NRL 2010 - Round Three: The Raiders Fall from Grace

I wish I played for the Cossacks... or dressed up as their mascot...

Hello and welcome to the Tip'O'Drome for NRL Round 3. I honestly can't think of anything of interest that's happened during the week - I can't decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing. According to reports, Sonny Bill Williams is looking to rejoin the NRL. I would love to see the big guy back here trying to resurrect his career, and after being rejected by every single club in Australia, packing my groceries at Woolworths. And if that fucker squashes my bread, I'm going to fucking crowbar the shit out of him.

Round Three awaits!

Wests Tigers v Parramatta Eels
I don’t rate the Tigers much this year, which is sad, because I certainly do like saying the word ‘tiger.’ I’m going to back the Eelies to win, based mainly on my hatred of Lote Tuqiri, who has come back from ‘the game they play in heaven’ about 80kgs overweight. I guess the ‘running game’ doesn’t necessarily require an awful lot of running.

St George Illawarra Dragons v North Queensland Cowboys
The Dragons will piss this in. The Cowboys just don’t seem interested in playing these days. It’s fine when I don’t feel like doing much work at my office, because I can just sit on the net or write awesome blog entries and no one really cares (or notices), but when the Cowboys decide they’re going to phone in a day at work, it doesn’t quite work out that well.

Penrith Panthers v Melbourne Storm
The last time I was attacked by a wild panther in the jungles of Borneo, I won quite easily and was a little disappointed with the lackluster efforts of the big cat. The last time I was in a storm, I got quite wet. Storm to triumph this weekend.

Manly Sea Eagles v Newcastle Knights
Ummmm… Manly. I don’t know why, I just have one of those feelings deep within my belly button. I know, it sickens me as well. Manly. Yuck.

Gold Coast Titans v Canberra Raiders
I know I should tip the Raiders, but after a good win last week, they’ll be thinking they’re giant killers and will turn up to the game a little bit pissed after spending way too long at Cocktails n Dreams drinking vodka slushies and abusing underage girls.

Brisbane Broncos v Warriors
Broncos. I think the Warriors have probably already won more than they expected to all year.

Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs v Sydney Roosters
The Dogs SUCK SOOO BAD. They are seriously shit. I wouldn’t tip them even if their table service was excellent and they gave me free garlic bread. Fucking Roosters to win.

Cronulla Sharks v South Sydney Rabbitohs
I’m tipping the Bunnies to finally fucking beat someone. If they can’t get their arse into gear to beat the Sharks, then there’s no help for them at all and they should be forced to watch that really shit Russell Crowe film where he drinks a lot of wine and spends way too much time reminiscing about his life when he was Freddie Highmore.

Good luck, tipsters!

Broom broom!

Every time I open a newspaper these days, there are a thousand stories about a Toyota that’s developed some kind of glitch whereby the ABS brakes aren’t bluetoothed to the CPU and therefore the cruise control onboard computer isn’t responding to the manual override commands. Invariably, this means that the car is sent into hyperdrive down a freeway and crashes into a large metal pole. If that was your car, I’d say that such an event would pretty much ruin your day and possibly your pants.

This would never have happened in my day. With my first car, if something in it broke down, it didn’t move. It didn’t grow artificial intelligence and attempt to kill me, it didn’t lock into a GPS signal to try and destroy a government facility, and it didn’t develop self-awareness and a sense of loathing and drive itself off a cliff to end the pain and torture of its own existence. It just didn’t move. The last time I drove it, the radiator blew up and the it shuddered to a steaming halt of not-moving-car-ness. The brakes still worked but the accelerator didn’t; kind of the way God intended it to be.

When you get your licence, you should also get a 1986 Ford Laser. A hatchback with a faded paint job, key marks down the sides, a de-mister that doesn’t work, a tape-deck and a fucked-up driver’s side door lock that requires you to get in through the passenger side. It has a top speed of around 130kph, but anything over 110 makes a horrible noise in the engine and the car begins to shake violently. There are no voice-activated CD changers, no moisture-sensitive windscreen-wipers to clear the rain, no space-aware braking mechanisms, no automatic height-adjusting mirrors, no computer-memorised seat positions, no auto-correct steering and no collision-detecting sensors – this is a car that you have to fucking learn how to drive before you hit the road. God forbid your tilt-sensitive coffee holder misfires and spills your soy mocha latte.

NRL 2010 Round 2 - Canberra's Revenge

These two legends showing us the Raiders' home and away jerseys pop up about 50 times when I type 'NRL 2010' into the Googlebox. I'm not sure why they need a different 'away' strip, as no other team would contemplate lime green as a colour.

Yes, I know it’s been a long time since my last non-footy-tips-related post. There’s some radness coming, trust me.

Chill, Winston.

Round one may not have quite gone to plan, but I blame that on the teams I tipped, rather than my tipping. They let me down, the bastards.

Dragons vs Bulldogs
Well the Doggies did what doggies do best last week – licked their own balls. I have hated them for a while and that’s not going to change anytime soon. St George to win by about six thousand.

Rabbits vs Titans
It’s the CLASH OF THE TITANS and the Rabbitohs. The Titans are kind of named after the Titanic, which was kind of named after the Titans, which were defeated by the Olympic gods, none of which played rugby league for the Bunnies. Ergo, henceforth, thus, the Titans will probably win.

Warriors vs Sharks
Jay La’gaia is on Home and Away and may be hooking up with someone who is way too young for him (I saw it on an ad). This should be enough to inspire the mighty Kiwis to dominate the hapless Cronullas.

Knights vs Storm
It was a dark and stormy knight… and the storm won.

Cowboys vs Panthers
I lay in bed awake last night and contemplated what would happen if a cowboy actually had to fight a panther. Would he lasso it and hog tie it and spit tobacco and eat pork and beans? Or would he be killed and dragged into a tree and eaten later on? It was a tough choice, and it gave me nightmares. In the end, I think the popular choice would be for Willie Mason to be eaten by a large jungle cat, so I’m running with that.

Eels vs Sea Eagles
Manly failed to impress anyone (even their wives, girlfriends and rape victims) last week, and with their only good player out for six months due to a broken leg, impending jail time and a nasty case of syphilis, the Parramattas should have no trouble in coming away with the points here.

Roosters vs Tigers
I hate it when the Roosters play well. It’s probably the worst thing in the world – worse than floods and famines and earthquakes and disease and Miley Cyrus (I watched my first Hannah Montana episode last week and was left utterly confused by its popularity, somewhat bewildered by how deep her voice is, overjoyed with the reappearance of Billy Ray Cyrus, and bemused by the ugly seven-year old Puerto-Rican kid who claimed to be a ladies’ man and proved this by line dancing), but I’m tipping them anyway.

Raiders vs Broncos
At lunch, Australia are 93/1 against New Zealand. Katich is looking in great touch and Ponting is scratching around like the venereal disease that he is, and should fall to Vettori very soon. Raiders to win by an embarrassingly large amount.

Flip em and tip em!

Round 1 - NRL 2010. WOOT!

This is definitely a ball.

The league season kind of snuck up on me this year, struth be told, but I’m here once again to guide you through the ins and outs of who to tip for 2010.

The first week of a season is a lottery – no one really knows what the teams will be like, and watching the Footy Show last night sure hasn’t helped, as everyone was given the same memo: “Yeah, [new player’s nickname] is really fitting in well here. [New player’s nickname] brings [youth/experience] to the team and he’s really excited to be a part of the club. [New player’s nickname] is really looking forward to having a great season, and our team will rely a lot on [new player’s nickname].”

My hot tips: Cronulla to win the spoon, Storm to win the premiership (again) and the Raiders will not do too much to bother anyone. The Roosters will have a fucking dismal season and everyone in the Titans will get arrested for separate incidents. Willie Mason will do nothing like he has for the last 20 years of his career, Braith Anasta will also continue his fine run of uselessness, Todd Carney will get into a lot more trouble, since he is in a much bigger place with way more people to rape and piss on and a whole new city in which to get drunk and bashed. Whoever’s coaching the Broncos will get fired, and Lockyer will take over as captain/coach and retire because he's not good at being either.

Eels vs Dragons
I’m tipping the Eels, because I hate them slightly less than I hate St George. That's all.

Broncos vs Cowboys
Remember how last year, the Raiders beat the Broncos by 60 points? That was awesome. But they’ll win this game.

Bulldogs vs Knights
Welcome to Struggletown, population: Knights. I remember when they were good. It actually wasn’t that long ago. I like their jumper, at least.

Panthers vs Raiders
I’m not tipping against my beloveds this year, so this should be the first step in a year of walks in the park for the Green Machine. Bet your house on it (but only if you have another house to live in first. It would be a shame if you ended up homeless because of my tips, and I'd feel slightly guilty about it).

Sharks vs Storm
I’m pretty sure even the Sharks players aren’t expecting too much from this season, and they should be soundly belted by the Mexicans.

Titans vs Warriors
It’s the CLASH OF THE TITANS… and the Warriors. It’s Friday arvo, and I haven’t heard about any kind of massive police movement at the Titans’ training session, so I’m assuming they’re all ready to play. And they will win. Because the Warriors are no good.

Rabbitohs vs Roosters
If there’s not about seventy fights in this game, it’d be a wasted opportunity. In between fisticuffs, the Rabbits should overpower the overpaid, overrated, underachieving Bondi boys.

Tigers vs Sea Eagles
This could actually be a good game. But because it involves Manly, they’ll ruin it somehow (by turning up, probably). My money is on the Tiges to win, but it’ll be a close one (72-68).

If you can’t grip it, don’t tip it! Until next week…