So it’s the last week in June, and Thursday will mark 20 years since the 2002 FIFA World Cup Final, when Brazil, spearheaded by the original fallible demigod Ronaldo and his iconic haircut, sank Germany 2-0 in Yokohama, becoming the first country to win the World Cup 5 times, and the first team to win all 7 of their matches in a World Cup.

Change my mind, that Brazilian team of the early 2000s was the most talented international team of the 21st century, simply because of the Four Rs of Ronaldinho, Roberto Carlos, Rivaldo and Ronaldo, then you throw in Cafu as captain, Middlesborough cult hero Juninho, Gilberto Silva, one-time Manchester United key singing Kleberson, and a future Ballon d’Or winner in Kaka was an unused substitute for most of the tournament.

Still, Ronaldo had that thing on his head to distract the world from the fact that he had a groin injury…. It turned into one of the greatest haircuts in the history of football.

It’s amazing to think that since 2002, Brazil hasn’t reached another World Cup Final, nor has any South American team won the tournament, with Argentina in 2014 coming the closest.

I think we can pinpoint the exact moment the slide began for that Brazilian team…

Roberto Carlos tying his shoes when he was supposed to be marking Thierry Henry during a Zidane free kick in the 2006 World Cup Quarter Final in Frankfurt.

After that, the fear factor of playing Brazil just drifted into history.

It is late on a Tuesday night

Dion Prestia is still lying concussed on the MCG, and the umpires haven’t bothered to stop the game to let the trainers take him off.

Iga Swiatek now has the longest WTA winning streak since the year 2000 & the 21st Century

In fact, the last time Iga lost a match, Ash Barty was still a month away from retiring.

It’s four days out from the Super Netball Grand Final and despite the match being in Perth and having belted the Vixens two weeks earlier, I am absolutely certain the West Coast Fever will find a way to lose in a heartbreaker

Because between the entire existence of the Perth Orioles, the 2018 Grand Final defeat at home, the 2020 Grand Final defeat to the Vixens, and the Salary Cap breaches in 2020 that probably would’ve resulted in the Fever having that Premiership stripped if they’d won, nothing good has ever happened to professional netball in Perth or WA.

There’s a few parallels between Games 1 and 2 of the 2019 and 2022 State of Origin

1. Queensland win Game 1 in something of an upset

2. Brad Fittler makes wholesale changes after botching the Blues team in Game I, 2 Blues players make their debuts in Game II

3. Game 2 is at Optus Stadium in Perth.

4. New South Wales win by 32 points

5. Queensland go scoreless in the 2nd Half

6. Jake Trbojevic leads a dominant Blues forward pack

7. New South Wales won the penalty count, the total amount of penalties was 13

And that’s where it ends, because unlike 2019, Game III will be at the Graveyard known as Lang Park in front of a wild Maroons crowd, so I suppose we’ll see in 2 weeks if the series ends with a try in the last minute to the home team.

Got ‘me’ name in the paper!

Always great to be named in The West Australian, alongside white collar criminals, shonky builders, West Coast Eagles puff pieces and jilted Mark McGowan stories, and I think this means I’ve had more mentions in The West Australian this week than the Fremantle Football Club.

Yes so the story behind that is I played in the Three Bowls Pairs at Manning on Saturday after smuggling into the draw with the wise old owl Bob Connell (Who I’ve spoken to many times since I took up competitive bowls) as the 16th and final pair on Friday afternoon, and we had a good start to the afternoon, winning the 1st Game 10-9 in the last end after an almighty arm-wrestle, after which we played the dangerous duo of Bob The Builder and Honeybun, who had easily defeated Steve The President and Neil The Men’s Captain 14-5, and for 5 ends it was looking like a high scoring epic as we were tied 6 shots apiece…

But after that, as the sun went down and the air got colder, Bob and myself kept landing shot after shot, while Honeybun had a really off game, and unlike his catchphrase, Bob The Builder couldn’t fix it, and we absolutely romped away by winning 7 out of the last 8 ends (Including a 13-0 run) to win the game 24-7, capped off by a 5 on the last end when the result was beyond doubt.

So that meant we got 2nd place overall and $30 apiece, and on Monday I went to get The West just so I could gander at the State of Origin stories, and out of curiosity I had a look at the sports results to see if anyone at the club had put the Friday & Saturday pairs results in, and sure enough they had, and I’d got in The West.

But, as they say, it’s all downhill from here.

The Colorado Avalanche dent the Stanley Cup minutes after accepting it

That’s nothing, have they:

A) Left one of their kids in there and found out that he pissed in it

B) Forgot about it and left it on a roadside after replacing a tyre

C) Pissed in it with their teammates

D) Burned a mortgage in it

E) Filled it up with dog food and let their pet eat out of the bowl

or

F) Drop kicked the Cup into a frozen canal

A great horse by the name of Rogan Josh died last week at the age of 29

If you don’t know, Rogan Josh is the last WA-bred horse to win the Melbourne Cup, and he was owned by a colourful Darwin schoolteacher named Wendy Green, aka ‘Wendy in Wonderland’ as Bart Cummings would nickname her, who bought the gelding for a mere $13,000, and originally had him trained by the Bunbury-based Colin Webster, who trained Josh to wins in the Bunbury & Pinjarra Cups, and a narrow 2nd placing to King of Saxony in the ’99 Perth Cup.

Where the story becomes a classic is that Wendy had dinner with Bart in Darwin and somehow convinced Bart, through his foreman in Melbourne, to train Rogan Josh and aim him at a Melbourne Cup, despite the fact that he wasn’t anything flash when it came to breeding, but after some convincing, and the fact he’d run 2nd in the Perth Cup and proven he could run a good 2 miles, Bart accepted him.

So that Spring, Rogan Josh started at 250/1 to win the Melbourne Cup in futures markets, but his odds were smashed after winning the Herbert Power Stakes, then he faded and ran 4th to Sky Heights in the Caulfield Cup a week later, by which point he was into 15/1 and guaranteed a Cup start with 50kg, and he was crunched again into 6/1 second favourite after winning the Mackinnon Stakes on Derby Day in a race record time.

Then, come Cup Day, Bart and Wendy in Wonderland, who did a 7,500km round trip from Darwin to Melbourne, pulled off another great chapter in Melbourne Cup history as the late Johnny Marshall piloted Josh to victory in a driving finish against Central Park, to give Bart his 11th of 12 Melbourne Cups.

Fun fact, Rogan Josh was the last horse to win the arduous Mackinnon-Melbourne Cup double, before the Mackinnon was moved to Stakes Day in 2016.

As a tribute to Rogan Josh, here’s what Richard Freedman said about the gelding’s chances for the Melbourne Cup after he ran 4th in the Caulfield Cup – I’m pretty sure he’s referring to the fact that Ken Callander said Rogan Josh could win the Cup.

So there you go, Rogan Josh, the country galloper that went from humble beginnings to winning the biggest race in the country, thanks to the magic touch of James Bartholomew Cummings.

Jodie Burrage stopping the match at Wimbledon for a sick ball boy

It’s tough being a Japanese manufacturer in MotoGP

First of all, Suzuki decided to pull the rug out and leave the sport at the end of 2022, which has seen their results go down shit creek, with 3 double DNFs in 5 races.

Next, in the German Grand Prix two weekends ago, Honda were already in the doldrums without Marc Marquez, and the next painful chapter was that they didn’t have a bike in the points for the first time since the 1982 French Grand Prix (Which Honda boycotted due to dangerous track conditions), ending a scoring streak of 633 races, in which time they’d won 21 Premier Class titles.

And this weekend, with both factory bikes crashing out (Fabio Quartararo and Franco Morbidelli), Darryn Binder destroying his bike and Andrea Dovizioso finishing 16th, Yamaha were out of the points for the first time since the 1985 Dutch TT, when every Yamaha bike on the grid crashed out.

It does seem ironic that both Honda and Yamaha’s streaks would end at the tracks where they’re historically strong, given Honda won every MotoGP race in Germany from 2010 to 2021, and Yamaha has the most wins at Assen in the MotoGP era.

Looking at some of the other manufacturer scoring streaks, it looks like KTM now have the second-longest streak, going back to Aragon 2018, Aprilia’s streak only goes back to Valencia last year, while the only time Ducati have never scored a point since entering MotoGP in 2003 was the 2003 French Grand Prix, when they only had the 2 factory bikes and Loris Capirossi and Troy Bayliss both crashed out in the first part of a rain-affected race.

In fact, the last time Ducati didn’t have a bike in the Top 10 was the 2006 Portugese Grand Prix at Estoril.

So yes, while Ducati probably won’t win the Riders’ Championship they so badly covet, considering their leading rider is Johann Zarco some 58 points behind Quartararo in 3rd place, thanks to having 8 bikes with at least 1 finishing on the podium every race, they’re on track to win the Constructors’ Championship by Aragon in September.

I think that gag at the end of the KISS show in Vienna was caused by Gene Simmons appearing in too many TABTouch commercials in Australia

Of course, this is the possibly intentional gag that we’re referring to, as Kiss performed in the Austrian capital of Vienna, a place renowned globally as an Ultravox song, and the home of unique creatures like kangaroos and Russell Crowe:

As the title of this segment suggests, I think it’s possible that Gene Simmons simply got confused about Austria & Australia due to the fact that he’s spent too long filming ads for TABTouch that have gone to air in WA and on Sky Racing, and if you haven’t had the pleasure of seeing them, here’s what I’m referring to: