how the first week might have gone. It was perhaps the most dominant opening win of the World Cup yet the the four-time world champion New Zealand Parliamentary Rugby Team’s … Read more
Duncan Greive spent a month in 2013 speaking with those around a then amateur Lydia Ko for a feature. This morning he watched her win her first major. A little over two years ago I was on the rural fringes of Albany, watching a 15 year old at the driving range. It was a sunny … Read more
Toby Manhire watches All Black coach Steve Hansen give an interview of surprising emotional honesty. There was a wee outburst of online anger when The Nation announced its star interviewee was Steve Hansen. But I’d wager that, had they stuck around, even those who have no appetite for rugby whatsoever would have found something remarkable in … Read more
The international break is a special time on Premier League Twitter. Lots of joyful plane and bus selfies as players disperse around the world and catch up with their countrymen, tempered by the grim spectacle of the non-internationals left behind to fend for themselves. Shopping … pic.twitter.com/2iriHt0HHi — Jermain Defoe OBE (@IAmJermainDefoe) September 8, 2015 … Read more
Scotty Stevenson watches as Stephen Donald makes his triumphant return to the City of Hamilton, wearing number 22 for Waikato tim boyn the ITM Cup. The great kiwi battler-cum-hero returned to Hamilton in the rain on a Thursday. Not many people cared. At least, not many people cared enough to witness it in the flesh. … Read more
It may not have the pizzazz of the Super Rugby season or the hype of the Rugby World Cup, but make no mistake: the ITM Cup is the best ten weeks of rugby this year, and every year. Where else do grown men run around in the kind of deer outfit that would make a … Read more
There are approximately three million golfers active on the PGA tour. We know the big names – the Spieths, the McIlroys, the Days – and they’re all well and good. But who are the cool, funny, and weird golfing legends hiding down the card, the ones we can really get behind? Is there a golf … Read more
With Shaun Johnson in recovery from a severe leg injury, Don Rowe thought he might be able to take him down – on PlayStation, at least. Wrong. Seated in a bright yellow bucket-seat, wearing one shoe and a moon boot, Shaun Johnson was still the best league player in the room. Hayley Holt from The … Read more
Conrad Smith sat down with Alexander Bisley ahead of the Rugby World Cup to discuss rugby’s global growth, reverse colonialism, anthems and collective contracts. AB: In Cory Jane’s biography, he say the All Blacks’ Rugby World Cup nemesis the French, likely opponents in the Cardiff quarter-final, are hard to analyse because, well, they’re hard to … Read more
Calum Henderson goes forking mad for the latest competitive sport to hit Maori TV: furious forklift driving in The World Forklift League. Proof that mad genius is alive and well in Aotearoa New Zealand: 1. Somebody came up with the idea of forklift driving as a competitive sport 2. They then packaged that idea as … Read more
Ever wondered why has a horse never won an ESPY? Joseph Harper spends a vexed afternoon watching the surreal awards ceremony, and reports back with his findings. Yesterday I watched the Excellence in Sports Performance Yearly Awards, aka the ESPYs. It was super weird. I’ve never watched the Halberg awards, but based on video highlights and pictures … Read more
Yesterday the All Blacks finally played a test in the Pacific Islands, thanks largely to the efforts of one passionate man with a bug in his head. John Campbell campaigned endlessly on the irony of so many of our most glorious ABs having island ancestry, yet the side never having played a test there. And … Read more
For this Music Monday, Alex Casey finds a totally normal way to excuse yourself from devastating cricket chat with help from The Mighty Boosh. // Yes, the cricket final happened last night and some bad things happened. We were all there, no need to dwell. Actually, let’s. As someone who has struggled with watching sport … Read more
Inside the Lightbox is a new sponsored feature where we mine the extensive Lightbox catalogue for cool shows you might like to watch. This week, after the nail biting CWC semi final last night, we gathered together some sporty shows to tide you over before Sunday. Friday Night Lights Friday Night Lights is the Canterbury of … Read more
My Life in TV is a new weekly feature, wherein we interview a member of the television industry and ask them how they got here, and what they’ve learned along the way. First up: Graeme Hill-Humphreys. // Graeme Hill-Humphreys is one of the more elusive characters these islands have manufactured. Some know him as the … Read more
Friday Night Lights examined the side effects of a small town’s obsession with high school sports. Don Rowe reflects on the show’s realism through comparison to his own rugby career at Hamilton Boys High. “Do you think God loves football?” “I think everyone loves football.” – Jason Street and a young fan, Friday Night Lights For an … Read more