Wales v New Zealand (WWC)

Subject: Wales v New Zealand (WWC)

How is it that the talent to win is repeated, irrespective of gender in certain sports.

I'v been watching the woman's rugby World Cup currently playing in New Zealand between the host nation and Wales. The Black Fern trounced Wales in all departments of the game other than the courage to keep on competing. From half time it was a one way street of try's with NZ converting the set play around the scrum into fluid interlinking backline play, always backing each other up when near the line, always giving the overlap, from which the Welsh were unable to respond. We are used to the male 'All Black' dominance, they are almost mystical in the way they captivate the phases of the game, from the Harka to the last 15 minutes of clinical try scoring.

The girls seem to have captured that mystic from the boys, they feed off the tradition of winning and the way to win. Coached by the best in the world, the tips and technique is there in abundance, the self confidence of a nation that always punches above its weight sitting, so remote in the conflux of the Tasman Sea and the Antarctic Ocean, a mixture of Polynesian and European culture that seems to blend into a polyglot culture.

Woman's rugby has progressed in leaps and bounds now the teams have become professional,  no longer just large ladies trying to emulate large men but rather fit large ladies with the tenacity and physicality that fitness brings, continually putting their bodies on the line, tackle after tackle. It's  is hardly what you expect of this most delicate gender but stereotypes fall away as the woman provide all the guts and the gore in spades.

Wales were brave and defiant but lacked the 'nouse' of the Kiwi who I think will take some defeating in the tournament.

England v NZ would be the dream final in this what is a masculine game but I always worry for our soul back here when tuning to the local UK TV program, on an equally wet and windy island, almost diametrically opposite side of the globe how obsessed we are with men cooking.