Back Of The Net… Or Not

Went to the North Sydney Oval on Sunday to watch New South Wales (or the Speedblitz Blues if you prefer the sexy alter ego) take on Tasmania in the one day (50-over) Ford Ranger Cup. After the ‘testing’ test against Sri Lanka Brett Lee, Michael Clarke and Stuart Clark were all left out of the squad after ‘consultation with Cricket Australia’. Ricky Ponting then goes and makes them all look like a load of wimmin by picking himself for Tassie and slapping the blues all round the park for the most nonchalant century you’ve ever seen.
NSW won the toss, elected to bat, and were all out for 265. Being fairly new to the game I didn’t realise that this was a bad score but was soon put right by the helpful advice some of the thirstier spectators were hurling towards the wicket. Simon Katich (56) and Brad Haddin (74) did alright, but lads like Moises Henriques were copping it, especially when he had a go at bowling and was get belted all over the place as opener Michael Dighton and Ponting made a record 257 partnership to win by 9 wickets. I got in for free as my mate Luke’s a member but tickets normally cost a whopping $15. The North Sydney Oval’s a lovely ground too, one of the oldest in Australia, as this cracking wee site will tell you. I might become a member, it costs $50 and you get into all the games for nowt (and a free Speedblitz Blues baseball cap!).

After that we jumped in a cab to the football stadium for the mighty Sydney FC Vs Queensland Roar Hyundai A-league game. It’s a cracking stadium, holds 45,000, and as with the cricket there was a “sit anywhere you like” policy seeing as it weren’t a sell out. They normally get gates of about 8,000, but the crowd on Sunday was over 16,000. And why? ‘Cause Dave one-million-dollars-a-week-for-playing-part-time-in-a-conference-league Beckham came out with the Galaxy at half time and waved to the crowd ahead of their Tuesday night friendly with Sydney. .Seeing as the game finished nil-nil, I ain’t lying when I say he got the biggest cheer of the night. The standard is truly Gills-esque. This worked in Sydney’s favour as Queensland had the better of the game and missed a couple of absolute sitters. But oh you should have seen them quaking when Juninho got wheeled on in the second half… he’s now one of the slowest players on the park and turns like a ferry. How the mighty have gotten old. Danny Tiatto (can’t cut it at Leicester? Then we’re going to have to ship you off back home to Sydney son…) got put on for Queensland at the same time and made more of an impact. I barely noticed Michael Bridges either. Sydney’s set pieces were as good as the Gills an’all – when short corners didn’t work they’d whip them into the box and watch as a Queensland centre back strolled over to where it was coming in and lazily headed it out in about ten yards of space, the boys in blue deciding to camp about 25 yards out and wait for said header rather than put a challenge in.
The crowd are funny too. There’s a singing section of about 1,000/1500 that come out with a few tunes and it’s surreal to hear chants like “Stand up, if you hate Melbourne…” and “With a packet of sweets and a cheeky smile, Kevin Muscat is a paedophile” (Muscat’s now the assistant coach at Melbourne). “Oh when Syd-ney, goes marching in” was the most popular tune of the evening though, followed by the witty “Fuck off Queensland” sung to the tune of ooh-ah Cantona. There’s also a separate group of about 100 yoofs who sing there own songs and the same songs but at completely different times. A few of them look Mediterranean and there’s a big Italian community in Leichhardt, which probably explains the odd scarf-round-the-face, megaphone directing the chanting and “Ultras” t-shirts on a few of them. One of them was waving a ‘Sin City Crew’ flag which cracked me up an’all seeing as they’re all pissed-up fifteen year olds, with a few sad lads in their twenties thrown in. One thing that was (sadly?) missing was the higher level of anger, abuse and general despair that you get when supporters have hitched themselves to a crap team for the long haul. Being a second or third tier sport for most means they're all just happy to be there, which is quite a change of attitude from Priestfield - screaming abuse at your useless right back (Ruben Zadkovich) as he gets peeled like an orange for the ninth time gets you dirty looks and tuts... Oh aye, and the reason the singing’s such a popular thing in general is because song sheets with action diagrams were given out at the beginning of the season! Only $18 a ticket though and you can buy beer, take it back to your seat and get leathered watching the game, so I’ll be down there again hoping to see a goal, or even a challenge from a corner…

P.S. You can click on any pic for a bigger version, and what the hell's happened to Andy Fordham!!