Actually I know where you're coming from there Terry. I also went to a few games at the last World Cup and I actually enjoyed myself more at the games not involving the Wallabies by not having an emotional attachment to the game. It was more having a passion for the game & soaking up the atmosphere without having the passion for a particular team.
Having thought about it a bit more, they both work for differing reasons.
I also think my passion for the Reds has diminished a tad since the championship. I hope like hell that they can repeat it but I no longer feel as downcast if they don't. I'm finding my passion to attend games has dropped. I think that has more to do with the artificial atmosphere they try to create at pro games these days. I don't need the music or a bloke telling, nay screaming at me through a microphone about when I should be cheering the team on, it's a turnoff.
Hi ya Pen
gee, maybe there is another thread in some of your points. Man, do I hate the trend of recent years for this almost desperate urge 'for the crowd to be entertained at all times at all costs'. It's like there is this pathological need that not one second go by without having 'something' fill the gap. It probably comes from the silly twenty twenty cricket. You know, the first date syndrome. "Oh, there was just this two second period where nothing was said, it is all going so horribly. She does not like me, so I must say/do anything to ensure another two seconds of silence does not occur again'. So at the 20-20 we gotta have the dancing girls in their pom pom outfits doing a jig every time a six happens. Nauseating.
Good for the kiddies tho, the five second concentration span of the facebook generation.
No, when the game stops for a minute or so, why not let the crowd discuss what they have seen, dissect what has happened etc? Instead, we HAVE to have the ground announcer play some disjointed fifteen seconds of (god help me) some bloody horrible Queen song (if I ever hear we will rock you again I am sure I'll vomit). And it's not even as if they are 'venerating' the song, it suddenly get's cut off in mid sentence anyway!
And the sheer VOLUME at those world cup games!!! The second the whistle went for half time, 110 dbs at least, Heinekin ads blaring at you non stop. You had to yell to the person next to you to even be heard. How do you discuss what you have seen at the 'most important rugby competition' that only happens every four years and you go across the world to watch?
I hated it so much I actually started giving tickets away and watched the games in the pubs nearby instead! I doubt I will ever go to game again (tho I am keen to go to the local central west games and get back to the grass roots, meet the fellow enthusiasts, no PA system at the grounds)
So going to the RWC in england interests me, but only if the family go on a canal trip and stop every few miles for a day, head off the those three hundred year old pubs and watch the broadcasts with the locals, soak up the atmosphere that way. Going to the games themselves is for mugs. IMO of course.
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