Periodically noxious rugby scribe Stephen Jones may sniff at this country's 'fluffy' rugby, but he seems to appreciate our commentators.
In the Welshman's irregular column on rugbyrugby.com, he named Keith Quinn to lead his dream commentary squad and said he wouldn't rank the other Kiwi callers that far behind.
But the Bok
and Murray Mexted got a good taste of the Jones' lash, "frankly, if I were watching South African TV I'd turn the sound off. And remember dear old Don Clarke droning on daily in 1995 ... made Murray Mexted sound like Bill McLaren".
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Former drop kicking All Black number 8 Zinzan Brooke has produced one of the more merciless reasons to retain the cannon fodder countries at the cup - just enjoy giving them the bash.
" ... once I crossed that white line I played flat out and loved giving the lesser teams a thumping," he wrote in his column for the BBC. "We would simply try to beat teams by as many points as we could. I think that helped the minnows. It showed them respect and made them realise they would have to go back to the training ground and work really hard to compete with us".
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Little Aussie battlers at some little West Australian schools have been banned from playing rugby during interval, lunchtime and even little play. Teachers are worried the breakout of cup generated rugby enthusiasm will end in tears after one too many ruck and mauls.
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A ND finally ... 10 reasons to be less worried about England
1. It was only South Africa, the wooden spooners of the Tri Nations.
2. If South Africa's early kicks had gone over it could have been very different.
3. England couldn't construct a try.
4. Some of their forwards are starting to act their age.
5. Their very relief at avoiding the All Blacks in the quarter-finals exposes deep Tim Henman-like frailties.
6. World Cup referees are watching their professional fouls.
7. Jonny Wilkinson (goalkicks apart) showed he is far from perfect
8. Put under pressure they "fumbled and bumbled" (M. Johnson).
9. They're all so possessed they'll need medication and will fail doping tests.
10. Their high-tech jerseys are coming apart at the seams. An omen?
