Revengists,
There's only one bloke who can mix his metaphors better than me, and that's Tim Sheens.
He really did say on interview after the game "we are brain dead because we shot ourselves in the foot time and time again".
Mid afternoon Friday, wandered into the Front Bar at The Local and found The Philosopher enscounced in his usual possie under the mirror in the dimly lit corner of the room contemplating this week's favoured tipple.
A large vodka and tonic with two slices of lemon.
Now, as we know, The Philospher is loathe to venture an opinion or make make an informed comment on anything, let alone something as insignificant as football.
But when pressed on his thoughts about the evening's game, he did manage five words as if it was a throw away line: "Prince could get murdered tonight".
And so it came to pass.
Prince was hammered in every tackle, and hit late and put on his backside after every kick.
Copped a clothesline around the chops that the Bamford's missed, not to mention the odd squirrel grip going on here and there, and then there was the Christmas Hold option.
Clearly, Prince was getting "special treatment".
Balmain people don't forgive easily and never forget.
Prince taking the truckload of cash from the Gold Coast in '06 whilst trading on the fact that he was a Premiership Ring wearer from just the year before is still viewed as a bastard act of treachery among the Leichhardt faithful.
Never mind that the idiot Balmain board let him go in what SC Sheens described as "the worst decision made by any football club in my entire rugby league career".
Getting the scoundrel was among just a few personal vendettas going on, which for mine, distracted the Miracle of '05 veterans from the game at hand.
They were 14-0 up after 11 minutes then rested on their laurels, for gawd's sake, while going around bashing a few blokes up and putting on some cheap shots.
While they were busy doing that, none of the set plays worked, they were seriously harrassed in defence, and just failed to grasp the nettle in the second half.
It always looked like it would come to nought, then Prince had the last throw of the dice.
Sold the Tigers defence a pram full of dummies to stroll in untouched for the softest match winning try of the season, as they stood around and looked at each other while shaking their heads.
Didn't help that The Refrigerator made two inexplicable mistakes, to wit, knocking on in the play the ball late in the piece to serve the game up to the Titans on a silver platter.
To make matters worse, The Fridge is down to Sick bay for at least a fortnight with an ankle.
Nurse!
You can only hope the boffins down in the Rehab Dept are putting in their overtime chits.
With plenty of time on his hands, Toddy'll be the first one this season to be sent down to the Room Full Of Mirrors on the Balmain Road, to have a good look at himself.
Could not believe the news that Mr Chris Heighington became the subject of a joke charge for a 'careless' high tackle on that serial pest Greg Bird -- without doubt the most annoying person in the entire game.
Heighington decided in a split second that he'd have to take that one up to the judiciary, thank you very much.
Slip on his best suit and tie and take a good QC with him, who no doubt would have advised him not to appear before the Panel of His Eminences and say in his defence "it wasn't careless, guvna. I wanted to flatten the bloke, y'know, give him a real good clock around the ears and nose, y'know, teach the low bastard a lesson. I could carry on like a pork chop, but, like, you know what he's like, just disappointed that I didn't give him a better one, a real good shot, y'know, guvna".
Lord, spare me.
At the very least, our lad deserves natural justice.
SC Sheens also remarked on interview "no wonder coaches lose hair and go grey".
Like something straight out of the Picture of Dorian Gray.
You can just the see the coach pulling his hair out over dinner, and then watching it as it continues to go grey while it lies there on the kitchen table.
The Club Secretary might be scrabbling about in the back of the football office looking for the abacus as there is a bit to ponder.
3-3 after six is enough to put you thereabouts, but with the best part of a quarter of the season gone, will have to do better to threaten the top four.
Needless to say, it doesn't get any easier this week against the in-form Brisbane outfit at home.
GOLD COAST TITANS 20. Tries: Zillman (2), Minichiello, Prince. Goals: Prince (2).
WESTS TIGERS 14. Tries: Dwyer, Heighington. Goals: Marshall (3).
At Robina Park.
Crowd: 17,221.
Awoke in the very small hours of Saturday morning to the sound of torrential, flooding rain on the tin roof.
Immediately thought "ooh, it'll be a wet track at HQ".
Not surprised to find 48mm [that's two inches in the old money] in the backyard rain gauge and my rocket and swiss chard seedlings washed away.
Good thing that the GLW eschewed the chance of getting a cheap ticket to the Doncaster Day/Swans Game double.
Given that it rained all day and night, no one really fancied the prospect of the inevitable punters nightmare on a bog track at Randwick, then arriving at the G without your shirt, only to watch pigs rootin' in mud and your side go down in a mudbath.
In a match where tactics pretty much went out the window and structure was the baby thrown out with the bathwater, Geelong just found a better fit on the head for their wet weather thinking caps.
Cats valued patience at a premium.
Nothing much to it.
Swans didn't win the lottery.
Oh well.
What's news?
No heroics.
No Nick Davis Come To Save Us this time [Davis, of course, played the best quarter of Rules football ever seen at the SCG the last time the two teams engaged each other on the ground five and half years ago -- it messed with his head; after being consistently dropped, he was unceremoniously shuffled out the back door with an attitude/weight/injury/drink/drugs/problem three years later, and never played again. Probably sleeping under the old Glebe Island bridge, for all we know].
While the Swans quite rightly pin their hopes on the veterans and journeymen to provide the backbone with their skills in the air and in the wrestle, the weather exposed most of them as having lost a couple of yards in pace and finding it difficult to compete with the ball running on the ground.
That could be a problem.
Seasoned observers at the ground noted that it's interesting to see how the young fellas are going; the Jetta Kiddie and Spida Jnr being a case in point.
Going from creditable performances, including the goal of the year, last week, to a patchy showing at best from both of them against serious opposition players this week.
Guess it can be put down to the inexperience and inconsistency of the Yoof of Today.
In normal circumstances you'd send 'em for a stint in reserves to get them up to standard, but who else is there to play?
The hard truth for anyone under 21 in this caper is that Rules, among all the football codes, is probably the hardest to learn how to play well.
Coach Longmire would have been happy enough to get to Sunday morning smoko by the magic waters at Bronte, take up his position on the much vaunted and prized flat rock, recently vacated by SC Roos, and gaze out over the Tasman Sea to the horizon, and have a good think about things.
Happy enough, too, to have the bye this week.
At least then nothing can go wrong over Easter.
SYDNEY: 4.3 4.5 6.9 7.12 (54). Goals: Bevan 2 Mumford 2 Goodes Kennedy O'Keefe.
GEELONG: 3.2 6.6 8.10 11.15 (81). Goals: Wojcinski 3 Chapman 2 Enright Ling Menzel Podsiadly Johnson Varcoe.
At Sydney Cricket Ground.
Crowd: 25,300.
