DRUNK WORLD CUP STARS ..WE'VE SEEN IT ALL BEFOAR!
Bob Shields
20 March 2007, Daily Record
I HAVE to confess that my initial excitement over the Rounders World Cup over in the coconut countries has already begun to wane. Poor Scotland took an early humping - albeit to the Aussies - and I got fed up looking at failed England players being paid to bask in the sunshine and pass comment on the current crop of failed England players. Only Ireland's plucky win over Pakistan inspired to me to stay on alone in the pub and buy another drink. But that moment has been soured by the tragic death of the Pakistan team coach, Bob Woolmer.
But what's this? The England team out on the pina coladas at the local reggae club until the wee small hours? Vice-captain Andrew Flintoff all at sea and heading for Mexico, lying pissed in a pedalo? Some of the local girls inviting England's finest for a bit of hair-braiding under a moonlit palm frond? Now THAT'S what a World Cup is all about.
In fact, it was Scotland who invented this type of intense pre-match preparation. The only difference was that the sport was football, the venue was the Clyde not the Caribbean and little Jimmy Johnstone was in a rowing boat heading for Arran before his team mates sobered up enough to rescue him. Of course, we can laugh about the winger's maritime exploits now, but the old soccer sages will claim it wasn't funny at the time.
That's where I beg to differ. It WAS funny at the time. And even though Jinky couldn't swim and became the first Celtic player to be registered as a danger to shipping, nobody got hurt. In fact, after a lot of 'tut-tutting' from the SFA beaks, it probably did team bonding the world of good. Sadly for Andrew Flintoff - or Freddie or whatever he calls himself - the repercussions have been more severe, and a lot more childish than the high jinx that caused the row in the first place.
The gin-swigging blazers from Lords are only enjoying a monthlong jolly in the sunshine thanks to the sweat of guys like Andrew in the first place and they didn't seem to mind Flintoff drinking his socks off when he helped win the blessed Ashes for them just 18 months ago. When they toured London in that open-topped bus, champagne fuelled Freddie didn't know if it was anew ball or New Year. But, of course, that was just his natural "high spirits". Sadly, there was no place for such "high spirits" the night after an opening defeat by New Zealand.
The blazers stripped him of his vice-captaincy and dropped him from the team to play Canada yesterday. Which means they didn't give a full toss about the people who helped pay their fares to the West Indies - the England cricket fans.
If the 'Barmy Army' are anything like the Tartan Army, some will have saved up for years to travel 5000 miles see their country play in the World Cup. To put out a side devoid of its star player, just to make a meaningless point about future team discipline was, to use a cricketing phrase, well wide. Too bad the entire squad lacked the bails to announce "No Flintoff - no team". That would have led to immediate expulsion from the World Cup and the toffs in blazers flying home three weeks earlier than they told their wives to expect them. You would have heard the spluttering in their gins from as far away as Key West.
Hopefully, this World Cup has more off-field excitement to come. Maybe the trophy will get stolen - like England in1966 - then sniffed out from under a coconut by a local pooch. Michael Vaughan might be accused of stealing a bracelet - like Bobby Moore in 1970 - from the hotel jewellery shop. But let's hope nobody does a Willie Johnston and fails a drug test like he did in Argentina in 1978.
I can see the headlines now - "England Star in World Cup Ganja Shame!" We wouldn't wish that on our worst enemy - would we? '
----------------
"The Rounders World Cup" - hahaha