It goes beyond any reasonable comprehension as to how on earth the World Rugby bosses resolved to award the hosting right of the 2023 IRB World Cup to France at the expense of South Africa, whose initial bid was unanimously hailed spotless.
As a Namibian and patriotic African, yours truly is not disappointed and shocked, I’m shivering like a fired-up ‘boere orkes’ from uncontrollable anger, to say the least.
France, which hosted the global showpiece in 2003 and 2007, got the nod ahead of South Africa, despite their initial bid being rated second best to South Africa’s juicy bid in the evaluation report.
South Africa hosted the IRB World Cup and 1995, which they narrowly won at their first attempt in an electrifying final against Jonah Lomu’s inspired All Blacks at the packed-to-rafters Ellis Park Stadium in Johannesburg via the educated boot of flyhalf Joel Stransky, whose last-minute dropped goal gifted the Springboks an historic victory over the tournament’s hot favourites.
International World Rugby’s decision to award the hosting rights to France is a serious travesty of justice and boils down to cowardice, hypocrisy and misdirection of the highest order in regard to its own subjects.
Rugby should take a leaf out the playbook of international football and learn a trick or two about the genuine practice of democracy and fair play.
Truth be told, the methodology of the voting pattern does not make any sense at all, because the majority of European affiliates are always likely to gang up in a desperate effort to swing decisions in their own favour.
It was a three-horse race between South Africa, France and Ireland and when the latter dropped out in the first round it was obvious their vote would be channeled to their cousin – a practice that defeats the spirit of fairness that left poor South Africa to pick up the pieces.
The International World Rugby should rethink the methodology of awarding hosting rights and introduce a rotational format if they are to level the playing field and avoid creating unwanted animosity amongst member nations.
The evaluation report stated clearly that the rainbow nation should be awarded the hosting rights following an impressive overall rating of 78.97 in comparison to France’s 75.88 and Ireland’s tally of 72.25.
Kudos to Brave Warriors
Yours truly has been following with utmost disgust and dismay comments on social media about the Brave Warriors’ convincing 3-1 victory over Zimbabwe to claim the Dr Hage Geingob Cup.
A significant number of some hot-headed self-proclaimed football pundits, who claim to know the dynamics of the beautiful game resolved to make it their sole beat to criticise the team’s triumph and overall performance on the day.
Some Namibians are shamelessly unpatriotic, as they seem never to be satisfied with their own success and are always out to have a go at the team’s technical department.
Instead of applauding the Warriors’ well-deserved victory, they resolved instead to attack the coach, claiming the team’s composition does not reflects the country’s demographics – forgetting that just because the majority of the Brave Warriors’ playing personnel are from Windhoek-based clubs – these boys are fopr the most part not Windhoekers.
Let us all rally behind the team and give the technical staff and the boys a pat on the back when they doing well, considering Namibia did not have an active competitive football league over the past two years.
I rest my case.