WE HAD ‘SUPER Saturday’ last week. So called because of the amount of sport you could, and perhaps did, watch from dawn until way past sundown.
Super is the moniker given by the unambitious; those who lack a true vision for what is possible in this sporting world of ours.
Saturday past was just a staging post on the way to far superior Saturdays, and other days of the week too.
You might see limited time, a finite number of teams and athletes who may get tired or injured. And you might see fans who have lives outside of sport. If so, you are an enemy of high-performance culture and this column is not for you.
Rugby
The club season starts in September. We have Autumn Series and Six Nations running concurrently, with an Ireland tour every June/July – now promoted to the Nations Championship. You have your World Cup every four years, and a Lions Tour in the mix too. I like how you are thinking: August is wide open.
If we didn’t schedule another tournament there we’d be negligent when it comes to Growing the Game. As things stand there seems to be a fortnight in early August when players recover from knocks and drink the odd shandy before pre-season commences. A waste of a window, indeed.
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Nations League Championship for the win. Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
The solution is stunningly obvious: Le United PREM Top 38 – a series of playoffs between the sides that finished first v first down through second v second until last v merde. All games will be staged in emerging rugby powerhouse nations, in different stadia around China, Saudi Arabia and Texas. There will always be a game to watch, if we follow the traditional 24-hour clock. If it happens to be hot, non-half-time electrolyte drink breaks will be accommodated in the interests of Player Welfare.
The fans, how could we forget about the fans? AI assistants will be provided to help you keep on top of your rugby WhatsApp groups while you watch the games (some that you missed on x3 speed to make time to watch the next Big Match).
Before long, there will be humanoid robots to do household chores and take care of family admin. It’s hardly the Team of Us if half of Us are bringing the children to the playground or going for a walk on the beach or something. You need to be on the couch drinking the official zero zero affiliated lager, roaring on Your Team. Believe.
All proceeds from the extra games will go towards nourishing the grassroots of the sport.
GAA
On the face of it, 13 into 12 doesn’t go, with a county season that starts on January minus one and ends up with club finals in late January of the next year.
But there are opportunities still for us all to be Where We All Belong for more rather than less of our time. You’ve heard of the NBA and the NFL, yeah? You’ve heard of Christmas games? You’ve heard of the Railway Cup – what proper GAA man or woman hasn’t? You’ve heard of the reopened dome in Connacht, a testament to the Association’s indefatigable spirit against the forces of nature which once dictated we take a couple of months off while it pisses wind and rain?
I get knocked down, but I get up again: The Connacht Dome. James Crombie / INPHO
James Crombie / INPHO / INPHO
Put them all together and you don’t need to have a brain to rival an FRC member to know the Nollaig Shona Tent of Plenty of Interpro Compromised Rules Pre-Spring Classics is a no-brainer. We may as well get the Aussies and Scots involved alongside the provinces in case they have a boring, quiet Christmas planned.
Matches will start at 6am, once Santy has been and gone. Family comes first. Then games will be screened for your on-couch entertainment right up until the last Quality Street has been sucked from the tin and you’re little but a bloated but satisfied supporter, with a greatly improved grasp of the native language than you started 25 December with. Yes, games will be screened back-to-back-to-back on TG4 – those lads will go anywhere, any day – up until the point that a lot of people want to watch, from when it will be on GAA Plus (which is superb value compared to other pay-per-view services in other, some might say morally inferior, sports).
All profits will go back to the clubs and communities that make you who you are, in your DNA, in the GAA, in your very genome my fellow Gael. We are nothing without our clubs and volunteers who do savage work at underage with the future stars of the Nollaig Shona Tent of Plenty of Interpro Compromised Rules Pre-Spring Classics.
Soccer
Why are you even reading this? Reading anything longer than 140 characters? Is there not a match on? If the World Cup is over, there must be a pre-season tournament with a trophy the size of a small car that you could be looking at – from the comfort of your couch? If there has been a lapse between of greater than 45 minutes, then could you not have gone onto one of the social apps to meme a rival fanbase?
Some people can’t be helped. They need more, The Ballon More.
If the Ballon D’or was successful in establishing that football is more than a team sport, more than a cooperative but a stage for One Great Man to achieve and play and maybe even live forever. Then it was perhaps a little exclusive. The Ballon More, More, More seeks to include all players on the planet in a 24-7 YouTube series of Skills challenges, hosted in rotating eight-hour shifts by IShowSpeed, Mark Goldbridge and Mr Beast. And do so for the financial advancement of the Global Game’s precious grassroots.
Every professional footballer on Pele’s Earth has to make themselves available for impromptu Street Football Nutmeg Challenges, played out on authentic, jagged, urban concrete – with graffiti and all in the background.
Players must wear branded and bladed boots, available to buy in league, pro and elite models for €290 in an online shop near you. Brand ambassador Vinnie Jones plays as a wildcard, joining the defensive player and has dispensation to put in Old School Hard Bastard challenges, and also try to ‘kin well nut ya, you mug’ if players are taking too long to do Skills.
The losers are sentenced to ridicule via the live comments section and various other means of internet cruelty. Winners keep going until we find the ultimate baller; the king or queen of football, of sport, of life itself.
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Super Saturday just a minor staging post on the way towards far more sport on TV
WE HAD ‘SUPER Saturday’ last week. So called because of the amount of sport you could, and perhaps did, watch from dawn until way past sundown.
Super is the moniker given by the unambitious; those who lack a true vision for what is possible in this sporting world of ours.
Saturday past was just a staging post on the way to far superior Saturdays, and other days of the week too.
You might see limited time, a finite number of teams and athletes who may get tired or injured. And you might see fans who have lives outside of sport. If so, you are an enemy of high-performance culture and this column is not for you.
Rugby
The club season starts in September. We have Autumn Series and Six Nations running concurrently, with an Ireland tour every June/July – now promoted to the Nations Championship. You have your World Cup every four years, and a Lions Tour in the mix too. I like how you are thinking: August is wide open.
If we didn’t schedule another tournament there we’d be negligent when it comes to Growing the Game. As things stand there seems to be a fortnight in early August when players recover from knocks and drink the odd shandy before pre-season commences. A waste of a window, indeed.
The solution is stunningly obvious: Le United PREM Top 38 – a series of playoffs between the sides that finished first v first down through second v second until last v merde. All games will be staged in emerging rugby powerhouse nations, in different stadia around China, Saudi Arabia and Texas. There will always be a game to watch, if we follow the traditional 24-hour clock. If it happens to be hot, non-half-time electrolyte drink breaks will be accommodated in the interests of Player Welfare.
The fans, how could we forget about the fans? AI assistants will be provided to help you keep on top of your rugby WhatsApp groups while you watch the games (some that you missed on x3 speed to make time to watch the next Big Match).
Before long, there will be humanoid robots to do household chores and take care of family admin. It’s hardly the Team of Us if half of Us are bringing the children to the playground or going for a walk on the beach or something. You need to be on the couch drinking the official zero zero affiliated lager, roaring on Your Team. Believe.
All proceeds from the extra games will go towards nourishing the grassroots of the sport.
GAA
On the face of it, 13 into 12 doesn’t go, with a county season that starts on January minus one and ends up with club finals in late January of the next year.
But there are opportunities still for us all to be Where We All Belong for more rather than less of our time. You’ve heard of the NBA and the NFL, yeah? You’ve heard of Christmas games? You’ve heard of the Railway Cup – what proper GAA man or woman hasn’t? You’ve heard of the reopened dome in Connacht, a testament to the Association’s indefatigable spirit against the forces of nature which once dictated we take a couple of months off while it pisses wind and rain?
Put them all together and you don’t need to have a brain to rival an FRC member to know the Nollaig Shona Tent of Plenty of Interpro Compromised Rules Pre-Spring Classics is a no-brainer. We may as well get the Aussies and Scots involved alongside the provinces in case they have a boring, quiet Christmas planned.
Matches will start at 6am, once Santy has been and gone. Family comes first. Then games will be screened for your on-couch entertainment right up until the last Quality Street has been sucked from the tin and you’re little but a bloated but satisfied supporter, with a greatly improved grasp of the native language than you started 25 December with. Yes, games will be screened back-to-back-to-back on TG4 – those lads will go anywhere, any day – up until the point that a lot of people want to watch, from when it will be on GAA Plus (which is superb value compared to other pay-per-view services in other, some might say morally inferior, sports).
All profits will go back to the clubs and communities that make you who you are, in your DNA, in the GAA, in your very genome my fellow Gael. We are nothing without our clubs and volunteers who do savage work at underage with the future stars of the Nollaig Shona Tent of Plenty of Interpro Compromised Rules Pre-Spring Classics.
Soccer
Why are you even reading this? Reading anything longer than 140 characters? Is there not a match on? If the World Cup is over, there must be a pre-season tournament with a trophy the size of a small car that you could be looking at – from the comfort of your couch? If there has been a lapse between of greater than 45 minutes, then could you not have gone onto one of the social apps to meme a rival fanbase?
Some people can’t be helped. They need more, The Ballon More.
If the Ballon D’or was successful in establishing that football is more than a team sport, more than a cooperative but a stage for One Great Man to achieve and play and maybe even live forever. Then it was perhaps a little exclusive. The Ballon More, More, More seeks to include all players on the planet in a 24-7 YouTube series of Skills challenges, hosted in rotating eight-hour shifts by IShowSpeed, Mark Goldbridge and Mr Beast. And do so for the financial advancement of the Global Game’s precious grassroots.
Every professional footballer on Pele’s Earth has to make themselves available for impromptu Street Football Nutmeg Challenges, played out on authentic, jagged, urban concrete – with graffiti and all in the background.
Players must wear branded and bladed boots, available to buy in league, pro and elite models for €290 in an online shop near you. Brand ambassador Vinnie Jones plays as a wildcard, joining the defensive player and has dispensation to put in Old School Hard Bastard challenges, and also try to ‘kin well nut ya, you mug’ if players are taking too long to do Skills.
The losers are sentenced to ridicule via the live comments section and various other means of internet cruelty. Winners keep going until we find the ultimate baller; the king or queen of football, of sport, of life itself.
That person gets to take a day off.
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24 hour party people GAA growth mindset Rugby Soccer