The 2008 Tri-Nations Rugby Union series kicked off today in New Zealand — you may have seen the giant ad for it to the right there — and what better way to get it started than with a big fat haka from the All Blacks? If that doesn’t get your blood pumping a little faster, nothing will. (In case you’re wondering, yes, the Stellenbosch ELVs are being tested this year.)

The boys at MediaZone were nice enough to hook me up with a Rugby Channel account, which I will be testing today. They seem eager to give away a free one-month subscription to the Rugby Channel through this site, so keep an eye on this blog for details.

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Canada is more than happy to participate in just about every major American sports league there is. Baseball? Sure, come on up to Toronto. Basketball? No problem. We’re happy to launch the Raptors and Grizzlies north of the border. Soccer? Hey, we’d love to have Toronto FC in MLS. Look at our crazy fans! Let’s do this in Montreal, too! We love this stuff!

But when the NFL starts making a move into Canada, suddenly, those American interlopers are trying to destroy our Canadian culture! Newspapers are up in arms! Politicians cry out that we must look out for the good for the country! PR people are producing videos like this:

Yeah! This is our league! Keep your league out of our borders, you 100-yard heathens!

You know what? I don’t see you Canadians rushing to pull all your hockey teams out of the NHL and forming your own uniquely Canadian hockey league. I don’t see you trying to build on the success of Toronto FC, the Montreal Impact and the Vancouver Whitecaps and building your own uniquely Canadian soccer league. All you have is a tri-cities championship and an association that can’t pull its head out of its arse. You’re not rushing to kick the Raptors out of Toronto, either, are you?

But no, 3-down, 110-yard football is such a vital part of your heritage, isn’t it? What would we ever do without the Grey Cup?

You’d watch the NFL, that’s what. It’s the same reason so many soccer fans who enjoy the Premier League and EURO 2008 can’t seem to get into MLS games. People want to see the best players play at the highest level, and for the gridiron game, those players aren’t in Canada. They’re in the NFL. That’s why CFL expansion into America failed in the 1990s. We don’t want minor league football in this country, and that’s what most people think the CFL is. The best CFL players almost always move south to the NFL. Most of those players played college football in the USA, anyway. It’s not like they’re switching from rugby union to rugby league or something.

Hey, here’s an idea — why don’t you dump all those Burnside Rules and go back to playing rugby union? That was your gift to America back in 1874, wasn’t it? Then Thrift Burnside came along and took some ideas from Walter Camp, and 100 years later, it constitutes Canadian culture. How fitting.

Here’s another idea — if you’re so worried about the survival of the CFL, Canada, why don’t you go round up some mounties and have them surround the Rogers Centre so that the Buffalo Bills won’t be able to get inside to play there? It won’t happen, Canada, and you know why? Canadian fans want to see the best football players in the world, too. Plus, you’re too chickenshit to build your own national leagues in other major sports. If an NFL team in Toronto destroys the CFL, then maybe the CFL isn’t good enough to stand on its own, eh?

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How strange was it to watch United and the Rhinos face off in a rural, albeit massive soccer complex in Boyds, MD rather than the spacious confines of RFK Stadium in the District? To be able to hear the thud of ball on foot and the shouts between players, rather than merely watch the game from afar and take such sounds for granted?

Two days prior D.C. played the Los Angeles Galaxy and David Beckham in front of 35,979 screaming fans and a nationwide audience on ABC in the sweltering midday heat. On Tuesday that dynamic setting was all but forgotten, as 2,752 mostly-quiet fans settled onto the bleachers and enjoyed the clear, humidity-less summer twilight.

Barra Brava still showed, as did the Screaming Eagles and La Norte, but their numbers measured less in the thousands with drums than in the dozens and a drum.

I understand why, of course. D.C. United has bigger fish to fry than the U.S. Open Cup. The million-dollar SuperLiga is a week and a half away, the CONCACAF Champions League is just around the corner, and this team really wants to win MLS Cup this year. Plus, rent for RFK Stadium can’t be cheap, and the Rochester Rhinos aren’t going to pull nearly as many Screaming Eagles as Posh’s husband. (That’s why the New York Red Bulls never schedule home games for the Open Cup. Renting out Giants Stadium for a crowd of 5,000 just doesn’t make financial sense. Better to throw out the reserves in Baltimore against Crystal Palace USA and get out quick.)

On the other hand, the Chicago Fire are traveling to D.C. next Tuesday in what will be the marquee match of the Open Cup quarterfinals. This game will also be played at Maryland SoccerPlex instead of RFK. I suspect that was a precautionary measure, just in case they drew Crystal Palace. Still, the Fire brought 18,000+ to RFK Stadium in May, and last month’s match in Toyota Park was a testy affair in which 9-man United undid 10-man Chicago in stoppage time. Doesn’t it seem like D.C. United v. Chicago Fire deserves a slightly bigger stage than this?

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That’s when he throws Claudio Lopez into the game and tells him to start pushing forward. One goal and one bad penalty — which led to Railhawks fans singing, “Who’s your father, who’s your father, who’s your father, referee?” — and suddenly, we’re in extra time. A breakaway goal by the Wizards and another late penalty sealed the deal.

Then the Wizards decided to start a fight in the final minute of stoppage time for no good reason, and they got a Railhawk player sent off for it. None of their players were shown the red card, despite some punches being thrown. Then one of their players capped it off by sending the final free kick of the game into the stands. It appeared he wanted to peg a fan in the head as people were leaving. Classy.

I may not care that much about MLS, but at least I have a team to hate now. Eat shit and die, Wizards. I hope you chimpfuckers rot in the MLS East cellar until the day MLS forces you to move to St. Louis.

*sigh* I’ve had better nights than this…

Anyway, it appears only three USL clubs at the most will make it out of the 3rd round this year. Crystal Palace Baltimore upset the New York Red Bulls, 2-0, much to the consternation of Ives Galarcep, and the Charleston Battery advanced on PKs over the Houston Dynamo. As I type this, the Seattle Sounders are up 1-0 on Chivas USA early in the second half. I’m watching it right now on USLLive.com. I might update this later.

UPDATE: Seattle won, 2-0, which means I’ll be cheering against the Sounders on Thursday and for the Sounders next Tuesday. By the way, I estimate the Railhawks saved about $15,000 by losing tonight, so there’s that.

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Via World Footy News, here’s a clip of the US Revolution, our national Australian Football team, preparing for the International Cup this August in Melbourne. This is part of a larger documentary about the team called Australian Football, American Revolution.

Hey, someone had to film it. ESPN certainly doesn’t give a shit about Australian footy anymore, except for retrospectives and such. “Oooh, look, we even showed Aussie Rules back then. Wasn’t that weird?”

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My Carolina Railhawks managed to shake off a disastrous road trip in which they took 1 point in 4 games and their coach was accused of flipping the bird at Rochester fans, and they pulled out a 1-0 win against USL-2 club Real Maryland to advance to the third round of the U.S. Open Cup, America’s domestic cup competition.

It took a penalty in stoppage time to break the deadlock. That part annoys me. During the offseason, the Railhawks signed the leading scorer in USL-1 and the leading scorer in USL-2, and yet they’ve only scored 13 goals in 14 competitive matches. So why is it that these guys need a penalty in the 90th minute to beat a USL-2 team that has yet to score on the road this season and has an away goal differential of -12? I know there are a lot of fans who would take nothing but 1-0 victories all season, but man, this team really needs to organize its attack a little better…

Still, a win is a win, and we get to play the Kansas City Wizards here in North Carolina next Tuesday. The Wizards are currently the worst non-expansion team in MLS. I think we’ve got a shot… if we ever start putting them in the net like we should.

“All we are saying is give us a goal…”

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Three of the four Group Stage winners at EURO 2008 — Portugal, Croatia and the Netherlands — went out in the quarterfinals last week. The one thing those three teams had in common? They all clinched their groups after two games, then rested their starters for the third to avoid getting anyone else hurt before the Knockout Stage began. Result? They looked tentative and rusty, and their opponents, who all had to must-win third games in the Group Stage, looked sharper and played better.

This same sort of thing seems to happen to the Indianapolis Colts every year, doesn’t it? Most of the time, they clinch the AFC South with a few games to spare, and what does Tony Dungy do? He rests his players to avoid getting any of them injured. Every time he does that, the Colts get bounced out of the playoffs early.

Remember what happened the year the Colts won Super Bowl XLI? Dungy couldn’t rest his players. The Colts had to scrape and claw for playoff position right up until the end of the season, and they didn’t get a bye week in the playoffs, so they had to play right on through. They didn’t lose their edge, and they pushed through until they won it all.

I get that coaches don’t want their players to get hurt, but you know what? Injuries happen in football, and you can’t be scared of them. What’s worse: the risk losing a player to injury in a meaningless game, or the risk of losing your edge because all your players had a game off and bombing out early? This seems even more crucial in a competition as compressed as EURO 2008, which only lasts for a month. Are you telling me that these guys are so out of shape that they can’t play a full six games in 22 days?

So the next time anyone argues for resting players before a knockout stage, point them to the Indianapolis Colts. They’re as good a sign post as anyone here.

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Comedian George Carlin passed away on Sunday, and the world suddenly seems less funny because of it. Nevertheless, we still have his comedic legacy to make us smile, including this classic skit explaining the differences between American football and baseball.

Here’s hoping we always have a place for his stuff.

(Spotted on FanHouse)

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According to The Wizard of Odds, Duke and Louisville struck a deal to play each other every year for four years. Duke backed out of that contract after one year, so Louisville sued them for breach of contract. Duke’s defense? There was a clause in the contract stating that Duke should be fined $150,000 for every year that Louisville can’t find a “team of similar stature” to replace Duke on the schedule. The lawyers then reminded the judge that the Blue Devils have a record of 6-45 over the last five seasons, so just about any other Division I school would meet the “similar stature” clause.

The judge sided with Duke.

Only a school like Duke could take the general disgust everyone else has for them and turn it into a legal defense. Harvey Birdman would be proud.

(Spotted on 850 the Blog)

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That’s me on 850 the Buzz, the local sports radio station, chatting it up about EURO 2008. The clip is from last Friday, so it’s not exactly timely. Still, it is nice to know I’m a go-to guy when it comes to something. Like fart humor, for example.

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Yeo proposes to move two of the struggling Victorian teams, obviously Melbourne and North Melbourne, to the west coast of the USA, say Los Angeles and San Francisco. He surmises, given his own market research, that most Americans have a desire to travel to Australia, have been exposed to Aussie Rules through cable television, and would support AFL teams based on their mainland.

Apparently, Mr. Yeo hasn’t seen any cable television around here lately, or he would know there hasn’t been any AFL on cable since the 1980s. Setanta Sports is only on satellite TV, and only expatriates and die-hard fans with dishes are going to spend $15/month just for their Aussie Rules fix. What makes Yeo think California cities will support AFL clubs any better than Melbourne?

What’s more, the AFL is actually trying to make its league less accessible to America. AFL boss Andrew Demetriou is proposing a twilight AFL Grand Final. So instead of starting Saturday afternoon at the MCG, the biggest annual football event down under would begin around 5:00 PM.

Right now, the Grand Final begins at midnight on the east coast of the U.S. and 9:00 PM on Friday on the west coast. A twilight Grand Final would start at 3:00 A.M. on the east coast and midnight on the west coast. That pretty much eliminates the possibility of watching it live for most people outside of Pacific Time.

So let’s move AFL teams to California, where there’s no stadium capable of holding a game and a fan base too small to fill this imaginary stadium in the first place, while making it impossible for Americans to watch the Australian equivalent of the Super Bowl as it’s happening. Brilliant.

Meanwhile, Tasmanians continue to wave their arms frantically, trying to get the AFL to notice them…

(Spotted on World Footy News)

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So I’m off to the beach this weekend, where I will make a legitimate attempt to tune out football for a couple of days — Hard to do, what with EURO 2008 dominating my brain (and my FanHouse blogging) for the last week.

Before I go, though, I thought I would send you off with this awesome video celebrating Brian McBride’s career at Fulham, which Soccer By Ives shared with us earlier this week. Nothing gets the blood pumping like football highlights set to a Foo Fighters — so long as it’s not “Walking After You,” anyway.

Have fun, folks. I’ll be back on the task on Monday.

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I don’t think it matters what form of football is being watched here. A bunch of guys on the sofa yelling at the TV is a universal thing — especially when they’re loud, crazy Italians. Seriously, why watch football with anyone else? They’ll yell, they’ll curse, they’ll jump around, and then they’ll ask the women in the kitchen when the sauce will be ready.

(Spotted on Soccernista. Welcome back, Garth.)

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