Articles with georgiawales

FATIALOFA FOREVER

Today will hopefully be the last horribly humid day of the year. However, I did say that last week…and the week before that. The Japanese summer takes no prisoners; just stepping outside or sitting at home will leave you dripping in sweat. The temperature hasn’t dropped below 20 in months. But now it’s over…hopefully.

In the rugby yesterday, Wales delivered a sensational first half performance, running in four tries to put the match to bed early. Georgia managed to tie the second half thanks to a couple of tries of their own, but it proved to be little more than a consolation.

Today, Russia are back in action, just four days after they opened the World Cup against Japan. This kind of scheduling is disappointing, as you are only really supposed to play rugby once a week on medical grounds.

Aside from the health considerations, it’s also a big disadvantage to the team forced into this schedule and Japan were the most obvious victims of this at the last World Cup.

After their legendary victory over South Africa, they only had four days to recover before their other crunch game against Scotland, which unsurprisingly ended in a heavy defeat.

England will also be affected on Thursday and they have already announced that they will be making 10 changes to their starting 15.

Hopefully, more thought will go into the scheduling of the next tournament.

Russia would be unlikely to beat Samoa in any case, however. Samoa, or Western Samoa as they were called back in 1991, were a big reason I got into rugby during the first World Cup I watched.

One of the most enduring memories I have of the tournament is of their surprise victory over Wales that qualified them for the last eight.

Peter Fatialofa (Fats) was the captain of the team back then and, quite fantastically, specialised in moving pianos when he wasn’t on the pitch. With his enormous frame it wasn’t hard to see why.

On searching what he was up to today, I was saddened to discover that he had passed away at the age of 54 in 2013. Happily, he had been made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit by the Queen prior to that in 1996.

This year, he was posthumously inducted into World Rugby’s Hall of Fame, a fitting tribute to the man.

RIP Papali’itele Peter Momoe Fatialofa.

Yesterday’s Matches
Wales 43-14 Georgia (Toyota Stadium, Toyota)

Today’s Match
Russia vs Samoa (1915 JST) (Kumagaya Rugby Stadium, Kumagaya)

Expression of the day
蒸し暑いですね (mushi atsui desu ne)
Which means…
It’s rather humid, wouldn’t you say?

Previous Day Next Day


TYPHOON TAPAH

Typhoon Tapah (no 17 of the season) has bisected Japan and South Korea, passing along the Korea/Tsushima Strait and into the East Sea/Sea of Japan. There’s not space to get into the naming dispute here, but you should use the former names if you’re in South Korea and the latter when in Japan.

As is the norm, the cyclone has caused a great deal of transport disruption, although it seems not to have been a particularly damaging one as typhoons go. If you live in Japan, you can expect twenty or so a year, but only a handful will probably hit closely enough to affect you personally and it normally is just a matter of staying indoors.

That’s why I found comments made by Eddie Jones (England head coach) about how England were prepared to deal with the effects of the previous typhoon puzzling. He lived in Japan, so he should have known that the chances of them seriously affecting his team’s preparation were small to non-existent. It just seemed alarmist for the sake of it.

Having said that, the big ones can do a lot of damage: overturning vehicles, ripping off roofs, causing landslides and flooding that all can lead to the loss of life.

I’m into my fifth typhoon season here but it was not until the fourth, when Shizuoka took a couple of direct hits, that they were truly alarming on a personal level. It’s a rather unpleasant feeling when your apartment block is swaying like a ship and you’re watching your washing rock back and forth in the middle of your room…and your room is on the eighth floor.

Returning to rugby, there was a dearth of close contests yesterday. Italy got over an early scare before asserting themselves in a high scoring clash with Namibia. After that, Ireland and England comprehensively shut out Scotland and Tonga respectively. Both winners can feel they’ve put down a marker for the rest of the tournament. Italy might need to shore up their defence.

Today’s match is the first in Toyota as the land of my fathers, Wales, take on Georgia, a team I watched twice while I was living there. I’m expecting a very physical battle between two countries renowned for power and strength, although it’s hard to look beyond Wales for the win.

Yesterday’s Matches
Italy 47-22 Namibia (Hanazono Rugby Stadium, Osaka)
Ireland 27-3 Scotland (International Stadium, Yokohama)
England 35-3 Tonga (Sapporo Dome, Sapporo)

Today’s Match
Wales vs Georgia (1915 JST) (Toyota Stadium, Toyota)

Expression of the day
風が強いですね (kaze ga tsuyoi desu ne)
Which means…
It’s fairly windy, isn’t it!

Previous Day Next Day